What are the cheaper options?

Western Sahara but realistically it’s all morroco. They have largest reserves now and at the price to mine 4500m deep underground, it would turn a lot of resources in morroco to reserves.

I did feas work on a project in Tunisia a decade ago that was quite substantial but economics marginal and couldn’t get it over the line due to then prices of phosphorous and the ability of morroco to just ramp up production (actually should probably dust it off). There are lots of resources like this that would become economical faster. Supply/demand and all that.

That said the initial ore body may be great and 50 years from now who is to say

This is what I was curious about, thanks for clarifying. But based on the 400m orebody results, do you have any suggestion for how much phosphate this "rock" might contain at reasonable mining depths based on todays technology?

I'm curious if this could turn out to be enough for 20 years, or a drop in the ocean.

Assuming it's enough for 20 years, and we estimate batteries will continue to get more efficient, does the 20 years in todays technology end up being 50 years?

Not with just that info. Lot of what I quickly found is all press release marketing fluff. You need the % phosphorus and a bunch of other variables.

Battery tech needs little phosphorous now, in terms of overall percentage and even with overly optimistic battery estimates I don’t think it will get to any more than 10% of demand. It’s mostly about fertiliser/agriculture.

"But based on the 400m orebody results, do you have any suggestion for how much phosphate this "rock" might contain at reasonable mining depths based on todays technology?"

Odds are they found a massive body of apatite. If so, huge amounts of phosphates.

> The massive numbers they are talking about are extrapolating drill results down to 4500m, which is pretty crazy.

Surely this assumption is based on data of some sort? Assuming what’s in front of you is also 4km away seems a risky presumption.

I haven’t looked at the data, but junior mining and exploration is a bit of the wild west in terms of honesty and would not in the least be surprised if some trickery is at play to produce that result. Also a reason why it’s not advisable for new investors to get into this sector.

If you're going to put money on a mining exploration result you want to put it on JORC (or equivalent) certified results from a filed Technical Report at the Toronto TSX (or London Metals, Sydney Mining, South African Exchange, etc)

https://www.jorc.org/

JORC is Australian standard, however Anglo-Australian mining transnationals with the TSX as home base are the biggest mining concerns on the planet ATM.

Here is a third party discussion of the JORC definitions of 'Resource' Vs 'Reserve'

https://www.mmg.com/our-business/mineral-resources-and-ore-r...

* Mineral Resources can be classified as Measured, Indicated and Inferred, according to the level of geological knowledge and confidence.

* Ore Reserves can be classified as Proved or Probable on the basis of the Mineral Resource classification and consideration of all JORC modifying factors.

'Resources' can be wishful thinking until they're actually Measured (to a degree of confidence).

In their report on page 7, they say they drilled to 2200m: https://norgemining.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/11/Norge-Min...

> (important distinction in mining)

Any chance you could explain the distinction to a layman? To me they seem to mean roughly the same thing.

see: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=36584249

for brief distinction and line of further study.

Sure. Super high level. Resources are concentrations of some mineral that could be economically extracted.

Reserves are the economically mineable portions of those resources.

There are a bunch of levels to each, with varying levels of confidence.

I can drill two holes, 500m apart and by pure chance intersect nothing but lithium at same spacing between 10m-20m. I could theoretically say , you know what I think between these two drill holes it’s all lithium. It’s 500m spacing and according to grades I think we have 500ktons of inferred lithium resource here.

But for instance let’s say I did some more drilling and was confident I found a resource that indicates it has 1million tonnes of lithium in it. However, it’s located in the middle of Sahara desert, where there are no roads, water sources, or infrastructure of any type.

Just because it’s there doesn’t mean it’s economical to mine it (right now). So even though it is a resource it’s not a reserve.

To define something as a resource there is a lot of room for interpretation. Lots of statistical inference, and a bit of art meets science. From public company perspective you can announce you have calling a promising resource, but if you get it wrong, there’s a lot of leeway.

Calling something a reserve is a big deal. Not only are you extremely confident of the size, shape of the resource, but you have evaluated its economic viability to get it out of the ground and have determined that it’s net positive. You lie about this, and you are in trouble.