Fission Uranium (TSX: FCU) President Ross McElroy Provides an Update on Forthcoming Pre-Feasibility Study & 28-Hole Winter Drill Program at the PLS Property

January 30, 2019

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Gerardo Del Real: This is Gerardo Del Real with Resource Stock Digest. Joining me today is the President, COO, and Chief Geologist for Fission Uranium (TSX: FCU)(OTC: FCUUF), Mr. Ross McElroy. Ross, it's been a bit. How are you?

Ross McElroy: I'm doing well, Gerardo. Thank you. I think we're starting the year off on a positive front here. Lots of activity with good news in the uranium sector. So hopefully we keep the momentum going forward in 2019.

Gerardo Del Real: I know early in 2018, we said that would be a very important setup year. I think everybody can agree that it was, with uranium flirting with $30 a pound. I think 2019 is absolutely a breakout year for uranium, and obviously the juniors related with it. Plenty to talk about.

Let's start with the question that I often get asked more recently. The pre-feasibility study, we're expecting that. We were hoping for it sometime in Q4. I know we're now hoping that we get it in Q1. How are things coming along on that front? Then I want to talk about the exciting 2019 program, because there's a lot to chew on there.

Ross McElroy: You bet. I also get asked quite a bit about the pre-feasibility study. When's it coming out? We were hoping it would be out in the end of 2018, but our guidance right now is that we'll have it out in Q1 of 2019. We're already in Q1, so we do expect it to be out shortly. Putting the whole report together, there's a lot of components, particularly on the geotechnical side. It just takes time compiling it. We've done all the field work. All the information's there. It's mainly just pulling things together from all the various groups, and particularly geotechnical, but I think we're almost at that point. In the meantime, we're continuing to go forward, and there's a seamless transition into feasibility. But yeah, look for the pre-feasibility to be out shortly, Gerardo.

Gerardo Del Real: Excellent. Now, I know the geotechnical is a very important component of that PFS, especially because, as you just mentioned, you are transitioning straight from pre-feasibility to feasibility status. To support that, you just announced a 28-hole winter program. Can we talk about that? I believe it's expected to commence the first week of February. What are you looking to accomplish with that? Can you share some color on the details there?

Ross McElroy: I sure can. Really, it's more of the same with the PFS, the pre-feasibility, and some of the work we've done during 2018, and continuing those studies, just at a bit more advanced stage. Really, a big part of this project. As we know, this is an open pit mining concept, and because of the environment with overburden and the shallow Patterson Lake around it, with an open pit.

The focus here is really on the dike wall, the berm wall, that surrounds the open pit. That's where a lot of the information has to come in to help fine tune that design. That's what we spent a good portion of the pre-feasibility on. Going forward, that's also a little bit additional information required for feasibility. A majority of the program that we just announced is working on getting some more detailed information for that berm wall, with the 13 holes that we announced that'll go around that ring.

Some of the other aspects in there will be some more geotechnical work, but this one inside the open pit. That's where we'll do some hydrological pumping and monitoring studies. This is really to see how the overburden reacts in an open pit environment, just to see how it is. I mean, we're dealing with 50 to 55 meters of overburden.

These are the studies that are necessary for feasibility level work. I think it's been encouraging. Some of what we saw last year, I think that there weren't really any surprises in the negative side that we saw on the geotechnical front. I expect more of the same. It's really just getting more and more detailed information that helps us ultimately with our production scenarios going forward. That's really what this work is all about.

There is some other drilling that will be done this winter on the Tailings Management Facility. There's a couple of areas that we've chosen to be the prospective areas where we'll be putting the tailings on land. There's some necessary work that's required in the overburden to understand the nature of there, going forward with building a proper Tailings Management Facility plant, as well. We'll be doing some holes in there, probably eight holes in each area. That'll be mostly for a selective criteria, to see which area that we do prefer, which one comes back with the best characteristics able to host the tailings management area.

Other than that, this is an engineering-focused program that we're about to embark on in, as you mentioned, the first week of February. So all the kind of information that's required to go towards the feasibility study that we think is probably about, let's call it about an 18-month program overall. We expect the pre-feasibility to be done Q1 of this calendar year. Feasibility, we'd be looking towards the end of 2020. Those are some rough guidelines for us.

Gerardo Del Real: Excellent. Just to summarize a bit. Thus far, zero surprises. Everything's been pretty predictable thus far, and you're hoping that continues, obviously. Is that accurate?

Ross McElroy: Yeah, I think that's a pretty good statement. It's the same for anybody. When you do a PEA, the preliminary economic assessment that we completed in 2015, that's a desktop engineering study. Then you spend the next while trying to confirm these results with real world testing, real world data, that can back these concepts up. That's what we had done in the last couple of years, and we're just compiling all the information to be able to put in the comprehensive pre-feasibility. I haven't seen anything that strikes me as unexpected. Most of these things have been, I think, confirmatory to our PEA estimates that we had. We'll see. We haven't received the final pre-feasibility study yet, either, but we expect to soon.

Gerardo Del Real: Excellent. Cash position, what does that look like?

Ross McElroy: We've got just over $20 million, close to $21 million, in the treasury right now. We're certainly well-funded, I think, for the activities that we're doing, going forward in 2019. We're looking good. We've been able to embark on this winter program. We should be able to also do likewise with a summer program coming up. I think we're sitting in a pretty good position in the treasury.

We're also seeing the market, I think, responding a little bit better to uranium stocks overall. I think we're in a good situation with money in the bank. We've got a great project and I think changing sentiment overall in the uranium sector in general. So I think things are setting up pretty well for us.

Gerardo Del Real: Last but not least, Ross, I know you put a lot of emphasis, as you should, on community relations. How are things on that front?

Ross McElroy: It is a very important part. We need support from the communities, from the impacted stakeholders in our area. Just generally speaking, Saskatchewan can be proud that we've been able to develop strong relationships with government and community stakeholders. In particular in this project, I think things are going well. We've had some detailed meetings in the fall in 2018, had some more earlier this year. We'll continue to advance those kind of stakeholder involvement meetings and do even more this year, in 2019.

The larger the program grows, the more that we turn this project into reality, the more important community relations do become, because similar to the environmental side and government regulatory environment, the community relations is a hugely important aspect that we have. I just think that we've got a group of stakeholders that do support this project, do support mining in Saskatchewan. Keep those doors of communication open, but really our challenge is just to continue to advance the project and make it into an economically feasible project. I think these things will take care of themselves, as long as we continue to work on our community relations and environmental stewardship. I think that we're in a good setting.

Gerardo Del Real: Ross, that's a heck of an update. Thank you so much for taking time and for providing that thorough update. I appreciate it.

Ross McElroy: It's been a pleasure. So yes, we look forward to 2019 and what that brings. We'll see some more major milestones achieved for the PLS project. The better conditions in the uranium market in general, I think, are really setting us up for a great looking 2019.

Gerardo Del Real: I couldn't agree more. Thanks again, Ross.

Ross McElroy: Thank you very much.

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