Today's announcement adds another revenue string to AV:'s bow.
Australian Vanadium Limited (ASX: AVL, “the Company” or “AVL”) is pleased to announce that it has demonstrated the capability to produce greater than 99.9% ultra-high purity vanadium pentoxide (V2O5) at pilot scale, using AVL ore. These results confirm a processing route that can easily be incorporated into the AVL flowsheet, employing well known processing technology that can be readily scaled to meet market demand.
Ultra-high purity vanadium pentoxide is critical in applications where even the smallest impurities can significantly affect performance, such as the chemical industry and specialty alloys for the aerospace industry, including defence. These growing market segments demand higher purity levels. AVL has identified the importance of satisfying this expanding market, in addition to other steel and battery markets which can use the Company’s standard 99.5% purity level.
CEO, Graham Arvidson, comments, “AVL’s ability to produce 99.9% ultra-high purity vanadium pentoxide, in addition to our 99.5% standard high purity vanadium pentoxide, allows us to further strengthen our competitive advantage in specialised markets in which premium products attract a higher value.
“Our distinct advantage as a business continues to be our outstanding technical and economic vanadium processing acumen and I commend the team for the work undertaken to create and substantiate a new pathway for additional value creation. Our conviction remains that vanadium producers who can achieve the highest quality vanadium oxides will stand above the rest and command the greatest and most enduring returns. In addition to our proposed world-class vanadium project, our lowest quartile unit cost competitiveness strategy and our focus on product quality will provide further long-term competitive advantages to the Company and superior investor return. 1 See ASX announcement dated 13 December 2021 ‘High Purity 99.5% V2O5 Produced in Final Phase of Metallurgical Work for BFS’ ASX: AVL | www.avl.au
“We have been pleased to work with the team at ANSTO and for the support that the Australian Government has provided us in achieving this milestone. Adding value to vanadium through downstream processing in Australia aligns with the Federal Government’s Critical Minerals Strategy 2023-2030 and helps to keep the value of Australia’s minerals in the country as we transition to a net zero future.” The work undertaken to achieve ultra-high purity vanadium pentoxide was partly funded through a $3.69 million Australian Government Modern Manufacturing Initiative Translation grant under the National Manufacturing Priority Roadmap.2
AVL worked in conjunction with Australia's Nuclear Science and Technology Organisation (ANSTO) in Sydney to develop a feasible processing route. The pilot for producing ultra-high purity vanadium pentoxide is the culmination of two years of work, exploring the most economic method for producing this product. The pilot was designed and operated to simulate processing of a stream diverted from the leach circuit developed in the AVL Bankable Feasibility Study (BFS) flowsheet. 3 This concept allows for easy integration of an ultra-high purity process, in addition to the Company’s high purity process, that can be scaled to match ultra-high purity demand.
Importantly, the company has filed a patent application for the extraction of high-purity V2O5 which presumably covers the work done with ANSTO:
WO2022213158A1 VANADIUM RECOVERY 20210409
[0025] In view of the desire that the invention yield an ultra high purity vanadium pentoxide product, the flowsheet of the present invention incorporates, in one form, the use of appropriate nanofiltration and solvent extraction processes in series to simultaneously recover soluble vanadium from the pregnant leach solution (PLS) and remove soluble impurities ahead of recovering a suitable vanadium-containing solid product that is ultimately converted into high-purity vanadium pentoxide. Moreover, the use of the solvent extraction technology has the added advantages of increasing the overall recovery of soluble vanadium, increasing the vanadium concentration of the PLS, as well as increasing the actual vanadium leach kinetics.
It's good to see the government finally moving away from the "dig-it-up-and-ship-it-out" business model and supporting value-adding manufacture.
Australian Vanadium Limited (ASX: AVL, “the Company” or “AVL”) is pleased to announce that it has demonstrated the capability to produce greater than 99.9% ultra-high purity vanadium pentoxide (V2O5) at pilot scale, using AVL ore. These results confirm a processing route that can easily be incorporated into the AVL flowsheet, employing well known processing technology that can be readily scaled to meet market demand.
Ultra-high purity vanadium pentoxide is critical in applications where even the smallest impurities can significantly affect performance, such as the chemical industry and specialty alloys for the aerospace industry, including defence. These growing market segments demand higher purity levels. AVL has identified the importance of satisfying this expanding market, in addition to other steel and battery markets which can use the Company’s standard 99.5% purity level.
CEO, Graham Arvidson, comments, “AVL’s ability to produce 99.9% ultra-high purity vanadium pentoxide, in addition to our 99.5% standard high purity vanadium pentoxide, allows us to further strengthen our competitive advantage in specialised markets in which premium products attract a higher value.
“Our distinct advantage as a business continues to be our outstanding technical and economic vanadium processing acumen and I commend the team for the work undertaken to create and substantiate a new pathway for additional value creation. Our conviction remains that vanadium producers who can achieve the highest quality vanadium oxides will stand above the rest and command the greatest and most enduring returns. In addition to our proposed world-class vanadium project, our lowest quartile unit cost competitiveness strategy and our focus on product quality will provide further long-term competitive advantages to the Company and superior investor return. 1 See ASX announcement dated 13 December 2021 ‘High Purity 99.5% V2O5 Produced in Final Phase of Metallurgical Work for BFS’ ASX: AVL | www.avl.au
“We have been pleased to work with the team at ANSTO and for the support that the Australian Government has provided us in achieving this milestone. Adding value to vanadium through downstream processing in Australia aligns with the Federal Government’s Critical Minerals Strategy 2023-2030 and helps to keep the value of Australia’s minerals in the country as we transition to a net zero future.” The work undertaken to achieve ultra-high purity vanadium pentoxide was partly funded through a $3.69 million Australian Government Modern Manufacturing Initiative Translation grant under the National Manufacturing Priority Roadmap.2
AVL worked in conjunction with Australia's Nuclear Science and Technology Organisation (ANSTO) in Sydney to develop a feasible processing route. The pilot for producing ultra-high purity vanadium pentoxide is the culmination of two years of work, exploring the most economic method for producing this product. The pilot was designed and operated to simulate processing of a stream diverted from the leach circuit developed in the AVL Bankable Feasibility Study (BFS) flowsheet. 3 This concept allows for easy integration of an ultra-high purity process, in addition to the Company’s high purity process, that can be scaled to match ultra-high purity demand.
Importantly, the company has filed a patent application for the extraction of high-purity V2O5 which presumably covers the work done with ANSTO:
WO2022213158A1 VANADIUM RECOVERY 20210409
[0025] In view of the desire that the invention yield an ultra high purity vanadium pentoxide product, the flowsheet of the present invention incorporates, in one form, the use of appropriate nanofiltration and solvent extraction processes in series to simultaneously recover soluble vanadium from the pregnant leach solution (PLS) and remove soluble impurities ahead of recovering a suitable vanadium-containing solid product that is ultimately converted into high-purity vanadium pentoxide. Moreover, the use of the solvent extraction technology has the added advantages of increasing the overall recovery of soluble vanadium, increasing the vanadium concentration of the PLS, as well as increasing the actual vanadium leach kinetics.
It's good to see the government finally moving away from the "dig-it-up-and-ship-it-out" business model and supporting value-adding manufacture.