First 4N HPA Production For Lava Blue Demonstration Plant

Queensland Pacific Metals Limited (ASX:QPM) (“QPM” or “the Company”) is pleased to announce that 4N HPA has been successfully produced from the Lava Blue Demonstration Plant, located at QUT Redlands, Queensland.

Highlights

• Lava Blue’s Demonstration Plant successfully commissioned late May / early June.
• Kilogram batches of better than 99.99% (“4N”) High Purity Alumina (“HPA”) have been produced from aluminium hydroxide feed source.
• Total production of 60kg is being targeted for production for customer evaluation.
• Production of 4N HPA from the Demonstration Plant is a major technical milestone in the pathway towards commercial production.
• Product produced from the Demonstration Plant is critical for QPM’s offtake marketing efforts and will be provided to potential customers.

As with the TECH Project, QPM and Lava Blue procured aluminium hydroxide as a feed source for the Demonstration Plant. Production from Lava Blue’ HPA demonstration facility in Brisbane has begun to ramp up and kilogram scale samples produced during commissioning are achieving better than 4N purity despite progressively diminishing contamination from commissioning new kilns. The results of a composite sample, produced June 15, and tested for purity in the QUT laboratory that is dedicated to the Lava Blue HPA project, are tabulated below.

Figure: QUT analysis of HPA produced during commissioning of Lava Blue Demonstration Plant

Duplicates of the sample were tested and both the primary results of each test and the average of the test are displayed. While the results demonstrate greater than 99.99% purity is being achieved, higher than desirable iron, silicon and calcium contamination levels have been detected and are attributed to ‘curing” of new kiln internals.

Both QPM and Lava Blue are excited to have achieved 4N HPA during the commissioning phase of this project. Lava Blue will continue to operate the Demonstration Plant with a target of producing 60 kg of 4N HPA. The operation of the Demonstration Plant is also providing valuable technical information for the design of commercial scale plant.

Figure: Sample from which material from analysis tabulated above was drawn in the QUT laboratory.

QPM is also seeking to actively engage with potential HPA customers. It has recently appointed an in-house Technical Marketing Manager who will drive these efforts in cnjnn with external HPA marketing experts. The samples from the Demonstration Plant will be critical to customer engagement.

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