Recharge Resources Ltd. announce Ekosolve has achieved 99.89% purity on the first wash and 99.99% purity Lithium Carbonate (“Li2CO3”) using the Ekosolve lithium carbonate production system with brines from the Pocitos 1 Lithium Brine Project (“Pocitos One” or the “Project”) located near Pocitos township in Salta Province, Argentina. This far exceeds the purity requirement for battery grade lithium and is the quality for pharmaceutical grade.
Recharge Resources brine from Pocitos One was used for a 2-batch extraction, washing and stripping process and a 1-litre strip liquor with extracted lithium was obtained. The strip liquor then underwent a 7-stage crystallization process to produce a lithium carbonate crystalline product.
The majority of impurities, particularly calcium, potassium and sodium, were removed in the washing stage. Following that, lithium concentrations in strip liquor were concentrated in the two process cycles and the final lithium concentration in 2-liter strip liquor after mixing the 2 batches of 500 mL was 3,204.43 mg/L.
The Lithium % is accurate to +/- 0.005% so the reduction in purity from the second wash to the third wash is a function of measurement accuracy. In table 5 it is evident the Lithium content increased from 2064mg/L to 2077mg/L.
EkosolveTM is able to produce battery grade and pharmaceutical grade lithium carbonate. Prof Kathryn Mumford from the University of Melbourne commented that “Further improvement to the purity of lithium product obtained may be improved via a further systematic crystallization study”.
Ekosolve has advised that they intend to build a bigger pilot plant in Melbourne soon and be able to process 100,000 L volumes of synthetic brine.
David Greenway, President, and CEO commented, “Recharge Resources is thrilled to hit this major milestone from the Pocitos 1 Project. Achieving an impressive 99.99% purity in Lithium Carbonate is huge for the company, thanks to the outstanding efforts of the EkoSolve team in Australia and the University of Melbourne. This achievement signifies a promising future for the project, with substantial upside potential. In the face of the ongoing lithium supply shortage and the growing electrification of the economy, we at Recharge Resources are genuinely excited to witness the continuous positive development of the Pocitos 1 Project in Argentina. We are pushing forward on all fronts with our inaugural NI 43-101, a completed MT geophysics survey, a pending drill program, and a planned upcoming NI 43-101 resource estimate. These developments should make for an exciting next period for Recharge and its stakeholders at the Pocitos Lithium Project.”
Extraction Efficiency 94.9%
Ekosolve DLE technology pilot plant test work at University of Melbourne announced on June 23, 2023 achieved 94.9% extraction efficiency with brines at average lithium concentration of 86 ppm lithium. While sampling of aquifers has been as high as 174ppm with Mg values from 758 to 2521 mg/L the Ekosolve process was able to “ignore” the magnesium and produce a very high extraction of lithium.
Mr. David Charles Greenway elected chairman with new mandate to grow the Recharge team
Furthermore, the board has elected Mr. David Charles Greenway, the company’s CEO and Director to Chairman of the board and has added a mandate that Mr. Greenway identify personnel ideally suited with experience in developing resources. The board wishes to attract additional personnel that have the experience of taking established resources from the much anticipated resource estimate being prepared by WSP from indicated and inferred to proven, probable as well as stewarding the Pocitos 1 project through feasibility and permitting to the ultimate goal of constructing a 10,000 -20,000 tonne per year EkosolveTM direct lithium extraction (“DLE”) plant at the Pocitos 1 project.
WSP Engagement for NI 43-101 Resource Estimate
As announced on July 24th, 2023 the Company engaged WSP Australia Pty Ltd (“WSP”) to prepare a NI 43-101 resource estimate at Pocitos 1. WSP is a leading global consultancy with more than 67,000 professionals and consultants with expertise in hydrology and brine resource estimates. WSP will utilize information gathered from the NI 43-101 technical report dated 30 June 2023 completed by Panopus Pte Ltd and the May 2023 MT Survey, 2018 TEM survey, drilling programs, core logs and core porosity data to prepare the Resource Estimate.
The company is has completed relogging the 2018 core and interpretation of its porosity data and packer sample test depths. This data has been sent to WSP to complete the Mineral Resource Estimate.
About Pocitos Lithium Brine Project
The Pocitos 1 Project is located approximately 10km from the township of Pocitos where there is gas, electricity, and accommodation. Pocitos 1 is approximately 800 hectares and is accessible by road. Collective exploration totals over US$2.0 million developing the project, including surface sampling, trenching, TEM and MT geophysics and drilling three wells that had outstanding brine flow results. Locations for immediate follow up drilling have already been designed and identified for upcoming exploration.
Lithium values of 169 ppm from drill hole 3 packer test assayed from laboratory analysis conducted by Alex Stewart were recorded during the project’s December 2022 drill campaigns. A double packer sampling system in HQ Diamond drill holes were drilled to a depth of up to 409 metres. The flow of brine was observed to continue for more than five hours. All holes had exceptional brine flow rates. A NI 43-101 report has been released on the Pocitos 1 project.
Recharge is awaiting the completion of the process engineering work to be completed by Ekosolve Ltd to produce and assay the lithium carbonate being produced, where extraction was above 94% of the contained lithium in the brine i.e. 158.86ppm of lithium would have been recovered from 169ppm.
WSP Australia is waiting on the relogging of the cores to be completed before it delivers the Company’s maiden resource estimate at Pocitos 1 that will result in an update of the NI 43-101 report completed by QP Phillip Thomas in June 2023.
Figure 2. Pocitos Lithium Claim Map
Market Awareness
The Company is pleased to announce that it has engaged Triomphe Holdings Ltd. (dba Capital Analytica) (“Capital Analytica“) to provide a multi-faceted Promotional Enhancement Service. Capital Analytica is a Nanaimo, BC based company.
Pursuant to the agreement, Capital Analytica has agreed to provide investor relations and communications services to the company in exchange for an aggregate amount of $60,000. The services will include continuing social media consultation regarding engagement and enhancement, social sentiment reporting, social engagement reporting, discussion forum monitoring and reporting, corporate video dissemination, and other related investor relations services. The term of the Capital Analytica agreement is for a period of three months beginning October 15th, 2023.
Capital Analytica and Recharge are not related parties and operate at arm’s length. Neither Capital Analytica or its principals have any interest in the Company’s securities, directly or indirectly, or any right or intent to acquire such an interest.
For further information please contact:
Jeff French
President
Capital Analytica
Telephone: +1 (778) 882-4551
E-mail: [email protected]
Qualified Person
Phillip Thomas, BSc Geol, MBusM, FAusIMM, MAIG, MAIMVA, (CMV), a Qualified Person as defined under NI 43-101 regulations, has reviewed the technical information that forms the basis for portions of this news release, and has approved the disclosure herein.
Mr. Thomas is independent of the Company and is not a shareholder of Recharge Resources. He visited the property between January 15th-22nd, 2023 and 8 May 2023 to select core to be sampled for resource estimate calculations.
About Recharge Resources
Recharge Resources is a Canadian mineral exploration company focused on exploring and developing the production of high-value battery metals to create green, renewable energy to meet the demands of the advancing electric vehicle and fuel cell vehicle market.
On Behalf of the Board of Directors
“David Greenway”
David Greenway, CEO
