Australian uranium miner Energy Resources of Australia (ERA) has extracted the final ore from the Ranger mine in North Australia concluding 30 years in operation for the mine.

The company completed open-cut mining with extraction from Pit 3 of the mine, located 260km east of Darwin with the earlier two pits concluding production in 1994 and 1997 respectively.

The mine produced an approximate 67,000 tons of uranium oxide for export between 1997 and 2011.

ERA operations general manager Tim Eckersley remarked that mining teams worked efficiently to de water the pit following the wet season to take advantage of the high grade ore at the bottom.

"They then maintained these strong efforts to move material from the mine very effectively and ahead of the projected timeframe," Eckersley added.

ERA has begun backfilling work at the pit and plans to backfill 30 million tons of material as part of the first phase before the end of 2014 for rehabilitation.

The company intends to initiate exploration drilling in the second quarter of 2013 for the purpose of developing the Ranger 3 Deeps underground mine.