Sunrise Energy delivers feasibility study for Friedland-backed scandium project

Sunrise Energy Metals (ASX:SRL), the Australian scandium miner backed by Robert Friedland, announced Tuesday the completion of a feasibility study for its Syerston project, demonstrating its pathway to a globally competitive, low-cost producer of the critical mineral.

The feasibility study, prepared by GR Engineering Services, confirms a capital cost of $120 million and an average life-of-mine direct, site-level cash operating costs of $534 per kilogram of scandium oxide (Sc2O3).

Over an estimated 32-year operating life, it could produce 60 tonnes of high-purity Sc2O3 on an annual basis. This would position the company to capture significant market share in a rapidly growing global market that is currently estimated at about 50-60 tonnes per year, Sunrise said.

Syerston was one of the Australian projects classified as being of great importance to national security by both the US and Australia during President Trump’s meeting with Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese in October 2025.

Scandium is a strategic metal for strengthening aluminum alloys used in aerospace, defense, and automotive industries, and also in solid oxide fuel cells powering AI data centres. With China controlling 80-85% of the global supply and now restricting exports, Western customers are seeking alternative supply options.  

The Syerston site, located 450 km west of Sydney, represents one of the few significant non-Chinese sources of scalable supply in development today that can meet this immediate strategic need, the company said. It holds one of the world’s largest and highest-grade deposits of scandium. A 2025 resource update showed it has nearly 46 million measured and indicated tonnes grading 414 parts per million scandium.

“There are few examples better than scandium to demonstrate the importance of critical minerals in today’s geopolitical landscape,” Sunrise’s co-chairman Friedland said in a news release.

“Whether in rapidly deployable power generation for AI data centres, defence-sector aerospace alloys or as the foundation for a new generation of 6G wireless communications architecture or solid-state memory chips, scandium is indispensable.”

“We find ourselves at an extraordinary juncture in history, where access to a handful of metals is directing one of the most rapid and aggressive global public policy responses seen since wartime, and one that is likely to be sustained for many years,” CEO Sam Riggall added.

“The completion of the feasibility study marks a pivotal moment for the Western world’s ability to access a metal that is rapidly becoming indispensable.”