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MINING SERVICES
FYI: IMO has it right
estern Australia’s emergence as a sign. We are working very hard on getting plain what 4Ns is about.
Wdownstream processing hub took an- the end product online,” FYI managing di- The demand for 4N HPA of about 27,000
other step recently in the inner south-east- rector Roland Hill told Paydirt. tpa globally is driven by traditional usage in
ern Perth suburb of Welshpool. Hill said the DFS numbers expected this LED screens and sapphire glass. However,
There, Independent Metallurgical Opera- month would not stray too far from the PFS acting as a separator between cathode and
tions Pty Ltd (IMO) has successfully con- details released in 2018, with the compa- anode technologies, specifically as coat-
ducted what is believed to be a world first ny’s confidence in the project growing after ings for lithium battery separators is where
pilot plant trial utilising FYI Resources Ltd’s the pilot plant matched modelled expecta- future demand for 4N HPA is headed with
kaolin and process flowsheet to produce tions. projections that demand is estimated to rise
HPA. The trial four nines (4N) HPA product is to about 35,000 tpa in the next few years.
Paydirt was among visitors, including being analysed at a special laboratory in “I think nearly to a tee everybody that
international HPA end-users, commod- the US for quality and purity assurances. is involved in this sector and this industry
ity traders, project investors and financiers Alas, FYI, which is part of WA’s Future have come and visited the site and have
and government representatives like WA’s Battery Industry Strategy, appears to have been truly impressed by what is going on,
Department of Jobs, Tourism, Science and captured some attention in the market on so the image that you might have prior to
Innovation (JTSI) to view the refining pro- the back of promising developments at the coming to site has been effectively shat-
cess last month, as FYI closes in on a DFS pilot plant facility, with the company trad- tered on the positive side,” Hill said.
on the Cadoux kaolin project, 200km east ing at its highest levels for 2019, up 15% to “The technical and marketing guys have
of Perth and 65km from Wongan Hills. 8.5c/share in the week after hosting tours of been super impressed and it is not until you
“All the offset testing that was completed the Welshpool site. see it in operation that the message is driv-
2-3 weeks ago is all going into the data Unlike graphite and lithium, HPA is still en home and that it is working and it is real;
management and harder engineering de- relatively unknown, with Hill needing to ex- you don’t go and buy a house until you visit
FYI managing director Roland Hill (right) with IMo senior Investors and a range of stakeholders viewed FYI’s continuous
metallurgist alex Borger at the pilot plant facility in Welshpool, perth Hpa refining process in operation, utilising kaolin from the
company’s Cadoux project as feedstock. The pilot plant facility
is bespoke designed and built to demonstrate the capabilities of
FYI’s innovative Hpa flowsheet design
Page 72 NOVeMBeR 2019 aUSTRaLIa’S PaYDIRT
