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The Chatham Rise rock phosphate project is making significant progress in determining the viability of its undersea reserves.

Project status: The joint venture has established a team of key technical, environmental, financial and other experts to bring together and evaluate existing data who are advancing a number of work streams. A group  of technical advisers and Widespread directors met in Wellington in late July for a two day workshop to share knowledge, identify information gaps and plan the next steps in the years one and two work programmes for the project. Further work is also being undertaken with several undersea mining organisations to evaluate the optimal approach to extraction of our seabed rock phosphate resource. A dialogue has also been initiated with representatives of the German organisations that played a central role in the exploration role in the early 1980s.

Data analysed: The data gathered in the exploration voyages of RV Valdivia and RV Sonne in the late 1970s and early 1980s has been digitised and is now being analysed.  

Profile raising: Chris Castle attended the Australian fertiliser industry annual conference and while there met representatives of a number of  fertiliser manufacturers and users. Click here to find out more about the conference. Chris will also be presenting a paper at a conference on undersea mining in Russia in October. A six page fold-out marketing brochure has been produced and is available to view and download here.

Shareholder presentation: Click here for a link to the presentation Chris Castle gave to Widespread Energy shareholders on 29 June.

Click here to read this article by Australian journalist Robin Bromby on the future of phosphate.