Energy Transition Minerals receives regional approvals for Penouta mine restart in Spain  

A shuttered mine in the hills of inland Galicia is a step closer to becoming the European Union’s only domestic primary source of tantalum and niobium after Energy Transition Minerals (ASX: ETM) announced Wednesday it has secured the final regional approval needed to take it over. 

Xunta de Galicia, the regional government, has authorised the transfer of the Section C mining concession at the Penouta mine, in the municipality of Viana do Bolo, Ourense, to ETM’s Spanish subsidiary.  

The resolution formally recognises the company as the incoming holder of the mining rights and is the last regional step in its rescue of the project from the insolvency of the previous operator, Strategic Minerals Spain, which collapsed in 2024 and stopped production. 

Europe mines almost none of the metals Penouta yields, and over 80% of the world’s niobium comes from Brazil; most tantalum is mined in the DRC and Rwanda, and critical minerals processing is dominated by China.  

Tantalum and niobium are both designated critical raw materials by the European Union, and all three of Penouta’s metals appear on the critical minerals lists of the US and Australia.  

Tin, tantalum and niobium are foundational to semiconductors and capacitors, high-performance aerospace and defence alloys, and energy-transition technologies.  

Tantalum prices have this year run to multi-decade highs following supply disruption in central Africa. 

ETM said a revived Penouta would give Europe a transparent, locally regulated and traceable source of supply of its own.  

The Critical Raw Materials Act aims to cut the bloc’s dependence on any single foreign supplier, setting a target that no more than 65% of the EU’s annual demand for a strategic raw material should come from one third country, and pushing to rebuild extraction and processing within Europe by 2030.  

ETM said retains its open-pit mine, a processing plant tailored to its ore and supporting infrastructure – the remnants of a historic investment of around €28 million.  

Penouta covers 282 hectares and has certified resources of more than 76 million tonnes, measured and indicated, according to NI 43-101.  Mineral resources in the area were exploited from the beginning of the 20th century until the 1980s, with research being reactivated in 2011 by Strategic Minerals Spain, focusing on the use of tailings from the old exploitation.  

The company said it has signed a memorandum of understanding with commodity trader and merchant Traxys for the offtake of concentrate from the mine.  

“ETM intends to reactivate the mine responsibly, retaining experienced local staff, prioritizing local hiring, and working closely with the Viana do Bolo City Council, local civic and business associations, and productive sectors throughout the region – an area with a mining heritage spanning more than a century – so that the reactivation of Penouta generates tangible and shared benefits across the entire region,” ETM managing director Daniel Mamadou said in a press release Wednesday. 

“Europe has spent years talking about reducing its dependence on a handful of distant suppliers for the metals its industries cannot do without,” Mamadou said.  

Penouta is one of the few places on the continent where that ambition can actually be met – and met soon. This approval clears our path to bringing it responsibly back to life, with real benefits for the Galician community and for Europe’s wider supply-chain resilience.” 

Penouta forms part of ETM’s portfolio of critical minerals projects across Western Europe, North America and Greenland. 

Last week, Greenland rejected an application from Greenland Minerals, a unit of Energy Transition Minerals, to renew its exploration licence for the Kuannersuit rare earths project. 

ETM said Greenland’s Ministry of Mineral Resources had its application for nine months before giving the company 48 hours to respond to technical geological assessments, refusing a one-week extension. 

“The compressed timeframe meant the decision did not take account of ETM’s recent exploration results, which identified new mineralized zones across the wider licence area,” the company said.