JOHANNESBURG (miningweekly.com) – The Waterberg platinum group metals (PGMs) project in South Africa’s Limpopo province is poised for a $1.8-billion funding uplift as part of a private placement being conducted by Toronto- and New York-listed Platinum Group Metals.

Planned is the selling of 800 000 shares at $1.26 each to Hosken Consolidated Investments, to enable the South African company to return to being a 26% beneficial shareholder.

Net proceeds of the private placement are earmarked for pre-construction site work, engineering and preparation costs on the project, as well as for general corporate and working capital purposes.

The private placement is subject to customary closing conditions, including stock exchange approvals and completion of the definitive agreement.

Platinum Group Metals operates the project as a majority owner of what is a bulk underground platinum, palladium, rhodium and gold deposit.

A prefeasibility study was completed in 2016, with results of a definitive feasibility study (DFS) announced in 2019.

A mining right was granted in early 2021 and an update to the 2019 DFS was completed in 2024.

Proven and probable reserves were calculated to be 246.2-million tonnes at 2.96 g/t four element (4E) or 23.41-million ounces 4E on a 100% project basis.

The life-of-mine is 54 years and 2 000 jobs are expected to be created during construction and 1 425 permanent jobs as steady-state mining is achieved.

The orebody is being jointly developed with Johannesburg Stock Exchange-listed Impala Platinum, Mnombo Wethu, and HJ Platinum Metals, a company established in 2023 by Japan Organisation for Metals and Energy Security (Jogmec) and Hanwa as a special purpose entity to hold and fund their aggregate future equity interests in the project.

The shallow project, on the northern limb of the Bushveld Complex, facilitates mechanised production with the potential for moderate cost.

The initial exploration of this section of the Bushveld Complex in November 2011 was funded by Jogmec.

In October 2017, Impala Platinum purchased its interest for $30-million and acquired a right of first refusal for concentrate offtake and Hanwa has the metal marketing right.

BATTERY PGMS

To support the use of palladium and platinum in lithium battery applications, Platinum Group Metals has the Lion Battery partnership with Anglo American Platinum, which is opening up the possibility of creating additional demand for platinum and palladium in the battery technology space.

In turn, Lion Battery’s agreement with Florida International University is targeting the potential of PGMs uplifting the discharge capacities and cyclability of lithium air and lithium sulphur battery chemistries.

The agreement with Florida gives exclusive intellectual property rights to Lion, which is looking at developing several next-generation battery technologies using platinum and palladium.

Considerably higher energy density reportedly enhances the performance of the lithium air and lithium sulphur batteries by orders of magnitude in mobile and stationary applications.