MANILA, Philippines -- Norwegian miner Intex Resources is still keen on mining nickel in Mindoro island after facing a setback in securing its environmental compliance certificate or ECC.

"First of all, we're not yet mining the site. We're studying it. There might be a misconception that we are already mining," said Jake Foronda, project manager at Intex's Mindoro nickel project.

Foronda said Intex was still working on its feasibility study on the project, as of Thursday. "We expect the feasibility study to be finished around February," he said.

The Department of Environment and Natural Resources said in a statement it decided to suspend Intex?s ECC while looking into complaints of lack of public consultation when the ECC was processed.
Locals also said the prospective mine site was on a watershed.

Intex likewise said in a statement posted on the company web site that it received notice the ECC was suspended for 90 days.

DENR records indicate that Intex Resources Philippines, Inc. was issued an ECC last month covering its $2.4-billion nickel project in Mindoro. The prospective mine site for the project straddles the
municipalities of Victoria, Pola and Socorro, all in Oriental Mindoro, and Sablayan in Occidental Mindoro.

Foronda told the Philippine Daily Inquirer in an interview that Intex went through the process of consultations and getting necessary permits to study its potential mine site.

The site, he said, would not sit on a critical watershed.

"The critical and protected watersheds in the country are all published and our site does not sit on one. Actually, all rainfed places in the Philippines are watersheds but our site is not sitting on one that is critical or protected," Foronda said.

Nevertheless, Foronda said, the company would always be ready to discuss concerns about its project and would be ready with environmental mitigation measures. He noted that Intex already had nurseries for tree saplings as part of its environmental sustainability plan, which was recently cited at a mining safety forum.

Intex has just completed its first limonite ore reserve estimate for the Mindoro nickel project. The study shows a 96 percent conversionfrom measured and indicated resources to proved and probable reserves.

Intex president and CEO Erlend Grimstad earlier said that development of its Mindoro nickel project was estimated at $2 billion for stage 1 and an additional $900 million for stage 2.

Stage 1 development, Grimstad said, would involve production of the mine's limonite resources with a projected production of 40,000 tons of nickel per year and 3,000 tons of cobalt.

Stage 2, would bring the production of nickel to 80,000 tons and cobalt to 700 tons and would include the processing of saprolite resources.

Grimstad said all of the output in Mindoro would be sold to refineries.

Grimstad believed that the Mindoro nickel project could be a 'really huge production with extremely low costs and can be competitive to other projects around the world."

Aside from low cost, what would make this project stand out would be its potential energy generation, Grimstad said.

He said the Mindoro nickel project, would produce up to 80 megawatts of its own electricity.

"We will be producing energy from our plants. Steam will generate electricity, more than what we will need," Grimstad said.

Funding for the project is still being worked out, according to Grimstad. Intex has been looking either at getting a partner or resorting to borrowings, he said.

Intex's pre-feasibility study shows that the Mindoro nickel mine can be among the lowest capital-cost facilities in the industry.

The mine enjoys the advantage of being situated in a low-cost setting compared to other similar projects. Furthermore, its laterite ore has favorable processing properties.