Last Updated on Friday, 11 September 2026, 21:07 by Writer
The Canadian company, U92 Energy Corp., through its wholly-owned LIA (Guyana) Inc., will this year invest US$5 million in exploring for more uranium that will help the company decide whether to construct a U$150 million plant and contribute to Guyana’s clean energy thrust, exploration geologist Richard Spencer said.
“For the project to be economically significant, it needs to be about 50 million pounds, in a country that is growing as quickly as this one is. We are 20 and I am pretty confident that we are going to get to 50 and quite a lot bigger than 50 as well within the 18-month period,” he said.
Formerly awarded to the French company, Cogema and U308 Energy, the concession has proven uranium reserves of 20 million pounds.
However LIA (Guyana) hopes to find at least another 30 million pounds to make the project commercially viable.
“I think it’s a very good chance that it will be an economic deposit of significant size,” he said.
Dr Spencer explained that the current exploration exercise, on which US$5 million would be spent this year, would last 18 months after which there would be one year of studies to “ensure that we make the right economic decision.”
U92 Energy intends to market the uranium to the United States, Canada and Europe during the 25-year mine life when production begins
Already $35 million has been spent on exploration by U308 Corp. from 2007 to 2012.
Spencer says U92 Corp hopes that small nuclear-powered modular power plants will add to Guyana’s plan to produce cleaner energy from renewable energy sources.
“At the rate at which the oil and gas have taken off, anything that is going to contribute significantly to the clean energy needs of the country, therefore, needs to be a project of significance,” he said.
He said the most recent drilling done at the location in Kurupung (Region 7 – Cuyuni-Mazaruni) between 2007 and 2012, shows that the deposit is located in veins and is relatively moderate.
He said the company plans to expand the resource to make it more relevant to Guyana’s energy industry.
“The main one, I can see where the exploration went wrong in the past and the exploration sort of deviated so it looks like half of the deposit remains to be found with just drilling at a slightly different angle,” he added.
Dr Spencer said one option is to erect small modular reactors at locations that are far away from the regional grids and fuel them once every three to seven years.
The U92 Energy consultant sought to allay fears that there would be severe environmental impact, saying that radioactivity is extremely low after the topsoil is removed.
He also said the reactors do not impact the environment severely.
“What is crucially important about these things is that the environmental footprint is minimal and you can have them anywhere in the country, anywhere where power is required,” he added.
Asked what the company’s risk analysis has shown about possible objections by Venezuela, LIA (Guyana)’s in-house financial expert Gavin Singh declined to discuss that.
“We won’t comment on that at this point in time,” he said.
Venezuela has over the decades formally registered its objections to onshore and offshore gold and oil exploration production in the Essequibo Region and the abutting Atlantic Ocean.
