Quarterly report pursuant to Section 13 or 15(d)

Summary of Significant Accounting Policies

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Summary of Significant Accounting Policies
3 Months Ended
Mar. 31, 2014
Accounting Policies [Abstract]  
Summary of Significant Accounting Policies
3.
Summary of Significant Accounting Policies
 
Basis of presentation
 
These financial statements have been prepared by management in accordance with United States generally accepted accounting principles (“US GAAP”) and include all of the assets, liabilities and expenses of the Company and its wholly-owned subsidiaries Ur-Energy USA Inc.; NFU Wyoming, LLC; Lost Creek ISR, LLC; NFUR Bootheel, LLC; Hauber Project LLC; NFUR Hauber, LLC; and (as of December 20, 2013) Pathfinder Mines Corporation. All inter-company balances and transactions have been eliminated upon consolidation. Ur-Energy Inc. and its wholly-owned subsidiaries are collectively referred to herein as the “Company.”
 
These unaudited interim consolidated financial statements do not conform in all respects to the requirements of generally accepted accounting principles for annual financial statements. The unaudited interim financial statements reflect all normal adjustments which in the opinion of management are necessary for a fair statement of the results for the periods presented. These unaudited interim consolidated financial statements should be read in conjunction with the audited annual consolidated financial statements for the year ended December 31, 2013.
 
Presentational currency
 
As a result of losing its foreign private issuer status during 2013, the Company changed its presentational currency from the Canadian dollar to U.S. dollars. Comparative information has therefore been restated in U.S. dollars in these financial statements. The effects of doing so are not significant because the Canadian and U.S. dollars were close to par at March 31, 2013.
 
Exploration Stage
 
The Company has established the existence of mineralized materials for certain uranium projects, including the Lost Creek property. The Company has not established proven or probable reserves, as defined by the United States Securities and Exchange Commission (the “SEC”) under Industry Guide 7, through the completion of a “final” or “bankable” feasibility study for any of its uranium projects, including Lost Creek property. Furthermore, the Company has no plans to establish proven or probable reserves for any of its uranium projects for which the Company plans on utilizing in-situ recovery (“ISR”) mining, such as the Lost Creek property or the Shirley Basin mine. As a result, and despite the fact that the Company commenced extraction of U3O8 at the Lost Creek property in September 2013, the Company remains in the Exploration Stage as defined under Industry Guide 7, and will continue to remain in the Exploration Stage until such time proven or probable reserves have been established.
 
Since the Company commenced extraction of mineralized materials at the Lost Creek property without having established proven and probable reserves, any mineralized materials established or extracted from the Lost Creek property should not be in any way associated with having established, or production from, proven or probable reserves. Accordingly, information concerning mineral deposits set forth herein may not be comparable to information made public by companies that have reserves in accordance with United States standards.
 
Restatement
 
The Company has regularly monitored practices followed by peer companies in the industry. As discussed above, the Company has not established, and has no plans to establish the existence of proven and probable reserves at this project. As a result of this, the Company changed its accounting policy at December 31, 2013 with respect to the nature of items that qualify for capitalization for in-situ uranium mining operations to align its policy to the accounting treatment that has been established as best practice for these types of mining operations.
 
The specific costs affected by this change are those associated with the development of the well field which, during 2013, was being constructed as a part of the Lost Creek project.  The development of this well field includes production and monitor well drilling and completion, piping within the well field and to the processing facility, header houses used to monitor production and disposal wells associated with the operation of the mine.  These costs are now expensed when incurred.
 
During the quarter ended March 31, 2013, a total of $4.1 million of such expenditures were originally capitalized as part of construction in progress within capital assets. Accordingly, the comparative financial statements have been restated to show the impact of this change in accounting policy and reflect this $4.1 million as development expense. This increased the loss per share from $0.03 per share to $0.06.
 
New accounting pronouncements
 
The Company continues to monitor new accounting pronouncements and their applicability to the Company’s operations and reporting. During the period ended March 31, 2014, there were no new pronouncements which directly affected the Company’s accounting policies or reporting.