"The construction of an exploration decline represents a significant key pre-construction project for Foran that will de-risk that timeline and capital costs to first production at McIlvenna Bay," Foran's CEO and executive chairman Dan Myerson said on February 15. 

Foran said the underground development associated with the exploration decline was planned to be roughly 1,475m long and was expected to reach the orebody in the second half of this year. 

Once completed, the company planned to extract about a 4,400 tonne bulk sample for metallurgical testing and conduct underground drilling. 

BMO Capital Markets analyst Rene Cartier agreed that the permits de-risked the project by clarifying the timeline and capital costs for construction. 

"Thus far, [Foran] has received approvals to begin construction of areas such as: the development of the boxcut, jet grouting the sandstone layer of the planned decline, and building the ore and waste pad and the containment pond system," Cartier said. 

BMO is anticipating that discussions were ongoing for an "appropriately sized" financing package as part of full-scale construction. 

"Given our expectations for a project that can be scaled for higher production rates, and inflationary pressures, in our view, investors should be considerate to higher feasibility-study capital costs," he added. 

Myerson said: "With the programme now underway, we are very excited for a catalyst-rich year at Foran, [this] includes a pending feasibility study, an exciting regional exploration campaign, and updates on the development of our pioneering ESG business approach." 

Based on the current pre-feasibility study for McIlvenna Bay, average annual production is expected to be 28 million pounds of copper, 89Mlbs of zinc, 17,000 ounces of gold, and 493,000oz of silver. 

Foran traded on the Toronto Stock Exchange on February 15 at C$2.42/share, which was down 1%. The company had a 52-week high/low of C$3.09/C$0.77 and a market capitalisation of C$507.79 million.