By Eric Pratt
Canada’s Athabasca Basin is home to the world’s largest uranium mine, McArthur River. The mine, 30% owned by AREVA Resources and 70% by Cameco (NYSE:CCJ, TSX:CCO), produces approximately 18.7 million pounds of uranium per annum.
The McArthur River deposit contains a resource of 367 million pounds of uranium, and production grades average 20.5%; making it not only the biggest uranium mine in the world, but also the highest grade. Cameco and its partners have amassed a total of 673 million pounds of Uranium in 5 deposits throughout the Athabasca basin.
The grade and frequency of large deposits in the Athabasca Basin has resulted in the basin being widely perceived as the best place in the world to discover additional world class deposits. Currently the basin supplies approximately 30% of the world’s uranium at grades 20 times higher than those mined throughout the rest of the world.
Over the past several years there has been a rush of exploration companies acquiring land in the basin, with the hopes of discovering the next world class deposit. The stage is now set for Canada’s next big uranium discovery. Picking an explorer with a realistic chance at making a discovery is no easy task. We’ve found the key is to find companies that have completed the required prospecting, geophysics and mapping and are now actively drilling their properties. It can take up to two years before a company can properly define drill targets; most companies in the basin are still at this early stage.
Tribune Uranium (TSX.V: TCB) recently announced two separate drill programs in the basin.
According to the company’s Sept 18/07 news release, Tribune recently mobilized its exploration program, on its 60% owned 100,000 hectare North Shore Property, located immediately north of Lake Athabasca and 10 kilometers west of the Maurice Bay uranium deposit owned by Cameco. The Maurice Bay deposit, discovered in 1977, hosts 1.3 million pounds of Uranium.
Previous exploration at the North Shore Property, which included extensive ground and airborne geophysics, prospecting, geologic mapping, and drill testing, identified over 200 uranium occurrences and showings. One characteristic which sets the North Shore property apart from others in the basin is the relatively shallow depth of the basin on the west side. Exploration costs are significantly lower when holes only have to be drilled 100 feet in order to hit their targets.
This morning, Tribune announced that they had initiation a second drill program at their Botham Lake property. The Company has identified 19 preliminary drill targets at Botham Lake which have been prioritized by focusing on the projected intersection of conductors with cross-cutting structures, and then comparing the geophysical signatures to those of known deposits.
Also in the today’s release, Tribune announced that exploration on its highly prospective Dufferin Lake property has also begun. Dufferin Lake is immediately adjacent to the Cameco/UEM's Virgin River project and their recently discovered Centennial zone. Discovery holes at the Centennial zone intersected 18.3% over 5.3 metres and 6.72 per cent U3O8 over 5.2 metres. Significant uranium showings have already been reported by Cameco within 1 km of the Dufferin Lake properties and conductors follow portions of the Virgin River shear zone and the Dufferin Lake fault through the Dufferin Lake property.
Currently Tribune has 13,000,000 shares outstanding and a discovery on any of these properties would add significant upside to the share price.
While the price for Uranium has come off of its peak of $125 per pound earlier this year, it is still trading strongly in the $75-85 range, and speculation is likely to resume in the wake of market softness brought on by global money market issues.
According to a story September 6th in the Economist, “America's nuclear industry is about to embark on its biggest expansion in more than a generation.”
The reason for nuclear power’s resurgence as mankind’s best hope for the anticipated demand for increased power generation lies in the fact that it is so clean.
Every year, emission of more than 2 billion tonnes of CO2 world wide is avoided by nuclear power plants fuelled by uranium. In fact Dr Kupcis, Chair of the Canadian Nuclear Association, stated that “Without present-day nuclear capacity, Canada’s greenhouse gas levels would be between 15 and 20 percent higher.”
Existing nuclear plants in Canada avoid the emission of 100 million tonnes of carbon dioxide each year, emissions that would occur if fossil fuelled plants had produced the same electricity. Eighteen nuclear power plants provide about 15 percent of Canada’s electricity and make a significant contribution to reducing greenhouse gas and other emissions.
Electricity generation fuelled by uranium produces no carbon dioxide or other emissions that contribute to smog and acid rain. A number of independent studies have shown that life-cycle emissions for nuclear power plants – including construction, operations, fuel production, decommissioning and waste disposal – are comparable to other non-emitting generation systems such as hydro and wind.
Other studies have found that nuclear compares favorably with all other large scale sources of electricity in life-cycle cost analyses.
With world electricity demand expected to double by 2030, nuclear is an increasingly attractive option to help meet growing demand and many countries are turning to nuclear. This trend will support strong markets for Saskatchewan uranium into the future.
Tribune Uranium is a well structured exploration company focused on the acquisition and exploration of advanced stage, drill ready uranium projects. The company has an experienced management team with two joint venture exploration projects in the highly prospective Athabasca basin.
Tribune is actively evaluating additional properties that meet these criteria and expect to add high quality projects to their portfolio on an ongoing basis.
