Independence Group (IGO) currently produces nickel, copper and cobalt from its Nova Operation and gold from the Tropicana JV with AngloGold Ashanti. Could you provide an overview of IGO’s key milestones over the past two years?

IGO has reshaped its purpose, strategy and portfolio over the last two years so that we are today fully aligned to finding and producing the metals that are critical for clean energy solutions – encompassing renewable energy, energy storage and electric vehicles (EV). As a result, IGO sold non-core assets such as Stockman and the Jaguar mine in 2017 and 2018, as they did not fit with our clean energy theme. We continue to hold our 30% non-operated interest in the Tropicana gold mine with our joint venture partner AngloGold Ashanti, which holds 70% and is manager. Tropicana is a high-quality asset that continues to deliver high margins. Our 100% owned Nova Operation in the Fraser Range of Western Australia is a world class asset producing nickel, copper and cobalt.

We also are actively investing in greenfield exploration with a willingness to look at other bespoke metals that are also important to clean energy.  IGO has a huge exploration program underway across multiple greenfield projects, and our focus across these projects is primarily nickel, cobalt and copper. The largest project is at the Fraser Range in Western Australia, where we are spending approximately A$35 million on exploration in 2019.

What was the driver behind IGO’s change in strategy to be solely focused on commodities linked to clean energy solutions?

In collaboration with our employees, we co-created our renewed strategy, and our purpose is making a difference. Through this co-creation process, what we found was that many of our people felt disenchanted by the concept of being just miners. We collaboratively wanted to make a positive contribution through mining, and we knew we could make a difference by contributing to clean energy solutions. The new strategy is something that really resonates with our employees.  

Apart from a strategic shift in commodities, how are you prioritizing sustainability at IGO?

We are in the process of building a solar farm, which will initially contribute 15% to 20% to our overall power requirements at the Nova project. The next stage will include some grid scale energy storage solutions, more solar and potentially wind power. The aspiration is to get to 100% renewable energy at our mines. IGO has also embarked on a program to move from using diesel equipment underground to using EV equipment. We are also working on our IGO process to produce nickel sulphate differently. Nickel sulphate is the main ingredient for the cathodes in most EV batteries, and as EV volumes have increased, so has the demand for nickel sulphate. At IGO, we are investigating unique and more innovative ways to produce nickel sulphate, including making it more environmentally friendly and at a lower cost. We have invented a process – the IGO process – which delivers on all of these factors and is a vast improvement from an environmental perspective to the conventional smelter and refinery process.

How have you seen the mining ecosystem in Western Australia change focus to value addition, and what role can IGO play in this shift?

IGO’s aspiration is to expand our business both upstream and downstream. Our initial foray has been into the innovative process that we developed to produce nickel sulphate, the IGO Process, but we do not intend to stop there. We will also look at the viability of taking the opportunity to the next level, which is to produce battery precursors. We could potentially do this ourselves using the metals we produce or look at doing a joint venture. We are still in the early stages of talking to partners about these possibilities that would unlock further value.

According to the Government of Western Australia, in 2017-18, China accounted for 47% of the state’s exports. Will a reliance on China’s demand for commodities impact IGO and the WA mining industry in the future?

The minerals that we are mining and producing are not only in demand in China, but a significant number of global jurisdictions. There is a worldwide trend towards cleaner energy. In Europe, regulations have been put in place to incentivize renewable energy and to reduce the CO₂ pollution from vehicle manufacturers. We are also seeing the trend at local levels where cities are banning diesel and internal combustion engines. The demand for clean energy minerals will continue to grow exponentially over the coming years, and the mining industry must try to keep up with this demand and find a way to produce more copper, nickel and potentially cobalt – especially from low risk geopolitical regions such as Australia.

Have you been impacted by the skills shortages in Western Australia?

Although IGO delivers significant value, we are still a small employer with approximately 300 people across the business. As the company becomes more successful, both in our upstream and downstream activities, we would expect to employ more people and some of the skills shortage challenges may start to bite. We try to stay ahead of this curve by focusing on bringing new people into the industry. The company has been very active in working with people on a pre-university, university and post-university level, helping them along the journey and providing graduate opportunities. IGO is also looking at opportunities to make the work that we do much more flexible in order to provide a better work-life balance for our people.

‘Mining 4.0’ has brought with it a range of new technologies to the industry. Which innovative technologies in the mining industry most excite you?

Most of the minerals Australia produces comes from only 30% of the land area. The other 70% of land has not yet been well explored as it is under cover. Where technology is going to have the greatest impact is in providing the industry the tools to explore the underexplored 70% of Australia. We have made significant investments into people and equipment to improve electromagnetic detection, which will allow for much deeper visibility into underlying geology and minerology. 

IGO has made a commitment to spend A$51 million on exploration in the current 2019-2020 financial year, and the largest drilling campaign in the company’s history, with nine drill rigs in the field, is currently underway. This is leveraging the targeting work we completed over the last couple of years and the capabilities of our best in class exploration team. Exploration and discovery are core competencies of IGO and key drivers of organic growth in our business. We have many exciting prospects that we aim to convert into discovery during the current program. New technologies to explore deeper undercover, such as EM and SQUID surveys, and geophysical studies previously used only in the oil and gas sector, are among them.

What are IGO’s key objectives moving forward?

Over the past 18 months, we have been focused on demonstrating delivery at our Nova operation, and we have done this with the project exceeding our expectations. For example, we just released our March quarterly results on 30 April, and the performance at Nova has been outstanding, with the operation delivering record high metal production and record low cash costs. We have also been focused on adding the next bit of value at Tropicana gold mine, with the approval and commencement of the first underground mine on the site.

For the rest of the 2019 calendar year, IGO will focus on developing better ways of producing nickel sulphate. We envisage by 2020 that we will be in a position to progress with a financial investment decision. Furthermore, we also will continue to pursue organic growth aggressively through exploration and discovery by investing into greenfield exploration to identify the world-class mines of the future similar to Nova. Moving forward, IGO wants to make a difference – and we have a vision to be perceived as a globally relevant supplier, and industry leader, within the clean energy solutions supply chain.