PRESS RELEASE: Back in 2006 the Nuclear Materials Authority of Egypt engaged Mineral Technologies to work on a comprehensive feasibility study for its El Burullus Black Sands project on Egypt's Mediterranean coast by Lake Burullus, approximately 170km north of Cairo.

This included coast resource modelling, metallurgical testing, flowsheet development, preliminary plant design, financial modelling, environmental impact assessments and marketing studies.

Following completion of the work the project remained undeveloped for many years until the Egyptian government identified the project to be of national significance. The Egyptian Black Sands Company (EBSC) was subsequently formed with shareholding by the federal government (military shareholding, nuclear material authority department and the provincial government).

EBSC requires a floating mineral sands concentrator plant and a land-based mineral separation plant (MSP) to produce ilmenite, rutile, zircon and garnet products from black sands in the region.

According to the new 24-month contract, Mineral Technologies'  scope of work includes a plant flow sheet, detailed structural design of the floating concentrator plant and land-based MSP, specification and purchase of processing equipment (both MT equipment and  third party vendors), electrical controls and instrumentation, power reticulation for the processing plants, equipment installation oversight, plant commissioning assistance  and operator training.

All works, other than those identified as on-site, will be executed or arranged from Mineral Technologies' office in Carrara, Queensland, Australia.