Egypt Attempts to Achieve Top Global Spot for Tantalum Production

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CAIRO, EGYPT--March 5, 2010--Researched by Industrial Info Resources (Sugar Land, Texas)--In 2006, Egypt's Minister of Petroleum and Mineral Resources Sameh Fahmi announced that Egyptian mineral experts had prepared a national plan to exploit the mineral wealth of the country for the following 20 years.

Fahmi said that Egypt will be the top producer in the world of the mineral tantalum after developing the Abu Dabbab project the Eastern Desert. Fahmi said that sales of the tantalum produced from the project had been discussed with the United States, Germany and Japan.

The project was started in 2006 in cooperation with Australian investments of $80 million, with 55% sourced from the Egyptian petroleum sector in a special arrangement for the funding of mining and petroleum projects.

The Abu Dabbab Project has a tantalum mineral resource of 44.5 million tons at a grade of 250 grams per ton. The nearby Nuweibi tantalum deposit has a mineral resource of 98 mineral tons at a grade of 147 grams per ton. Both projects are being developed by Gippsland Limited (ASX:GIP) (Nedlands, Western Australia).

The total contained tantalum content of both deposits is 55 million pounds, which Gippsland said was sufficient to satisfy global demand for more than a decade.

Abu Dabbab is scheduled to commence operations at an initial mill feed rate of 2 million tons per year, producing in excess of 650,000 pounds of tantalum pentoxide per year, which would make it the world's largest tantalum producer.

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