Anfield Energy Inc (CVE:AEC) is focused on energy metals, in particular uranium and vanadium. It's not just an exploration play, however. In addition to attractive exploration opportunities in Arizona, Utah, Colorado and Wyoming, the company also owns the Shootaring Canyon Mill in Garfield County, Utah, one of only three licensed uranium mills in the United States.
Anfield's conventional uranium assets consist of mining claims and state leases in southeastern Utah, and Arizona in areas where past uranium mining or prospecting occurred.
Anfield's uranium assets include the Velvet-Wood project in Utah, the Frank M project, and the Findlay Tank breccia pipe. All conventional uranium assets are situated within a 125-mile radius of the Shootaring Mill.
Nine Mile in Wyoming is of particular interest currently, as Anfield commissioned BRS Engineering in November 2017 to complete a mineral resources report for the project.
Nine Mile is part of a portfolio of 24 Wyoming properties acquired in 2016 from Uranium One.
Anfield has already reported a resource at two properties acquired in this transaction. At Clarkson Hill, it has demonstrated at 957,000 tons of ore inferred, with an average uranium equivalent grade of 0.058% U3O8.
Meanwhile, at Red Rim, the company has proved up an indicated resource of 336,655 tons of mineralised material with an average grade of 0.17% e U3O8, and an inferred resource of 472,988 tons of mineralised material with an average grade of 0.163% e U3O8.
A key aspect of this acquisition of the Wyoming properties was an agreement with Uranium One that will allow Anfield to process up to 500,000 pounds of uranium at Uranium One's Irigaray processing plant.
The Shootaring Canyon Mill is located approximately 48 miles south of Hanksville, Utah. It's one of three licensed conventional uranium mills in the United States, and is licensed as a conventional acid-leach facility to process up to 750 tons of ore per day.
The mill was built in 1980 and commenced operations in 1982, but ceased operations due to the depressed price of uranium.
Surface stockpiles at the facility include an estimate of 370,000 pounds of U3O8 at an average grade of 0.147%.
At the end of 2017, Anfield revealed the existence of a conceptual vanadium target at the Velvet-Wood project.
Under the auspices of NI43-101, Anfield reckons the target at between 6.3 mln pounds and 9.7mln pounds of vanadium in ore, with grades running at between 0.4% V2O5.
Anfield is at pains to point out that at this stage, the target is purely conceptual in nature.
Nevertheless, it is a useful complement to the uranium that's already in the ground there, as Anfield chief executive Cory Dias says:
"We believe that the recent upsurge of interest in vanadium provides Anfield with a unique opportunity to create a vanadium co-product production plan" which will both complement and enhance the attractiveness of uranium extraction at the Velvet-wood mine."
It's worth noting that vanadium was the best performing battery metal in both 2017 and 2016.