Investing in the future of Cornwall

 – South Crofty mine

“… it’s enabled us to increase our staffing and […] speed up our development on site.” – Steven Kingston, Cornish Metals Project Manager

The Good Growth Programme has invested more than £4.7m to support plans to make Cornwall a world-class region for tech metal mining, including lithium, tin and tungsten.

Investment includes funding for feasibility studies to support the planned reopening of South Crofty tin mine, which is seen as a strategic tin asset for the UK.

Fawzi Hanano, Cornish Metals Chief Development Officer, says: “Cornish Metals is an exploration development company. The focus is on bringing the South Crofty Tin project towards a construction decision and ultimately back into production.

“The Good Growth funding is very important and it’s an element of support. Being a mining operation we need to have support of the community, local and national governments.”

Fawzi says bringing the mine project back into production would benefit Cornwall and the country as a whole and South Crofty would be a local supply of tin in the UK.

He adds: “Tin is a very important metal for the energy transition. It is important in all technological applications and is essentially the glue that holds electronics and electrical infrastructure together.

“When South Crofty eventually goes back into production, we expect it will create approximately300 direct jobs.”

Steven Kingston, Cornish Metals Project Manager, says part of the feasibility studies has been looking at how to use sola power on roof spaces and thermal energy from mine water to create the possibility of having a net zero site.

He says: “With the Good Growth funding, it’s enabled us to increase our staffing and it’s enabled us to speed up our development on site.”

George Wilson, Cornish Metals Assistant Project Manager, says: “Here at South Crofty, we’ve had significant funding to date that has focused primarily on delivering the dewatering programme and bringing the mine to production through feasibility study. The Shared Prosperity Fund and Good Growth funding has given us the financial confidence to go forward and investigate how are we going to bring that to fruition.

“The funding provided by the Good Growth team and the support they provide has been fantastic in bringing this project to where it is today.”

Councillor Louis Garner, Cornwall Council portfolio holder for economy, says: “Cornwall’s reserves of critical minerals are of major international importance. We know these minerals are of exceptionally high value, and we want to maximise the number of jobs that are available to Cornish people in the sector. So, we’ve made a number of investments across the sector.

“We’ve put £192,000 into the mine at South Crofty, which is a tin mine. But actually, also we’ve invested in some of our skills and learning establishments like the Camborne School of Mines, we also want to encourage sort of future businesses and future investments, in order to grow their business and, and grow the sector.

“What we’re seeing now is a transition away from traditional fossil fuels and into more renewable forms of energy. That transition is only going to speed up over the next few years, and it’s absolutely vital that Cornwall is at the forefront of that.”

This project is made possible thanks to £92,106 and £100,000 investment from the Good Growth Programme, funded by the UK Government through the UK Shared Prosperity Fund.