Green Battery Minerals (GEM) and Volt Carbon Technologies (VCT) have signed a preliminary mineral processing agreement. GEM had provided Volt Carbon with a single 5 kilogram sample of crushed feedstock that was obtained from GEM’s 100%-owned Berkwood Graphite project in Québec, Canada.
Volt Carbon processed the sample using its proprietary dry separation process technology as a test. The test result yielded 146 grams of graphite flake per kilogram of crushed feedstock, reflecting a 14.6% yield of graphite flakes per kilogram of feedstock.
The processed material was subsequently sent to a third-party lab (Base Metallurgist Laboratories Ltd. in Kamloops, British Columbia) for independent testing. Base Metallurgist Laboratories Ltd. independently verified that the Volt Carbon-processed Sample yielded a graphite content of 91.55%, with total carbon showing at 97%.
Volt Carbon has developed a proprietary dry separation process that uses air as its separation medium. The major benefits of this process compared to traditional processing are that the process:
- does not use water, which eliminates a significant amount of waste traditionally associated with the purification of graphite due to its solventless and reagentless nature;
- does not produce an effluent; and
- results in the retention of the original quality of the graphite flakes (large +50 mesh and jumbo +35 mesh sized flakes).
GEM and Volt Carbon believe that large- and jumbo-sized flakes attain premium pricing due to their high-end performance as anode material for lithium-ion batteries (LIBs).