Stans Energy is Taking Off in the Rare Earth Space
With China pulling back and the U.S. and other former producers scrambling to get back in the game, it looks like there’s a new heavy hitter on the Rare Earth field.
Stans Energy Corporation, announced a year ago it was buying a Rare Earth Element (REE) mine called Kutessay II in the former Soviet territory of Kyrgyzstan. Now, Stans is expanding its Rare Earth (RE) presence with a deal to acquire a REE processing facility next door to its mine. The complex itself is a rarity – the only one of its kind outside of China focused primarily on processing the more precious Heavy Rare Earth Elements (HREE).
On January 13th, 2011, Stans Energy announced that it had reached an exclusive agreement with the owners of the Kyrgyz Chemical Metallurgical Plant (KCMP) to buy 100% of KCMP’s RE processing complex along with a nearby private rail terminal.
Location, location, location…
KCMP’s potential and together with its strategic location only 40 kilometers away from Kutessay II, were no doubt key selling points. For almost three decades, the complex Stans is buying had produced 80% of the former Soviet Union’s total RE product supply.
Much of the facility has been mothballed since the 1990’s, although a small amount of processing was performed as recently as 2009. According to Stans, the Soviets spent decades and countless millions to perfect the complex separation and extraction techniques at KCMP. That technology and valuable equipment is now effectively owned by the shareholders of Stans Energy. The company plans to call on the Russian institutes who designed and built KCMP to help retrofit and refurbish their new facility.
Stans’ REE processing complex is located near the town of Orlovka, where many residents have either worked at KCMP or in the Kutessay II mine. This valuable labour pool also represents a tremendous base of experience that will play an essential role in helping to get the facilities ready for what’s to come.
Railway to the world
Another attractive feature of the agreement is the rail terminal that is only a short drive away from the KCMP plants and Stans Energy’s own REE mine. During the Soviet era, this mine was used to supply the processing complex and transport its final products out to markets throughout the vast former Soviet Union. The terminal included in this sale is connected to the Central Asian Rail Network, which is linked to Russia and other REE markets such as China, South Korea and even (by ferry) to Japan. Acquiring this existing rail infrastructure represents a huge cost savings for Stans, since they will not have to spend millions of Capex dollars of to build a transportation network to get its products to market.
With this deal, Stans Energy has firmly established itself as a force within the Rare Earth space. Stans has not only expanded its supply chain, but it now has a proven facility where it can process output from its own REE mine. They have added processing capacity at a fraction of the cost other Rare Earth companies have budgeted for building their own REE processing plants.
Moving forward and leveraging their existing partnership agreement with prominent Russian metallurgical institutes, Stans will have the expertise needed to get their facilities refurbished and back in operation.
Stans has made tremendous strides to add the necessary infrastructure it needs to get its Rare Earth out of the ground, processed and to end users. With developments like this, Stans Energy is poised to solidify itself as a major HREE producer . . . the only one in the world outside of China!
Yes, Stans can now be considered a serious player in this industry – all within 12 months. One has to wonder “What’s next on Stans Energy’s agenda?”
