Critical and precious metals project developer and investor Metals One has signed an agreement with materials liberation company DISA Technologies to seek to evaluate and, if successful, treat historically abandoned uranium mine waste dumps and recover saleable uranium and other critical mineral concentrates at Metals One’s 100%-owned Uravan Belt uranium/vanadium project, in Colorado, in the US.

The Uravan project was acquired by Metals One in July 2025.

It comprises 59 unpatented mining claims situated near the historic Buckhorn mine within the Uravan Mineral Belt, a district responsible for more than 60-million pounds of uranium and 330-million pounds of vanadium production during the twentieth century.

Within the Uravan project, there are eight separate abandoned uranium mine waste dumps suitable for potential recovery.

In September 2025, Metals One announced it had returned grades of up to 41 768 ppm uranium (4.17%) from historic waste material from rock chip sample assays.

This agreement expands on an existing relationship with DISA.

Under the terms of the latest agreement, DISA will now advance exploration work.

Metals One will be paid a gross revenue share of saleable uranium and other critical mineral concentrates recovered from waste dumps at the Uravan project through the deployment of DISA’s modular mobile plants using the patented high-pressure slurry ablation (HPSA) system.

Metals One is not required to contribute any capital or operational expenditure.

Metals One will also receive a percentage of gross product sale revenue stream, minus certain post-treatment allowable costs – a sliding scale with a base rate of 2.5%, through to 4% in certain metals pricing environments.

DISA will be the operator of the Uravan project and pay all associated costs of permitting, evaluation, treatment and ongoing remediation.

The HPSA process treats surface dumps of previously partially mined and aggregated material.

In September 2025, DISA became the first company to receive a service providers licence from the US Nuclear Regulatory Commission, providing a regulatory licence for it to remediate abandoned uranium mine waste.

In addition to extracting valuable uranium and critical minerals, the process delivers improvements to the local environment and watersheds by removing on average 90% of the uranium and radium-226 content from the waste, as evidenced by a treatability study DISA completed with the US Environmental Protection Agency, Metals One points out.

It also highlights strong US government support for the domestic recovery of uranium and critical minerals from legacy mine waste.

DISA will now undertake a characterisation programme with a combination of assay and gamma probes to determine the likely quantities of uranium and other recoverable minerals present in the waste piles.

The application and completion of all requisite permits needed to start the treatment of waste and recovery of payable concentrates using HPSA technology will also be advanced.

“The Uravan project sits within one of the US’s most prolifically mined uranium belts. Assays from Metals One’s initial exploration activities last year indicate the exceptional grades historically mined from within the project, with multiple samples containing uranium and vanadium at ore-grade levels.

“It follows that there is a significant opportunity to apply DISA’s breakthrough process to remediate abandoned uranium mine waste from the identified sites and recover valuable uranium and critical minerals whilst improving the environmental legacy from historical mining,” says Metals One MD Daniel Maling.