TSX-listed Electric Metals (USA) says a detailed costing study on a proposed manganese processing plant somewhere on the US Gulf Coast puts a US$452 million capital cost on a 200,000 tonnes per annum high-purity manganese sulphate monohydrate facility.
Electric Metals said the front-end loading 1 (FEL 1) capex estimate, produced by Alabama-based Hargrove Engineers and Constructors, compared with the $464 million in its 2025 preliminary economic assessment. It included 20% contingency and 5% escalation allowance versus 25% contingency in the earlier PEA.
Electric Metals thinks it can reach mechanical completion and start-up 32 months after initiating the detailed design stage. It said the site chosen for its proposed high-purity manganese sulphate monohydrate (HPMSM) plant would need to provide access to river and port logistics, rail infrastructure and processing chemical feedstocks from petrochemical plants.
The company has the North Star manganese project, aka the Emily manganese project, in the middle of Minnesota. Emily has an indicated resource of 5.69 million tonnes grading 19.2% manganese and 23.02% iron and an inferred resource estimate of 777,800t at 22.48% manganese and 22.15% iron.
It’s unclear when Electric Metals will make a decision on where a HPMSM plant will be located but CEO Brian Savage has talked about the “strategic urgency of building dedicated domestic capacity” given the US is importing all of its manganese sulphate.
“For more than five decades the United States has relied entirely on imported manganese in all forms, including ores, concentrates, advanced chemicals and metals and metal alloy additives,” Savage said.
“The country has no primary manganese production and only limited intermediate processing capacity. Because manganese has few viable substitutes in most uses and global recycling averages just 9% this dependence creates a major strategic vulnerability across defence, aerospace, power generation, batteries, electronics, infrastructure, transportation and other industrial and consumer sectors.
“We’re moving directly into the next phase of engineering, with continued updates on the North Star manganese project’s path to production.”
The Gulf Coast site selection and associated permitting would advance in parallel with subsequent engineering phases.
Electric Metals’ share price is down about 22% in the past month, capitalising the company at about C$36 million.
