During the mining project development there are usually considered three kinds of support studies to the economic feasibility study, which reflect increasing and more rigorous knowledge levels:

• Conceptual study, also referred to as scooping, is a very preliminary evaluation of the mining project , still with very limited data, useful to identify the research and development work needed.
• Pre-feasibility study, which represents the intermediate level of the mining project’s evaluation: it reasonably characterizes the reserves and resources, presents alternatives for extraction methods, treatment and its incomes and includes a financial analysis based on reasonable exploitation, ore treatment, metallurgy, economy, marketing, legislation, environment, social and political assumptions.
• Feasibility study, which is the final and most detailed stage of the assessment. The mineral resource is already well characterized and the exploitation project detail will allow to determine rigorously the resources and mineral reserves. The financial analysis considers the same aspects in the pre-feasibility study, but this time with more detail and precision.

Going through the different stages of a minig project development usually saves time and money, once the investments are increasing, being of advantage to the investor that critical issues are identified and studied in advanced.

The Economic feasibility study is important in any mining project as a support document, at all times, for the investment or waiver decision.