Stefano Marani dismisses allegations that Renergen does not have the claimed helium reserves

Renergen CEO Stefano Marani has dismissed allegations that the Virginia Gas Project does not have the helium reserves it claims to have.

Renergen’s main asset is the Virginia Gas Project, which the company said could produce large quantities of liquid natural gas (LNG) and liquid helium (LHe).

The company states that its wells boast helium concentrations exceeding 3%, with some reaching as high as 12%. This is an order of magnitude higher than most producers in the world.

This extraordinary claim saw investors pile into Renergen with the hope that the company would become a profitable mining empire. However, this did not happen.

Renergen failed to produce any meaningful amounts of helium, and the company incurred increasingly larger losses as time progressed.

Many people expressed concern about Renergen’s helium deposits claims, with speculation that it was highly overstated.

BizNews founder Alec Hogg told Marani that a respectable asset manager expressed doubts to him regarding whether Renergen has the helium deposits it claims to have.

This echoes concerns from other analysts, including Cilandia Capital investment manager Albie Cilliers, who also alleged that Renergen does not have the gas reserves it claims to have.

In an interview with BizNews, Marani dismissed these concerns, saying international experts have independently verified their deposits.

“We don’t use South African geologists to determine whether the helium reserves are there,” Marani told Biznews.

“We use international experts who are qualified in oil and gas reservoir exploration and have personal liability in certifying the reserves.”

He explained that these experts came out to their field, Renergen drilled, the gas flowed, and the international experts, Sproule, tested it.

Sproule is a global energy consulting firm providing technical and commercial services for reserves certification and reservoir characterisation.

“To naively say the gas is not there is a complete misnomer, and it shows that the person isn’t doing research but rather just stating an opinion,” Marani said.

He added that the biggest challenge gold miners faced in the Virginia area is that they have fiery mines because there is too much gas.

“You have to be very obtuse if you make a claim like that without substantiating it or doing the research yourself,” Marani said.