• Nova operation officially opens in Western Australia
• About 400 people will work on site during production  

Mines and Petroleum Minister Bill Johnston today officially opened Independence Group's Nova nickel-copper-cobalt mine in the Fraser Range province.

About 200 delegates, staff and media were there to celebrate this significant milestone.

In just over five years, Nova advanced from a greenfield exploration discovery to commercial production in July 2017 and is now ramping up to nameplate capacity.

Located 360 kilometres south-east of Kalgoorlie-Boulder, the Nova operation is expected to have a mine life of 10 years and produce about 25,000 tonnes of nickel, 11,000 tonnes of copper and 925 tonnes of cobalt in concentrate during its maiden year of commercial production.

The world-class, low-cost mine was discovered in July 2012; construction at the site began in January 2015 and first ore concentrate was achieved by October 2016.