Russian authorities expect 'specific decisions' on Tomtor development in 2025 - head of Yakutia
MOSCOW. March 12 (Interfax) - The authorities of the Sakha Republic (Yakutia) expect "specific decisions" on developing the Tomtor deposit of niobium and rare earth metals (REM) in 2025, the head of the region, Aisen Nikolyaev, said in an interview with Interfax.
"The deposit is not being developed now for objective and subjective various reasons, because the license has been transferred to various companies, though a large layer of preparatory work has been conducted at one time. Accordingly, work is currently underway to prepare and launch the project following the president's instructions. We actively support this project ourselves. We will create favorable conditions for investors. There are already potential investors who are ready to do this. We expect that this year we will already come to some specific decisions on the development of the Tomtor deposit," Nikolyaev said.
President Vladimir Putin in November ordered that Tomtor be developed either by the current owner or by some other means. "The business structures that took these deposits many years ago are not investing. We need to talk to them somehow and resolve this issue: either they invest, or they somehow build relationships with other companies, with the state. This is a strategically important resource that the state needs now," Putin said.
The Tomtor project belonged to the ICT group Previously, with Polymetal as a minority shareholder with a 9.09% stake. Unified State Registry of Legal Entities (USRLE) data indicate that ICT group managers Vladislav Resin and Alexei Aleshin have controlled 90.91% of the project operator company since April 2022, and the Polymetal stake was transferred to the operator itself in the summer of 2024.
Citing its sources, the Kommersant publication said that Tomtor could be transferred to the management of the state holding Rosneftegaz, and its development is proposed to be financed by compensating for the costs incurred in constructing the Zvezda shipbuilding complex and related metallurgical facilities.
"The uniqueness of the Tomtor deposit is that the niobium content in it is on average 2.5-fold greater than in the richest deposits in Brazil and Canada, for example. The niobium content at Tomtor exceeds the average value by about 20-fold if we compare it with deposits around the country. The content of other rare earth elements is about 10 times greater," Nikolyaev said during the interview.
Tomtor is among the world's top three largest REM deposits and is one of the richest globally in terms of rare earth metal content in ore, as well as the largest non-producing niobium project. The reserves of the Buranny site within the Tomtor deposit are estimated at 11.4 million tonnes of ore containing 700,000 tonnes of niobium oxide and 1.7 million tonnes of rare earth oxides.