Boss Energy said in an ASX announcement this morning that the first wellfield has been pre-conditioned in the lead up to recovering uranium from the ground to be processed by the company.

The Honeymoon uranium mine was mothballed by previous owner Uranium Ore in 2013 in response to falling uranium prices, two years after the mine was established.

The project was subsequently acquired by ASX-listed Boss Energy in 2015, and the company announced last year it would resume uranium production in South Australia’s east.

At the time, the Perth-based company said it would ramp up production to a rate of 2.45 million pounds of uranium per year.

Today, Boss said the timing of the relaunch was “ideal, with the uranium market continuing to tighten and the spot price moving up, now trading at decade highs”.

The company has pre-conditioned the wellfields, which removes unwanted chlorides and calcium prior to uranium being extracted.

To achieve this, Boss said it completed construction activities including wellfield development, gypsum repository construction, water treatment and plant commissioning.

Boss managing director Duncan Craib said this puts the Honeymoon mine on track for production in the December quarter of this year.

“It is a testament to the hard work and effort undertaken by all Boss employees over many years to reach today’s pivotal milestone, the commencement of mining activities on Honeymoon,” Craib said.

Boss announced in 2020 that it had developed technology to lower operating costs at Honeymoon and in 2021 reported that the project required $110 million (US$80 million) in capital expenditure to resume, making it one of the lowest funding requirements of any pre-production uranium project worldwide.

Honeymoon will become Australia’s fourth operational uranium mine and the third in SA when production resumes.

Boss shares are up by 5.54 per cent to $4.57 following the announcement this morning.