Need help converting data from %ore to ppm

Industry Discussions Mining and Metals
1

Hello,

I need help understanding and/or translating values I’m read on a quarterly report as I seek to develop an investment thesis on a particular company.

Specifically, I need to understand how one converts % ore grade, given an estimated economical cut off grade of y% ----> to ppm (parts per million).

Please note: the conversion is not simply %ore to ppm…there is an intermediary conversion factor that employs the “estimated economical cut off grade of y%”…any help would so greatly appreciated…chatgpt and mistra have not been helpful

Basically I’m looking at a newly found Rare earth mineral venture…but I’m trying to compare it to an established competitor. Typically, ppm is the standard used, but this company opted to use % ore grade.

Any help would be greatly appreciated.

In essence I need to convert a provided %ore grade of a mine into ppm…so i can compare the two mines.

thanks and any help and direction is greatly appreciated. Links to any mineral, rare earth mineral forums on the fool so i can learn more is also appreciated.

Specifically, i need this translated to ppm:

" estimated total proven and probable reserves of 1.86 million short tons of REO contained in 28.46 million short tons of ore at Mountain Pass, with an average ore grade of 6.20%. These estimates use an estimated economical cut-off grade of 2.43% total rare earth oxide"

This is from $MP SEC filing 10Q; but I’m trying to compare this metric to a competitor company i am looking at. ty all.

2

First be careful to understand what units are involved. Minerals are often reported as their oxide. So the assay is more likely to be reported as % uranium oxide rather than uranium. Lithium is usually reported as lithium carbonate.

Uranium dioxide is 88.15% uranium. So multiply ore percentage given by 0.8815 to get the percentage uranium and that percentage can be converted to ppm by multiplying by 10000.

Chemists can easily calculate these for you. If you are not trained in chemistry, Merck Index in the reference dept at your local library has them all. It should be easy to look up the percent metal in the oxide.