Steenkampskraal Monazite Mine (SMM) in the Western Cape has launched Phase 1 of its monazite concentrate plant, BusinessTech reports, with Minister of Mineral and Petroleum Resources Gwede Mantashe and other officials at the launch. Phase 1 crushes and mills ore into a concentrate for export, with shipments due to begin before the end of 2026 under secured offtake agreements (buyers contracted in advance).
It is the first step in a three-phase roadmap: monazite cracking in Phase 2 and separation of individual rare earth oxides in Phase 3. The mine says the deposit holds about 14.5% total rare earth oxides and 2.1% thorium, which it describes as the highest known rare earth grade in the world, roughly ten times richer than a typical global deposit. Rare earth elements are used in electric vehicles, electronics, defence systems, telecommunications, renewable energy and advanced manufacturing.
The thorium claim
The headline number comes from SMM Executive Director Robbie Louw, who says the deposit contains about 14,000 tonnes of thorium, with an electricity-generation potential he puts at roughly 55 billion tonnes of coal. In what he describes as a mature, closed thorium fuel cycle, supplying electricity at roughly South Africa’s current national level would use only about 30 tonnes of thorium a year, so on that basis the resource alone represents about 500 years of current national generation. These are the company’s own projections about a fuel cycle that does not yet exist commercially, not independently verified figures.
Louw says South Africa needs additional reliable generation to provide baseload and strengthen the grid as wind and solar grow. His proposal is “to use Koeberg to qualify thorium fuel, then deploy it progressively in a new nuclear fleet, including Thyspunt, and to anchor a South African thorium-fuel industry in domestic demand before looking to the export market, which will include India and the world’s light-water reactor fleet”. SMM has partnered with Thor Energy, an international thorium-fuel developer whose oxide fuels have been irradiation-tested in the Halden research reactor in Sweden. Longer-term plans also include medical isotopes: thorium daughter products are being assessed for targeted alpha therapy in cancer treatment.
What the company wants from government
Louw has urged government to keep up structured engagement so both sides share a view of the resource’s strategic value, connect national capabilities including Mintek, Necsa and Eskom, use government relationships to support technology transfer, investment and market access, evaluate the rare earth and thorium pathways jointly, including the regulatory, technical and commercial steps, and build towards a shared roadmap for downstream processing, nuclear fuel development and industrialisation.
Executive Chairman Enock Mathebula called the opening “the first commercial step on a road South Africa has already proved it can walk”, noting that in June SMM and national research institution Mintek produced high-purity mixed rare earth products, which he said made South Africa the first African country to do so through a partnership between a mine and a research institution. The ministers’ presence, he said, signals that beneficiation is no longer a slogan at Steenkampskraal and that production has started.
What is not yet known: the commercial economics of large-scale thorium fuel production, the timeline for Phases 2 and 3, and the approvals a thorium-fuel industry would need. For more on energy and resources, see our Energy & Infrastructure section.
