Vital Produces High Grade Concentrate in First Run at Saskatoon REE Plant

8 July 2022

Highlights

• Vital achieves a high-grade concentrate of 43.7% TREO and 75.2% TREO recovery (single pass) from the first commissioning trial of the dense media separation (DMS) unit at its Saskatoon rare earth extraction plant
• The TREO concentrate grade (the Sinks) achieved from the DMS plant’s initial run was comparable to the laboratory metallurgical testwork grade performed by SGS, 43.7% TREO vs 44.6% TREO
• Vital will use results from the DMS to further finetune the plant
• Vital is working towards producing a 2.5t rare earth carbonate qualification sample for offtake partner REEtec Ag
• Carbonate production ramp-up will follow, once qualification is complete

Canada’s first rare earths producer Vital Metals Limited (ASX: VML l OTCQB: VTMXF) (“Vital”, “Vital Metals” or “the Company”) is pleased to report that results from the first feed of the dense media separation (DMS) unit at its Saskatoon rare earths extraction facility in Saskatchewan, Canada, is comparable to the TREO grade achieved from laboratory metallurgical testwork in its first run.

Results show the DMS plant Sinks achieved comparable grades to those seen in testwork, with 43.7% total rare earth oxide (TREO) achieved from the DMS Cyclone at Saskatoon, compared to 44.6% TREO achieved in laboratory conditions at SGS.

The DMS unit also achieved 75.2% recovery in its first run for a single pass, processing ~2,300kg of concentrate mined at Vital’s Nechalacho rare earth project (North T zone), sorted onsite and then crushed at the Saskatchewan Research Council (SRC) facility adjacent to Vital’s Saskatoon plant.

With the concentrate grade reaching the target, the plant will now undergo some adjustments and ultimately further trials will be conducted that involve taking the tails (floats) from the 1st pass and subjecting it to a second scavenging step to try and increase the recovery further, whilst maintaining the combined sinks concentrate grade >40% TREO.

Vital Metals Managing Director Geoff Atkins said: “Our team has achieved outstanding results from the DMS unit during initial commissioning at Saskatoon and the fact that on the first run we hit the laboratory test grades for total rare earths with 75% recovery with low grade feed material is above expectations. There will be work to do with optimising our process over the coming months but these initial results demonstrate incredible potential. It gives us a great level of confidence for future commissioning activities through the remaining process.

“I acknowledge the hard work of our team onsite at Saskatoon, led by our General Manager Commissioning Ray Anguelov, for their efforts in helping Vital achieve these results during plant commissioning, and I thank them for their efforts.

“We look forward to continuing our commissioning process with the production of our 2.5T qualification sample followed by production ramp-up.”

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