Okay, guys, last but not least, before bath time, we have another Queensland story. Diatreme Resources Limited, based in Queensland, are producing far north Queensland, producing silica sand for the global solar energy boom, which is just booming right now. All those solar panels on our roofs, I got some myself the other week. They are running out of stock. To tell us the good news, a guy's been called one of the good blokes in the Australian mining industry. Mr. Neil McIntyre, come on down.
Thank you. It's really good to be in Noosa again. I'm going to apologize in advance. I'm the last presenter before the bar opens. I'll try and get the message across as succinctly as I can and let you get back to the serious business of drinking in Noosa. Diatreme Resources, we're a developer of high-purity silica sand in far north Queensland, north of Cooktown, critical mineral in global demand. We're one of the world's purest in situ deposits in global resources, over 500 million tons now within our tenement area, running at over 99% pure silica. Potential for delivery of three world-class low-iron, high-purity silica projects. Our focus is on our Northern Silica Project. We also have Cape Flattery Silica following the successful takeover of Metallica Minerals Limited at the tail end of last year. We have our Galalar Project in the southern part of our tenement.
I probably don't need to sell you the solar story, but we see continuous extraordinary demand in the solar industry. Photovoltaics are a key driver. Our product is used as a direct feed product in the manufacture of solar panels for the encompassing glass, which comprises about 70% of every standard solar panel. Strong sustained growth. We've released a scoping study on our Northern Silica Project. Robust economics. We're advancing fast through our permitting and environmental approvals process. Our finalization of our PFS studies in about two months' time. Production target into 2027. Strong expansion potential beyond our primary project. Our corporate snapshot, market cap sitting around $100 million. Cash at bank, unusual for a company relative to where we are in our space. At the end of the March quarter, nearly $18 million.
That's contained in our joint venture with Sibelco, which is developing the Northern Silica Project and corporately. I haven't had to go back to market for almost three years now to raise money. We're fully funded through the PFS process and DFS process. We're in an unusual space. Looking to get some value drivers through the stock price. When we do go to raise capital, potentially that could be around assembly of project finance time. We're in a really good space, well funded. A snapshot of our tenement area, over 600 square kilometers, truly world-class deposit. Multiphase, really, nature has done a lot of the work for us through this dune system. Naturally leached the dune system. Over 99% pure through the drill pipe. Really simple processing we apply. Nothing technically challenging. Again, adding to that resource to the north of us.
We completely surround the operations of Cape Flattery Silica, been operating in the region over 40 years. The world's largest silica mine, producing over 3 million tons per annum. We completely surround their tenement area. Our Si2 Deposit is our primary resource area. We're looking to advance that as quickly as we can. Over 270 million tons, looking to produce between three, start up at 3 million tons per year, eventually moving to 5 million tons over time. The Galalar Project in the southern part of our tenement, another key deposit, looking to develop that in the medium term. Really simple circuit, really simple operation. I know many miners say that this is really a glorified quarrying operation. I would comment too that the rehabilitation is a really important part of our process. Really well established for rehabilitation of sand dunes. Really well understood. Really simple processing circuit.
Looking at some screening, removing of heavy mineral, some attritioning and washing of the sand. Gets it right to that perfect specification for manufacturers. We see about 90% of the market, the world market in solar panels in China. We see a spread beyond China also to Korea, Taiwan, and India. We see India markets also growing in particular over the last couple of years. We'll assemble a really credible list. We have Mitsui, and we have our joint venture partner, of course, Sibelco, who have a 27% commitment to offtake. We completed at the end of last year our takeover of Metallica Minerals Limited, puts us in a really dominant position within the dune field. We're advancing carefully through our environmental studies. We're looking to lodge our EIS at the end of August.
We're a coordinated project, so that process is managed through the Office of the Coordinator General here in Queensland. First step is an adequacy review. We'll get that in in August, late August, out for public comment towards the tail end of this year. Touch wood, all going well. Looking to get that public comment period over into the first quarter next year. Looking at potentially getting our mining leases granted by the middle of next year. We can really see the runway now towards mining activity. As I said, two MOUs already in place on offtake, one with Mitsui and Flat Glass Group, which is one of the largest glass manufacturers in China in the specialty field. Also we have Sibelco also as an offtake. We were recently awarded the Major Project Status by the federal government. We're a coordinated project in Queensland.
We're a project of regional significance in Queensland, and now we're afforded Major Project Status by the federal government. I don't think we have too many more boxes to tick with the various governments. They're highly supportive. We have a great relationship with government agencies, highly supportive of the project. This is going to have a major impact in a regional area that really needs economic activity. Over the last 12 months, we've seen an upgrade significantly in our resource, not just in size, but also in certainty and category. Planning our mineral reserve, which will feed into our PFS work over the next couple of months. We're fully funded through that process, I might add as well, which again is unusual in this space. Our scoping study, which we released some time ago, we're looking forward to updating these numbers.
Start up at 3 million tons, increasing over the first couple of years to 5 million tons. Stage one capex, $356 million. Looking at NPV about $1.4 billion. IRR over 33%. Cash operating margin, nearly $300 million per annum. Really robust scoping study supporting some of the work that we're doing. We're looking forward to improving that and defining that further through the PFS process. Nice shot of the wharf facility here. We have a standard, our scoping study. We're using a standalone maritime infrastructure option, including establishing a barge ramp wharf extension. May not be required if we can access the existing underutilized facilities. Facilities at Cape Flattery have a nameplate of 6 million tons. The incumbent Mitsubishi currently operated at a little over 3 million tons. There's extensive negotiation and discussion going on about access. State government, federal government are very supportive of that.
Also, the capacity at 6 million tons is only on a daytime operation. There's margin to go to a 24-hour operation there as well, which would support the two existing operations, world-class silica mines. We don't view, we exist in an area within our tenement area that has 13 clans, two PBCs. We've never seen that as a burden at all. We see that as a positive and a challenge. We work very closely with community. We're bringing economic development to an area that desperately needs it. Again, we'll have very ambitious Indigenous employment targets. There's some very good regional companies engaged in training activity. Looking at about over 120 jobs full-time on site, over 200 during construction phase. This is going to make a difference to the area in which we operate.
Again, we want to, we have the time and ability now to really develop this project in line with community expectation. We don't have the traditional challenges, perhaps, that other miners face in terms of having very carefully defined mining areas. We've been able to adjust our footprint, our infrastructure footprints, to meet community expectations. Areas of high cultural significance, we can plan around those. We can leave a very minimal footprint. A very clean mining activity. The only chemicals used on, it's just gravity and water essentially. The only chemical used on site would be a flocculant, which is used in standard council water supplies. We drink parts of it every day. As I mentioned, about 70% of every standard commercial solar panel is made of this high purity, low iron glass. We are a supplier.
Our intention is to supply 3 million tons of that at startup to manufacturers. There is also scope and opportunity to look at further downstream activity. We're looking forward to getting certainty about startup mining operations, but we also have an eye on some downstream opportunities for further processing of the sand into other high purity products. We think there's significant upside in that as well. Certainly, government is encouraging that, but there's some genuine opportunities in downstream. We're competing and actively competing throughout increasing supply out of Asia. Places like India, Indonesia, Malaysia. We can see a pathway to our production, which we need to get there as quickly as we can to mitigate some of that competition. It's a real growth story in the photovoltaic space. Markets are growing steadily.
Investment in solar, investment in solar passed investment in oil for the first time ever over the last 12 months. It's really won the energy race solar, and we're looking forward to being an important supplier to that supply chain. We keep a really close eye on the China market. It dominates the supply of solar panels worldwide. We see continued growth. We do see some pressure on margin. There's some evidence of some oversupply in China currently. We don't think that will materially affect our forward outlook on our pricing for our silica sand. There's definitely been some short-term impact. We've kept an eye on that market for some time. We've seen we've been continuously underestimating the physical demand on the other side. Interestingly, we also see some growth in the Indian market starting to compete with China. We see that as an important potential other supply route.
Joint venture partner in our silica project and corporately is Sibelco, one of the world's leading providers of industrial minerals. A private company based out of Europe, preeminent in the silica space. Been an important partner for us, not only financially but technically. Access to markets, access to processing technologies. They're a world leader in the supply of high purity quartz for photovoltaics and microprocessors. We rely on them heavily for our technical expertise. Incredibly supportive of us and this project. Resource estimate in global now over 500 million tons. We've added important certainty around the categories on that resource. Looking forward to getting a mineral reserve out over the coming months. Really focused on that Northern Silica Project, you know, supporting mining activity for 25 to 50 years in reality. Everybody says this good strong board.
However, we do have importantly a board experience in international commodities and who have genuinely taken, please read that at your leisure, but genuinely taken projects from greenfield to production in multiple countries and more particularly in the silica space. Highly credentialed board who have, Tom Kaposh in particular from Sibelco has from greenfield set up four or five silica processing plants in other parts of the world. An incredibly important technical base we can call upon from our board. Time's up and I'm cutting into your drinking time, so I will wrap up. I hope those of you who knew the story have got a better picture of where we're at. Those who have been supporting us for a while, thank you very much for your patience. We're really in that home stretch of permitting and approvals now. We're looking forward to delivering that over the next 12 months.
We have incredible government support as evidenced by all the ticks that we do have. We're really looking forward to delivering that importantly. Come and have a chat. We're on the booth. Please say good day. Thank you again for your time.