Have been thinking about the running sand resource at depth. The...

Have been thinking about the running sand resource at depth. The thing I like about it is that it is very shallow compared with other projects being around 80-85m. It is also localised and tabular so it is easy to define. The basal sands will also recharge from above and laterally (see APC's scoping study for the concept) so you can times that figure of 17Mt drainable by 1.5 at least and possibly a lot more given the jointed nature of the thick middle zone which has already been shown to flow at pump capacity of 3 L/s from 100mm cased bores.

So they can tie the basal sand high flow zone into the trenching network which will supplement the trench brines as the surface aquifer recharges with lower grade brine from outside of the lake. They will do this for a number of years to the point that the blended brine grade is no longer feasible after which they would tie the bores into the main supply trench. Note that the surface recharge brine although lower grade is still comparable to other projects so it will be very feasible especially 20 years down the track when the sop price has doubled and the operation is still running and paid for.

The flooding event was apparently a 1:100 year event but what is encouraging is how quickly the lake dried out... literally less than 6 months thanks to the 4m+ pa evaporation rates. During operations though they will likely have at least 6 months of harvest inventory stockpiled on the rom pad to offset any seasonal issues such as longer evaporation cycles from heavy rains.

So is the difference between the market caps of RWD $24m and the 3 front runners Kalium, Agrimin and So4 circa $75m justified ? Personally I prefer RWD's combination of the largest resource, good grade throughout and the ability to access deeper brine over the life of mine.