Imouraren mine

Imouraren is a building under digestion uranium mine in northern Niger.

Geography

Geographical location

Imouraren is located in the field of rural community Dannet, the part of the Department of Arlit in the Agadez region. The area around the west of the high mountains Aïr located on the southern edge of the Sahara desert mine is inhabited extremely thin. About ten kilometers east of Imouraren, the route d' Uranium ( "Uranium - Route"), which connects the town of Arlit over a length of 650 kilometers to the south of the country.

Geology

It is a sandstone -bound uranium deposit from the Jurassic and Cretaceous. The deposit lies in an average of 130 meters depth has a length of eight and a width of 2.5 kilometers. The uranium content is estimated at 179 000 tonnes of natural uranium with a uranium content of 0.07 %. Imouraren is considered the largest uranium deposit in Africa and the second largest in the world.

History

The deposit was discovered in 1966 by employees of the French Nuclear Energy Commissariat à l' énergie Atomique Centre (CEA ). The development of Imouraren was originally operated by a consortium of the Office National des Ressources Minières ( later SOPAMIN ) belonged to the Nigerien government, the CEA and the U.S. company Conoco. Due to declining uranium prices, the project was laid in the 1980s on ice. Conoco withdrew.

As uranium prices rose again in the 2000s, France reiterated his interest in Imouraren. The French Areva Group took exploring again in 2006 and took part as a majority shareholder, which was founded on the exploitation of Imouraren 2009 Imouraren SA. The investment amounts to more than 1.9 billion euros. It is the largest Nigerien mining project. The overburden work will be completed in 2013, with the start of production is expected in 2015.