Can you introduce us to Ivanhoe Electric?

Ivanhoe Electric is a US company focused on finding and developing new sources of critical metals. The company completed its initial public offering in June 2022 on the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE: IE) and a secondary listing on the Toronto Stock Exchange (TSX: IE).

Ivanhoe Electric’s key projects in the US are the Santa Cruz copper project in Arizona, the Tintic exploration project in Utah and the Hog Heaven exploration project in Montana. In addition, we operate a groundbreaking 50-50 joint venture with Saudi Arabian mining company Ma’aden to explore for minerals across a vast, underexplored land package on the Arabian Shield.

What are the main highlights of the recent initial assessment for the Santa Cruz project?

Our Santa Cruz Project, located west of Casa Grande, Arizona, has a significant defined resource with contained copper of approximately 2.8 million t in the indicated category and an additional 1.8 million t in the inferred category. The average grade of both the indicated and inferred resources is 1.24% copper. We believe that Santa Cruz is one of the largest, highest-grade, undeveloped copper projects in the US, entirely situated on private land. In May 2023, we acquired 5,975 acres of land, consolidating surface rights with pre-existing mineral rights obtained through option agreements. This comprehensive ownership encompasses the entire Santa Cruz project.

The Initial Assessment, published in September 2023, outlines the economic and technical potential of an underground copper mine at Santa Cruz. The study includes a 5.9 million t/y underground copper mining operation with estimated initial project capital expenditures of US$1.15 billion. The study incorporates modern mining technologies, including an electrified underground mining fleet and phased renewable power, resulting in estimated carbon dioxide emissions among the lowest in the global mining industry. With a projected total production of 1.6 million t of copper over a 20-year mine life at an estimated average cash cost of US$1.36/lb, the Santa Cruz oroject has the potential to become a significant, low-cost copper producer. Our estimated life-of-mine production includes approximately 1 million t of pure copper cathode and 0.6 million t of copper in concentrate that is 48% copper by weight.

It is important to note that our Initial Assessment is based solely on approximately 2.1 million t of high-grade soluble copper domains at our Santa Cruz and East Ridge Deposits. We have additional defined resources at the project, including oxides and primary sulfides, that provide the potential for future growth beyond the current Initial Assessment.

Can you speak of your other exploration projects in Utah and Montana?

Our Tintic copper-gold project in Utah is situated in a historically significant mining district that yielded substantial amounts of silver, copper and gold during the late 1800s and early 1900s. Leveraging the geological insights gained from our Typhoon survey, we are actively exploring the project, which is entirely located on private land.

Additionally, we are actively drilling the Hog Heaven copper-gold-silver project in Montana, with promising early drill results received in October 2023 from depths well-below historical mining operations. We recently completed a Typhoon survey at Hog Heaven and will incorporate the results of that survey into our future exploration efforts.

Can you tell us more about Ivanhoe Electric’s proprietary exploration technology?

Typhoon is a geophysical surveying technology and system developed by Ivanhoe Electric's former parent, I-Pulse in France. This powerful ground-based system can perform both induced polarization and electromagnetic surveys, enabling the coverage of extensive land areas at considerable depths in a short amount of time.

Ivanhoe Electric’s subsidiary, Computational Geosciences Inc. (CGI), has proprietary machine learning-based software that translates the massive amounts of data provided by Typhoon into detailed three-dimensional images of underground geophysical anomalies, which guide future exploration drilling.

What does Ivanhoe Electric hope to achieve in its joint venture with Ma’aden?

Our joint venture holds exclusive rights to explore an expansive 48,500-square-kilometer area of the Arabian Shield in Saudi Arabia. Thanks to our 50/50 partnership with Ma’aden, we have the unique opportunity to deploy our Typhoon technology on a wide scale.

What are the advantages of being a US-focused exploration company?

We believe that the United States remains significantly underexplored, particularly for the critical metals.