King River Resources has made a key appointment to lead its newly formed "High Purity Metals Division” as the company looks to lay the groundwork for building a processing plant for high purity alumina in Kwinana. According to the company, newly appointed CEO, Doug Flanagan has a pedigree in delivering base and precious metal projects, rare earths and oil and gas projects in Australia, Zambia, Malaysia and Central and North America.
The move by King River to create and appoint a leader of a “High Purity Metals Division” underlines its intention to focus on in-demand critical metals such as high purity alumina that is used in LED lights, Iphone facias and lithium batteries to name a just three of its lucrative uses.
King River also owns what is widely regarded as the largest vanadium-titanium deposit in the world at its Speewah Dome project in WA’s north.
Flanagan has been named as the division’s Chief Executive Officer after joining King River on a three-month contract in June.
He is a qualified engineer with more than 25 years’ experience in the mining and energy industries at all stages of project life from construction to the operation of multibillion-dollar plants across different commodities.
King River Chairman Tony Barton said: “The directors of King River Resources believe Doug’s considerable experience and broad technical and leadership skill base will not only bring the necessary experience to progress our projects forward to execution but will drive the entire business forward with new energy and insights into the broad potential of the high purity aluminium and precursor markets.”
The company said Flanagan will focus on researching and developing new markets and building relationships with potential new clients and business partners. He will also drive King River’s existing projects to commercialisation.
Amongst the existing projects is the plan for a processing plant for high purity aluminium, or “HPA”, at Kwinana, south of Perth. King River this month gave the go-ahead for a definitive feasibility study, or “DFS”, on a facility to produce precursor aluminium compounds for lithium-ion batteries. Work on the study is expected to be finished by May 2022.
The project is a scaled-down version of King River’s original vision for a full-scale plant to produce about 9,000 tonnes of 4N, or 99.99 per cent purity, HPA a year. The newly envisioned plant will churn out around 2000 tonnes of ultra-high purity product a year that will be suitable for use in lithium batteries.
King River has previously said that a reduced scale plant could leverage its accumulated intellectual property to significantly reduce capital and operational costs compared to the full-scale option and the smaller alternative could actually produce a higher rate of financial return.
Recent studies by technology groups such as ASX-listed Altech Chemicals show the addition of HPA to lithium-ion batteries not only boosts performance but adds to their longevity, delivering a new and booming market for the product.
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By Matt Birney
