EnCore Energy has obtained the last federal permit required for the Dewey-Burdock project and is now preparing to navigate the state permitting process in South Dakota, which has been frozen since 2013. A thirteen-year standstill, finally cleared thanks to the federal FAST-41 program and a twenty-year license renewal issued by the Nuclear Regulatory Commission.
The project covers nearly fifty square kilometers across Custer and Fall River counties in southwestern South Dakota. EnCore, listed on both NASDAQ and the TSX Venture Exchange, holds a 100% interest in the asset through its subsidiary Powertech USA. The extraction method of choice is ISR (In-Situ Recovery): water and oxygen solutions are injected underground to dissolve uranium from sandstone deposits, after which the uranium-bearing fluid is pumped to the surface and processed at a central facility. Compared to open-pit or underground mining, ISR significantly reduces surface disturbance.
On the federal side, the path forward has been both lengthy and complex. The Permitting Council added Dewey-Burdock to the FAST-41 program in August 2025, under Trump’s executive order on critical mineral production. In June 2026, the NRC issued the twenty-year renewal of the source material license, completing the full federal permitting process. A preliminary economic assessment (PEA) published in January 2025 by SOLA Project Services estimates total capital costs of $264.2 million over the project’s lifetime, with an operating cost of $23.81 per pound of U₃O₈. The central processing facility is designed to handle one million pounds of uranium per year, with total expected recovery exceeding 14 million pounds.
The transition to state permitting is far from automatic. Applications for mining permits and groundwater discharge authorizations have not yet been submitted to the South Dakota Department of Agriculture and Natural Resources, though the company has already filed new water rights requests. Department spokesman Brian Walsh noted that processing timelines are difficult to predict and will depend heavily on the level of public participation. The South Dakota Water Management Board had previously denied a similar application in 2021, citing outstanding federal permits. That obstacle no longer exists.
The broader landscape points to growing interest in domestic uranium across the American West. Also in the Black Hills, Canadian company Nexus Uranium has filed an application for exploration activities near Craven Canyon, close to the Dewey-Burdock area. If the project advances on the schedule outlined in the PEA — with plant construction slated to begin in 2027 — Dewey-Burdock could become South Dakota’s first operational ISR mine, bolstering a domestic uranium supply chain that Washington views as critical to both energy security and the expansion of civilian nuclear capacity.
