Thanks very much, Chrissy, and a terrific line-up here again in Fremantle, and a credit to the Vertical Events team. I'll be providing an update today on the progress Ardea's been making with Sumitomo Metal Mining and Mitsubishi Corporation on Australia's largest nickel cobalt resource, the Kalgoorlie Nickel Project, and specifically the Definitive Feasibility Study work underway on the Goongarrie Hub. So the project summary snapshot.
So we've already indicated a +40-year ore reserve, so we've got a very large resource and the ability for brownfields, low-cost expansion once we are in production. We've got the best possible partners with commodities experience right round the world, and specifically nickel laterite process development and operating experience. We are located in the best operating jurisdiction in the world, hands down, in my opinion, here in Western Australia.
And we've recently announced funding support, so collectively, $1 billion in support from Export Finance Australia and U.S. EXIM, and that's demonstrating a pathway to project development funding completed by the Ardea team with our Japanese partners having, of course, their own international relationships with large export credit agencies. Zoom in on the project location. So the Goongarrie Hub tenements are shown in green, and that's the subject of our incorporated joint venture with the Japanese consortium. The tenements in red remain 100% controlled by Ardea and provide additional future optionality. We're blessed with access to infrastructure, road, rail, gas pipeline, fiber-optic cable, and most importantly, great support from the City of Kalgoorlie-Boulder and the Shire of Menzies.
The joint venture with the Japanese consortium is the incorporated joint venture vehicle called Kalgoorlie Nickel Proprietary Limited, and there's a team of about 45 personnel working incredibly hard on the Definitive Feasibility Study. That's been fully funded by our Japanese partners with a budget of AUD 98.5 million. The Japanese consortium will ultimately be earning a 50% interest in the Goongarrie Hub. They've already earned a 17.5% stake.
Upon completion of the DFS, they'll move to 35% and, most importantly, move to 50% upon them making a positive final investment decision . And that means all the approvals are in place, and most importantly, the project funding has been secured. Little bit now on Sumitomo Metal Mining. They are fully integrated in the nickel supply chain, and they're very large producers of gold, copper, and other critical minerals such as scandium.
They've developed two nickel laterite projects successfully in the Philippines. Then when we move to Mitsubishi Corporation, they're a household name. They've got mega-project resource experience right around the world, and they've been investing in Australia for about 70 years. That combination of technical project, project development and operations experience is second to none, and it's a key enabler for Ardea and the Kalgoorlie Nickel Project.
We're using high-pressure acid leach process technology. It's been successfully utilized since the 1950s. A lot of components are now off the shelf, and as I mentioned, Sumitomo successfully developed two projects in the Philippines, and they both achieved over 100% of nameplate capacity in under 12 months. We've seen some green shoots at last in the nickel market. We've been bruised and battered for a number of years now, but Ardea's been able to progress the Kalgoorlie Nickel Project, Goongarrie Hub, with the support from our Japanese partners.
So it's been an ideal time to be moving the project forward, and we're arguably the only Australian nickel project that's been meaningfully advanced. Those green shoots coming out of Indonesia, it's the government moving their three-year mining permits, reducing that down to 12 months, and it's also included reducing the annual ore quotas. Of course, we've all seen some of the challenges in operating in a wet tropical environment, how you dispose of the tailings, how you incorporate that industrial safety and environmental expectations that we have in Australia. So we'll be a point of difference here with the standards that we take as a given in Western Australia.
So importantly, these green shoots have seen some appreciation in the nickel price, and they've also led to a realization that the surplus expected in the nickel market has been overplayed and that surplus is reducing. And similarly, the highest value ore, it's already been mined and processed in Indonesia. Their ore grade's declining, their operating costs have to continue to increase, so we feel our time into production is perfectly placed.
And some of the advantages I touched upon, our Eastern Goldfields location, high-pressure acid leach-proven technology, our partners, and the funding support that Ardea has already been able to demonstrate through Export Finance Australia and the U.S. Export-Import Bank. So moving on to that funding support for $1 billion. Importantly, the $500 million from EFA, it's funding support. It's not limited to just debt.
So it will be the available capital in the best interest that the capital stack required to see this project developed. This is funding support delivered even before completion of our definitive feasibility study. Ardea has been engaging with global export credit agencies, and this is an indication of the support for this globally significant nickel cobalt project, and it's about that supply chain diversity and decoupling from Chinese-dominated supply chains.
This is just the beginning, and this is a credit to the hard work from the Ardea team. It goes without saying, the contacts that our Japanese partners have. This is a very strong indication of the support for this project. A l ittle bit more detail now on the Goongarrie Hub. All of the ore reserve blocks are shown here in red, and it defined a 40-year ore reserve or 1.2 contained nickel tonnes in our 2023 PFS. To put that into perspective, the Kambalda District is a world powerhouse. It's well-known throughout the world as a globally significant nickel producer.
Kambalda's produced about 1.6 million nickel tonnes over its lifetime. We could be producing similar amounts of nickel just from the Goongarrie Hub. So that puts the significance of this project clearly into context. In terms of the growth potential in the DFS, we're only assessing 6 of 9 mineral deposits, so we're in no way resource constrained, and we've left room for a third autoclave. The base case is 3.5 million tonnes per annum through two 1.75 million tonne per annum autoclaves.
We're leaving space for a third autoclave. So once we're in production, it'll be a much lower capital intensity to continue to increase the project's size and throughput. We've also left room for a scandium refinery. The scandium goes into solution along with the nickel and cobalt, and depending on the future demand and pricing, that's another option available to us. But noting that the scandium market's currently only about 40 tonnes per year, so it's a small market, but it is growing. The most important consideration is our operating costs.
So in our 2023 pre-feasibility study, we demonstrated on a nickel-only basis, our C1 operating cost was about $10,000 a tonne. If we include the cobalt by-product credit, depending on the cobalt price, it's anywhere between about $6,000-$8,000 a tonne, and that firmly places us in the lower cost quartile. So we can be cost competitive with nickel producers right round the world. And already we're hearing reports that any time the nickel price gets below $15,000 a tonne, about 30% of producers in Indonesia are losing money.
Additionally, since we completed the financial metrics for the PFS, we've seen a production tax incentive from the Australian Federal Government, and what that will translate to for Ardea is that 10% of our process operating costs will be repaid. And similarly, you can see from the pie chart there that our process operating costs comprise about 64%. So that's a meaningful heads-up and a credit to the Australian government's support for the Australian critical minerals sector. We've maintained really strong news flow as the definitive feasibility study's been underway. It's due for completion in the December quarter, sorry, the June quarter of this year.
So there's a huge amount of work underway from the KNPL team, with a lot of involvement from Ardea and of course, Sumitomo and Mitsubishi as well, to deliver the best outcomes. We've completed about 50,000 meters of drilling as part of the DFS. It's been RC infill drill, resource definition, geotechnical drilling, QAQC drilling, and a lot of hydrogeological drilling to make sure we've defined sufficient groundwater sources for the process operations. So really pleased with the progress being made. It's a credit to the team. A lot of work underway, so that includes our application with the state government for Lead Agency Status. I was very pleased to see Minister Michael here earlier today.
I should have given him a friendly reminder, but we're cautiously optimistic that we will be granted Lead Agency Status in the coming months, and that will tie in perfectly with our Major Project Status from the federal government and see us have expedited assistance through the approvals process and any challenges we may encounter in advancing this project. We've also been engaging with the federal government agencies.
There's a new pilot program being developed called the Investor Front Door, and again, we're cautiously optimistic that we'll be part of that program as well. So strong news flow ahead, and of course, we continue to engage with stakeholders around the world and additional discussions with global export credit agencies, in addition to EFA and EXIM. We control about 3,200 square kilometers of tenure within the Kalgoorlie Nickel Project.
We've spoken about the nickel laterite resources, but those same tenements are also prospective for precious metals like gold and another broad range of other critical minerals that gives us a pipeline of growth already within our portfolio and control, so don't lose sight of that future optionality as well. In terms of the ESG standards, it's a given here in Australia, and Australia and Japan are very much aligned in those high expectations.
So we've got a terrific team within Ardea. A number of the team are here at Booth 52, so please come and ask any questions. We engage with all of our stakeholders from locally through to state, federal, and internationally, and that's been a huge enabler for us as a small company advancing a globally significant project. We've got design innovations, including minimizing our CO2 emissions.
Our acid plant will be our major source of power. We are looking at in-pit tailings disposal as well to minimize the surface footprint. So just to wrap up before Chrissy kicks me off stage, we've demonstrated a +40-year ore reserve with our 2023 PFS. We're going to expand upon that upon the delivery of the definitive feasibility study in the June quarter of this year. So it's that large-scale, long-life strategic asset with competitive OpEx, and it's these long-lived projects that are incredibly rare and sought after by all the major miners.
Our definitive feasibility study continues to be fully funded by our partners to the tune of AUD 98.5 million. We enjoy fantastic stakeholder support, and we've demonstrated a pathway to project funding even before conclusion of the DFS with the letters of funding support from EFA and EXIM. Now's the time to adjust your portfolio, take some profits off the table from your gold and other precious metal investments, and get into nickel while the green shoots are emerging. There's so few long-life, globally significant assets like this. So, appreciate your time.