The five TAC founding members are former Newmont director Clem Pelletier; former Placer Dome executive Martyn Creaney; FPX, Liberty Gold and Pure Gold Mining director Rob Pease; FPX board member Peter Marshall and Paul Hosford, who has held project manager roles for Anglo American, Barrick Gold and New Gold.

FPX chairman Dr Peter Bradshaw said the company looked forward to drawing on the TAC's experience to assist in advancing Baptiste.

"In particular, the additions of Clem Pelletier and Martyn Creaney greatly expand the company's depth of expertise in the development, permitting and construction of large-scale projects in British Columbia, with our TAC members having variously played key roles in BC projects including Mt Milligan, Galore Creek, Blackwater, KSM and Brucejack," he said.

FPX touted Baptiste's green credentials in January, saying further scrutiny of the 2020 preliminary economic assessment indicated the potential to produce the world's lowest-carbon nickel.

The updated PEA for Baptiste, at the Decar Nickel District project, had outlined a 35-year mine producing an average annual 99 million pounds of nickel in ferronickel briquettes at an all-in sustaining cost of US$3.12/lb.

Nickel is currently worth more than $7/lb.

The study put pre-production costs at $1.67 billion, the after-tax NPV8 at $1.7 billion and IRR at 18.3%, using a $7.75/lb nickel price.

The company closed an upsized C$16.1 million placement last week, priced at 65c per share.

Its shares (TSXV: FPX) spent most of 2020 below 20c before soaring to 94c in February.

They closed down 4.4% yesterday to 65c, valuing it about $138 million (US$110 million).