{"id":1109620,"date":"2019-04-08T10:27:55","date_gmt":"2019-04-08T10:27:55","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.mining.com\/?p=980498"},"modified":"2019-04-08T10:27:55","modified_gmt":"2019-04-08T10:27:55","slug":"lynas-weighs-up-rare-earths-processing-in-australia-as-malaysia-ups-pressure","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/juniorminingnews.com\/?p=1109620","title":{"rendered":"Lynas weighs up rare earths processing in Australia as Malaysia ups pressure"},"content":{"rendered":"

Australian rare earths miner Lynas Corp (ASX: LYC) is considering initial ore processing<\/a> in the home country, where its Mount Weld mine is located, as Malaysia has stepped up pressure on the company to fulfill new, tougher requirements to have its processing licence renewed.<\/p>\n

Malaysian Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad said on Friday<\/a> that parties interested in buying Lynas had agreed to extract radioactive waste from the ore extracted in Western Australia before being imported to the processing plant in the Southeast Asian country.<\/p>\n

The minister said even Lynas could continue to operate in the country as long as raw materials coming to Malaysia were \u201ccleaned.\u201d<\/p>\n

The company, which last month\u00a0declined a A$1.5 billion takeover offer\u00a0by Wesfarmers, said it had long been considering building new processing facilities.<\/q><\/p>\n

Lynas, one of the world\u2019s main suppliers of rare earths outside China, said on Monday it was seeking clarification from Malaysia, but that it was open to processing materials closer to its Australian mine.<\/p>\n

“We see value in operating alternative cracking and leaching processing close to our resource,” it said in a statement<\/a>.<\/p>\n

The company, which last month declined a A$1.5 billion takeover offer<\/a> by Wesfarmers, said it had long been considering building new processing facilities as part of expansion plans and to reduce risks from potential regulatory changes in Malaysia.<\/p>\n

This is not the first time the miner\u2019s six-year-old facility \u2014 known as the Lynas Advance Material Plant (LAMP) \u2014 is the cause of tension between Kuala Lumpur and the Sydney-based miner.<\/p>\n

LAMP was the centre of relentless attacks from environmental groups and local residents while under construction in 2012. They feared about the\u00a0impact the low-level radioactive waste the refinery generates could have\u00a0on the health of those living nearby, and to the environment.<\/p>\n

Scrutiny escalated last year, with Kuala Lumpur setting a committee to review Lynas\u2019 operations. The company\u2019s chief executive and managing director, Amanda Lacaze\u00a0raised concerns about the impartiality<\/a>\u00a0of a couple of committee members, as both are known for being long time opponents of having the refinery located in Malaysia.<\/p>\n

In December, the country\u00a0ordered Lynas to remove 450,000\u00a0tonnes of radioactive waste<\/a>\u00a0stockpiled at its processing plant by Sept. 2., when the company\u2019s licence is up for renewal.<\/p>\n

Lynas, however, revealed\u00a0earlier this year that it would not be able to comply<\/a>\u00a0with such demand by the given deadline.<\/p>\n

Despite the challenges, the company\u2019s Japanese lenders, Japan Australia Rare Earths, had affirmed their support for Lynas and its management team, it said on Monday.<\/p>\n

Lynas shares closed at A$2.12, up nearly 30% since the Wesfarmers bid, but still less than half what they were worth a year ago, when they were trading at A$2.45 a piece.<\/p>\n

The post Lynas weighs up rare earths processing in Australia as Malaysia ups pressure<\/a> appeared first on MINING.com<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Lynas, one of the world’s main suppliers of rare earths outside China, said it was open to processing materials closer to its Australian mine if that meant it can renew its licence in the Southeast Asian country.<\/p>\n

The post Lynas weighs up rare earths processing in Australia as Malaysia ups pressure<\/a> appeared first on MINING.com<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":8,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"site-sidebar-layout":"default","site-content-layout":"","ast-site-content-layout":"","site-content-style":"default","site-sidebar-style":"default","ast-global-header-display":"","ast-banner-title-visibility":"","ast-main-header-display":"","ast-hfb-above-header-display":"","ast-hfb-below-header-display":"","ast-hfb-mobile-header-display":"","site-post-title":"","ast-breadcrumbs-content":"","ast-featured-img":"","footer-sml-layout":"","theme-transparent-header-meta":"","adv-header-id-meta":"","stick-header-meta":"","header-above-stick-meta":"","header-main-stick-meta":"","header-below-stick-meta":"","astra-migrate-meta-layouts":"default","ast-page-background-enabled":"default","ast-page-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"ast-content-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"footnotes":""},"categories":[647,1757,1758,1545,404,369,426],"tags":[15],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/juniorminingnews.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1109620"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/juniorminingnews.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/juniorminingnews.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/juniorminingnews.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/8"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/juniorminingnews.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1109620"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/juniorminingnews.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1109620\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1109636,"href":"https:\/\/juniorminingnews.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1109620\/revisions\/1109636"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/juniorminingnews.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1109620"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/juniorminingnews.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1109620"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/juniorminingnews.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1109620"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}