TIDMTGR
RNS Number : 0909W
Tirupati Graphite PLC
21 April 2021
21 April 2021
Tirupati Graphite plc ('Tirupati' or the 'Company')
Commercial Operations Commence at Vatomina as Mine Opens
Tirupati Graphite plc, the fully integrated, revenue generative,
specialist graphite producer and graphene developer with operations
in Madagascar and India, is pleased to announce the opening of its
second mine in Madagascar at the Vatomina Project, where it remains
on track to start commissioning the first 9,000 tpa processing
plant in Q2 2021.
Overview
-- Start of excavation of overburden and first ore mined for the
upcoming 9,000 tpa Vatomina processing plant that remains on track
to start commissioning in Q2 2021.
-- Completed building the circa 12km new interconnecting road
that runs between Vatomina and Sahamamy, which will save circa 5%
in current OPEX towards logistics costs.
-- Initiated preparations to commence the accelerated
construction of Sahamamy's next plant, which has a planned capacity
of 18,000 tpa.
Shishir Poddar, CEO of Tirupati Graphite, said, "The opening of
the mine marks the beginning of commercial operations at the
greenfield Vatomina project, taking us one step further towards our
goal of increasing capacity in Madagascar to 30,000 tpa by Q1 2022
and 84,000 tpa by 2024. Furthermore, we are equally delighted that
our new road between our two projects, Vatomina and Sahamamy, is
now complete, providing them direct access to the National Highway
and thereby helping us reduce our OPEX.
"As demonstrated by the huge support we received for our
oversubscribed GBP10 million placing last week, investors are
increasingly cognisant of graphite's role in the green economy and
energy transition. Given its unique properties that enable a
multitude of green applications including its use in Li-ion
batteries and flame retardants, the high-tech graphite industry
continues to experience growing demand and tightening supply. We
therefore believe a prolonged supply shortage is likely; the
opening of our new Vatomina mine will go some way to plugging the
supply gap with our high-quality natural flake graphite. We will
continue to achieve milestones and update the market further as we
focus on fast-tracking our developments across our three
businesses."
Details
To support increasing demand for its products, Tirupati
continues to make excellent progress advancing its speciality
graphite and graphene processing businesses in India as well as its
two primary mining and processing projects in Madagascar, Vatomina
and Sahamamy, where it aims to increase production capacity to a
globally significant 84,000 tpa by 2024 in several modules.
Over the next 4-6 weeks now the Vatomina mine has opened, the
Company will strip the overburden and mine ore to commence
stockpiling of feed stock for the upcoming 9,000 tpa processing
plant that remains on track to be commissioned in Q2 2021.
Notably, the Company has developed and adopted environmentally
friendly methods for mining and processing in Madagascar including
energy efficiency, waste reduction and reuse strategies.
Vatomina currently has a defined Mineral Resource Estimate under
JORC (2012) of contained graphite of 852,000 tons, resulting in a
mine life of circa 14 years based on the originally planned 63,000
tpa production capacity. Given only a third of the mineralised
zones have been explored to date, with the established exploration
targets of between 8 to 10 million tonnes within the explored
areas, and the second stage exploration programme having commenced
in February 2021, the Company is looking to update the Mineral
Resource Estimates; SRK Consulting has been engaged in this regard
(see RNS dated 9 April 2021).
Additionally, the Company is delighted to announce that it has
completed building the circa 12km interconnecting road that runs
between Vatomina and Sahamamy, linking both projects and connecting
Sahamamy directly to the National Highway RN2. This is a key
operational milestone as it will lead to savings of around 5% in
current OPEX by lowering logistics costs and facilitating ease of
movement of the ground management team across both projects
creating operating efficiencies.
Furthermore, the Company has initiated preparations to commence
the accelerated construction of Sahamamy's next plant, which has a
planned capacity of 18,000 tpa, for which it raised additional
capital last week (see RNS dated 16 April 2021). This is intended
to bring total capacity across both Madagascan projects to 30,000
tpa by Q1 2022 and a globally significant 84,000 tpa by 2024.
Sahamamy, which is producing and shipping graphite globally with
a product basket of >85% jumbo and large flakes with up to 96%
purity, reached 97% of its current 3,000 tpa capacity in Q1 2021
(see RNS dated 9 April 2021).
This announcement contains inside information for the purposes
of Article 7 of EU Regulation 596/2014. Upon the publication of
this announcement, this inside information is now considered to be
in the public domain.
ENDS
For further information, please visit
https://www.tirupatigraphite.co.uk/ or contact:
Tirupati Graphite Plc
Puruvi Poddar +44 (0) 20 3984 9894
Optiva Securities Limited (Broker)
Daniel Ingram +44 (0) 20 3137 1902
---------------------
St Brides Partners Ltd (Financial PR)
Isabel de Salis / Cosima Akerman +44 (0) 20 236 1177
---------------------
Notes
Tirupati Graphite Plc is a revenue-generative, multi-asset,
multi-jurisdictional, fully integrated producer and developer of
high-grade natural flake graphite, speciality graphite and
graphene, which captures the entire value chain. With a unique set
of properties, graphite has diverse applications with multiple
growth streams and graphene forms the new generation of 2D
materials. In support of this, the Company places a special
emphasis on "green" applications, including renewable energy
generation, energy storage and composites, and is committed to
ensuring its operations are sustainable as well.
The Company's operations include primary mining and processing
in Madagascar, where the Company operates two key projects,
Sahamamy and Vatomina; 3,000 tpa of high-quality flake graphite
concentrate with up to 96% purity is currently being produced and
sold to customers globally, and this is planned to increase to
84,000 tpa by 2024 as per the Company's modular medium-term
development plan.
In India, through Tirupati Speciality Graphite Private Limited
('TSG'), with whom the Company has a binding acquisition agreement
subject to regulatory approvals, Tirupati processes and produces
speciality graphite for use in hi-tech applications like
lithium-ion batteries, fire retardants and composites. Its
specialty graphite processing operations include the 1,200 tpa
Patalganga Project, which was commissioned in July 2019 to
manufacture and sell CARBOFLAMEX(R), a trademarked fire-retardant
expandable graphite product. At the next stage of development,
Patalganga shall further be expanded to 4,800 tpa capacity with
capabilities to also produce high purity and micronised graphite,
so increasing market and product reach by 2021. TSG has developed
unique green processing technologies for manufacturing these
advanced materials.
After establishing itself in the specialty graphite markets
through the Patalganga Project, an additional 24,000 tpa specialty
graphite processing facility is to be established in two 12,000 tpa
phases. The plant will produce expandable, high purity, micronised
and spherical graphite. The west coast of India has been chosen as
the location and a detailed feasibility study has been completed.
TSG is also in the process of establishing the Tirupati Graphene
and Mintech Research Centre, a state-of-the-art R&D centre
focussed on manufacturing graphene, developing its applications,
and further providing environmentally friendly technologies
consultancy for mineral processing.
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END
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