Graphite explorer Renascor Resources (ASX:RNU) has shaken hands with New South Wales company Sicona Battery Technologies on a plan to develop battery anode material.

As a first step, Renascor will serve up material from its Siviour graphite project in South Australia so Sicona can test it in high-performance standard-energy graphite anodes and next-generation silicon-composite anode materials that use its own technologies.

The anode is the positive terminal of a battery – important because this is the end which electricity flows into.

Renascor’s $388m project on the Eyre Peninsula needs $114m to get going and produce about 80,000 tonnes a year in the first four years and up to 144,000 tonnes per annum from year five onwards following expansion.

Average earnings before interest, tax, depreciation and amortisation for the project would be $83m if the sales price was about $1,149 a tonne.

Renascor has plans for pilot production trials down the track and, eventually, production of commercial-scale quantities.

The company has pencilled in a binding agreement for the March 2020 financial quarter.

 

In other ASX battery metals news today:

Element 25 (ASX:E25) has put out another update on its pre-feasibility study for the Butcherbird manganese project, finding “no fatal flaws” at this stage. E25’s work programs are nearing completion as the company models a potential production hub for electrolytic manganese metal (EMM) and high-purity manganese sulphate monohydrate (HPMSM). Its EMM could be targeted at the steel industry while HPMSM could go into lithium-ion batteries for electric vehicles.

Bass Metals (ASX:BSM) has gained on declaring itself in a new value-building stage, in an update released ahead of monsoon season in Madagascar. The company is expecting to release a feasibility study for its large graphite project in the country, Graphmada, by the end of 2020 and hopes for “materially” low capital expenditure and operating costs for the 14.3-million-tonne project. BSM added 16.7 per cent to trade at 0.7c by late morning.

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