Ur-Energy, a Canadian uranium company, has sold around 110,000 pounds of uranium ore from 198,573 pounds from its Lost Creek plant during the first quarter ended 31 March 2014.
The sold quantity was lower than the previous estimations of approximately 200,000 pounds, while it remained higher than 90,000 pounds of ore sold during fourth quarter of 2013.
The ore was sold to utility customers at an average price of $61.12 per pound.
Of the total ore captured at the plant, the company packaged 171,233 pounds in drums, while 170,216 pounds of the drummed inventory were shipped to the conversion facility.
The average cost per pound sold, for the first quarter 2014 was $29.46, a drop from average cost of $34.40 during fourth quarter 2013 and the cash cost per pound sold was also decreased to $19.38, from a cash cost of $21.98 the previous quarter.
Wayne Heili, president and CEO of Ur-Energy stated that the company’s performance was in line with its previous estimations with production numbers rising incrementally, while production cash costs per pound declined.
"While we continue to commission our flagship Lost Creek ISR facility, we expect this trend to continue until we reach optimal operating rates," added Heili.
The uranium mining company claims that it had lowered the operational rate for the quarter in a bid to manage the plant feed rate, besides undertaking operations including the plant commissioning, water management and waste water systems.
However, the production head grades averaged 179 mg/l uranium ore, exceeding the technical estimations during the quarter.
"We have made significant strides toward our design-level automation, and are introducing refined processes to attain greater efficiencies in our water usage and disposal. These efforts will continue through the coming quarter," concluded Heili.
Ur-Energy, meanwhile, is hopeful of producing 1 million pounds of uranium ore in 2014, leveraging the plant’s annual processing capacity of two million pounds, alongside plans to sell 50% of the 2014 production through the eight long-term contracts that the company has at an average price of $52 per pound.