The Marela Project is located 370 km east of Conakry in the Mamou and Faranah prefectures.

It covers the north-western border of the Archaean craton and contains a large elliptical shaped ultramafic intrusion (7 km x 0.9 km) composed of an inner dunite core surrounded by rims of wehrlites and pyroxenites. The intrusive body has a number of similarities with other Ural-Alaskan type ultramafic intrusions around the world which host large titanium and magnetite resources.

The Marela project has a well-developed laterite profile across the whole of the intrusive complex.

Nickel, cobalt and scandium are enriched in the laterites overlying the dunites in the centre of the intrusion and vanadium (magnetite) and titanium (ilmenite) are contained within the laterites overlying the pyroxenite units.

The project was previously explored by Mitsubishi Corporation between 2006 and 2010 who engaged the French Geological Survey (BRGM) to design and manage exploration programmes on their behalf. From 2011 to 2015 a Middle Eastern company (AMER) carried out extensive drilling on the project. To date approximately US$ 20 million has been spent on the project.

NDM has recently defined a JORC-compliant Inferred Mineral Resource Estimate for nickel and cobalt of 27.15 million tonnes at 0.81% nickel and 0.08% cobalt. NDM has engaged Hatch to do a FEL-1 Scoping Study which is expected to be completed by the end of Q4 2023.