Nouveau Monde Graphite Inc. (“NMG” or the “Firm”) points the outcomes of the Up to date Technical Feasibility Research Report for the Matawinie Mine and Bécancour Battery Materials Plant Built-in Graphite Tasks (the “Up to date Feasibility Research”) carried out in accordance with the Nationwide Instrument 43-101 (“NI 43-101”)
Nouveau Monde Graphite Inc. (“NMG” or the “Firm”) points the outcomes of the Up to date Technical Feasibility Research Report for the Matawinie Mine and Bécancour Battery Materials Plant Built-in Graphite Tasks (the “Up to date Feasibility Research”) carried out in accordance with the Nationwide Instrument 43-101 (“NI 43-101”). Carried out by BBA Inc. and numerous specialised consultants, the Up to date Feasibility Research pulled from NMG’s 2022 Feasibility Research and up to date key parameters in mild of technological improvement, venture optimizations, engineering development, and up to date financial components.
Outcomes of the Up to date Feasibility Research point out that NMG’s Section 2 is technically possible in addition to economically viable. Upon a constructive remaining funding determination (“FID”), the Matawinie Mine and Bécancour Battery Materials Plant could possibly be constructed and enter business manufacturing inside lower than three years. Contemplating that its venture financing, practically 100% of its income, a big quantity of its capital expenditures and curiosity bills are anticipated to be denominated in U.S. {dollars}, the Firm has aligned the Up to date Feasibility Research monetary metrics with this forex, enabling a greater illustration of the underlying financial realities of the money flows related to this built-in venture and the related capital construction.NMG’s built-in manufacturing mannequin, overlaying the complete worth chain from mining to superior processing, is designed to cater to the North American electrical automobile (“EV”) and power storage market with a turnkey, native supply of pure graphite energetic anode materials. NMG has signed offtake agreements with Panasonic Power Co., Ltd. (“Panasonic Power”), a completely owned subsidiary of Panasonic Holdings Company (“Panasonic”) and Normal Motors Holdings LLC, a completely owned subsidiary of Normal Motors Co. (collectively, “GM”), (collectively, NMG’s “Anchor Clients”) overlaying greater than 80% of the Firm’s deliberate Section-2 manufacturing of energetic anode materials.
Arne H Frandsen, Chair of NMG, mentioned:
“The underlying driver for NMG’s ore-to-battery-material enterprise is plain. Whereas inflation, geopolitics, and commerce dynamics create turbulences, we’re targeted on delivering on our mission to responsibly produce carbon-neutral superior graphite supplies to energy the power transition. Right this moment’s outcomes reveal the engaging operation that we now have engineered inside a secure jurisdiction and underpinned by excessive ESG ideas to assist North American producers safe and reshore their provide chain.”
Eric Desaulniers, Founder, President, and CEO of NMG, declared:
“We’ve been arduous at work over the previous months to look at, problem, and refine each element of our future operations. The enter of our Anchor Clients coupled with superior precision by means of engineering, tools specs, procurement, and building planning have enabled us to optimize our projected Section-2 business manufacturing. We’re assured that our plans will ship a performing and aggressive operation, supplying extremely specialised merchandise to our Anchor Clients. I’m desperate to current the outcomes to our monetary companions in view of FID.“
Built-in manufacturing, from ore to battery supplies
Leveraging the Matawinie Mine manufacturing as feedstock for the Bécancour Battery Materials Plant, NMG has developed an built-in materials flowsheet to maximise the manufacturing of high-value energetic anode materials destined to the battery market segments. Therefore, the 2 services are set to function in tandem to maximise operational efficiencies and margins alongside the worth chain.
Desk 1: Financial Highlights of NMG’s Built-in Section-2 Graphite Operations
Each greenfield initiatives, the Matawinie Mine and Bécancour Battery Materials Plan have been costed utilizing take a look at work outcomes, Section-1 operations, provider quotations and consultants’ in-house databases. NMG and its consulting corporations have refined design, engineering, and building parameters to allow value optimization. Moreover, reserved blocks of Québec’s reasonably priced clear hydropower underpins the Firm’s operations, economics construction and carbon-neutrality dedication.
NMG’s built-in enterprise mannequin, with a secured feedstock, close-by operations on the western market’s doorstep and operational flexibility to adapt manufacturing primarily based on demand, represents a secure and cost-effective construction in at the moment’s everchanging macroeconomics.
The Firm’s superior processing capacities on the future Section-2 Bécancour Battery Materials Plant allow tailor-made manufacturing to distinctive buyer specs. Nearly all of the long run Matawinie Mine manufacturing is ready to be refined into energetic anode materials, whereas a portion of jumbo and huge high-purity flake graphite is ready to be directed to specialty markets, with some flexibility within the allocation of volumes.
The Up to date Feasibility Research incorporates NMG’s provide agreements with Panasonic Power, GM and Traxys, in addition to market research by Benchmark Mineral Intelligence, a acknowledged, regulated and unbiased worth reporting company. NMG’s beforehand introduced offtake agreements, that are topic to completion of circumstances precedent and the project-related agreements, with its Anchor Clients present visibility, pricing confidence, and lowered commercialization prices.
Desk 2: Commercialization Plans for NMG’s Built-in Section-2 Manufacturing
Matawinie Mine
The Matawinie Mine stays largely the identical as mirrored in NMG’s earlier technical report. The Up to date Feasibility Research considers revised key parameters and prices, leveraging development within the venture for the reason that 2022 report, particularly by means of detailed engineering, preparatory work on the web site, key contracts awarded and/or negotiated, procurement planning, building preparation, in addition to optimization of operations between the 2 Section-2 services.
The Matawinie graphite property, wherein the Firm owns a 100% curiosity, is situated roughly 120 km because the crow flies north of Montréal, Québec, Canada, in Saint-Michel-des-Saints. The Tony Declare Block, a part of the property, consists of 159 unique exploration rights totaling 8,266 hectares. For the reason that deposit discovery, a complete exploration program recognized crystalline flake graphite mineralization, in the end resulting in the definition of Mineral Sources and Mineral Reserves (as offered under).
The Mineral Sources for the West Zone of the mining property relies on a complete of 8,274 assay intervals collected from 27,888 m of core drilling and three floor trenches offering 207 channel samples. Correct high quality management measures, together with the insertion of duplicate, clean, and commonplace samples, have been used all through the exploration applications and returned inside acceptable limits.
Desk 3: Present Pit-Constrained Mineral Useful resource Estimate for the West Zone
Desk 3: Present Pit-Constrained Mineral Useful resource Estimate for the West Zone
The long run Matawinie Mine web site is well accessible through the devoted entry highway that NMG constructed to connect with the native freeway and is near key infrastructure, together with paved roads and high-voltage energy traces, and the regional neighborhood, which supplies a pool of staff and contractors. The venture is in proximity to the Montréal metropolitan space, which additionally has expert labor and lots of key suppliers.
Since 2015, a number of metallurgical course of improvement and optimization applications have been carried out on samples from the Matawinie graphite mineralization zones. The applications targeted on the event of a flowsheet that maximizes focus grade and restoration, whereas minimizing flake degradation. NMG has been working the Section-1 Matawinie Demonstration Plant since 2018 to assist de-risking the method and produce graphite focus samples for buyer analysis and processing technological improvement. All elements included within the Matawinie Mine course of are mature applied sciences.
With a 25-year lifetime of mine (“LOM”), the Matawinie Mine will leverage the West Zone deposit for a nominal manufacturing of 105,882 tonnes each year (“tpa”) of graphite focus. The deposit can be mined utilizing standard open-pit mining strategies consisting of drilling, blasting, loading, and hauling. To maximise the NPV, mining phases have been designed and included into the mining plan to defer waste rock stripping and supply a balanced blended feed grade for the on-site concentrator over the LOM. Via crushing, milling, flotation, cleansing, and drying, the ore can be concentrated to realize 97.5% C(t).
Tailings produced on the concentrator can be segregated after the desulphurization circuit into low-sulphur content material of non-acid producing (“NAG”) tailings and a sulphide focus of probably‑acid producing (“PAG”) tailings. Each NAG and PAG can be filtered to cut back water content material after which co-disposed with waste rock into deposition cells on a lined platform. The co‑deposition storage facility can be situated at floor and as of 12 months 7, tailings and waste rocks will even be positioned within the mined-out areas of the open pit. The deposit can be mined from south to north to make sure satisfactory house is on the market for in‑pit backfilling.
Desk 5: Operational and Financial Highlights of the Matawinie Mine
A ministerial decree authorizing the Matawinie Mine (Decree # 47-2021) was granted by the Québec Authorities and all permits and authorizations pertaining to exploration, geotechnical, hydrogeological, and early preparatory works to this point have been obtained.
Early works on the Matawinie Mine have included to this point tree clearing, building of the practically 8-km entry highway, preparation of the commercial pad, and civil works for environmental infrastructure. The location is taken into account concrete-ready for the beginning of building upon a constructive FID, with numerous key contracts having been awarded, together with course of tools, the devoted powerline and {the electrical} substation.
Bécancour Battery Materials Plant
The Section-2 Bécancour Battery Materials Plant is deliberate as a complete superior processing platform set to obtain Matawinie graphite focus manufacturing for refining and business distribution. Plans for this facility have been considerably revised utilizing inputs from NMG’s Section-1 operations, know-how improvement, and engineering.
Roughly 150 km northeast of Montréal on the Saint Lawrence River, within the coronary heart of Québec’s “battery valley”, NMG’s Bécancour web site is situated adjoining to its Section-1 purification plant, inside a longtime industrial park. The location supplies sturdy native infrastructure with a direct provide of chemical compounds from close by producers, reasonably priced hydroelectricity, multimodal logistics (worldwide deep-sea port, railway, and expressway) and a regional pool of expert workforce.
The long run Bécancour Battery Materials Plant will regroup shaping, purification and coating capacities to provide battery-grade energetic anode materials.
The shaping course of, basically a mechanical transformation, reduces the flake measurement (micronization) and rounds graphite materials (spheronization) to extend the density of the spherical graphite for battery use. At its Section-1 facility, NMG has already assimilated and refined this course of, and examined completely different tools to tell the engineering of the Section-2 plant. Shaping generates a micronized graphite by-product to be offered.
Purification removes impurities from the spheronized graphite to convey the product to ≥99.90% carbon content material. Following testing at its Section-1 Purification Plant plus third-party websites, trade-off analyses and course of optimization, NMG has chosen the prevalent chemical purification know-how for its future Section-2 Bécancour Battery Materials Plant. Business operations worldwide have demonstrated the efficiency and effectivity of this know-how according to battery producers’ necessities; thus, lowering the technological dangers for the venture. Continued optimization of the method to refine environmental efficiency, operational, and monetary parameters together with pattern manufacturing are being carried out at partnering services to help detailed engineering and commercialization efforts.
The coating goals at enhancing the electrochemical efficiency of energetic anode materials in lithium-ion batteries. To ascertain the right know-how, precursor sort and course of parameters, NMG carried out completely different research and checks at its Section-1 facility, in unbiased laboratories and at suppliers’ take a look at services. Most applied sciences chosen are being extensively used within the trade, additional lowering technological dangers.
Desk 6: Operational and Financial Highlights of the Bécancour Battery Materials Plant
In preparation for the launch of building, preliminary works – tree clearing, on-site highway building, web site grading – have been carried out in 2024.
Accountable Manufacturing & ESG
According to its environmental, social and governance (“ESG”) practices, NMG plans to construct and function an built-in manufacturing that promotes stewardship all through its worth chain. The Firm strives to forestall and restrict potential impacts by means of the introduction of accountable practices together with co-disposal dry stacking of tailings, progressive reclamation of the Matawinie web site, technique for the electrification of its operations, water recycling, greenhouse fuel discount measures, and energetic stakeholder engagement at each stage of venture improvement. NMG has signed a collaboration and benefit-sharing settlement with the Municipality of Saint-Michel-des-Saints in addition to an impression and profit settlement with the Atikamekw First Nation of Manawan.
NMG is dedicated to pursuing its efforts to enhance its practices, applied sciences, merchandise, and procurement because it advances the detailed engineering, building, commissioning, and launch of economic manufacturing. The Firm strives to maximise alternatives for Indigenous and native staff, contractors, and communities all through the venture execution.
Subsequent Steps and High quality Assurance
The affirmation of NMG’s Section-2 viability by means of the Up to date Feasibility Research permits the Firm to enter its venture financing stage with a view to achieve FID.
There isn’t any certainty that the financial forecasts on which the Up to date Feasibility Research relies can be realized. There are a selection of dangers and uncertainties identifiable to any new venture and often cowl the mineralization, course of, monetary, atmosphere and allowing points. Following an evaluation of the foremost dangers to the initiatives, a P50 administration danger reserve of US$122M is beneficial. This reserve shouldn’t be included within the capital value estimate however is inside the vary of the monetary sensitivity evaluation of the capital value. The highest dangers are: 1) The optimization of the water remedy course of know-how; 2) The environment friendly integration of key Asian suppliers into the venture detailed engineering and building; and three) The qualification by the shoppers of the product from the Matawinie Mine and the Bécancour Battery Materials Plant.
A sensitivity evaluation reveals that the viability of the Tasks is not going to be considerably weak to variations in capital and working prices inside the margins of error related to the Up to date Feasibility Research estimates. Nonetheless, the viability of the Tasks stays extra weak to the USD/CAD trade charge and the bigger uncertainty in future market costs.
Scientific and technical data offered on this press launch was reviewed and permitted by André Allaire, P.Eng. (BBA), Yann Camus, P.Eng. (SGS Geological Providers) and Jeffrey Cassoff, P.Eng. (BBA), Certified Individuals as outlined underneath NI 43-101.
The Up to date Feasibility Research can be filed on SEDAR+ at www.sedarplus.ca, EDGAR at www.sec.gov and on the Firm’s web site at www.NMG.com inside 45 days of this press launch. Readers are inspired to learn the Research in its entirety, together with all {qualifications}, assumptions and exclusions that relate to the small print summarized on this press launch. The Research is meant to be learn as an entire, and sections shouldn’t be learn or relied upon out of context.
SOURCE: Nouveau Monde Graphite
