Batteries for all power sources need manganese to function, so news on the mining front for that substance should turn heads.
Monday, it was the turn of Montreal-based Manganese X Energy Corp. (TSX-Venture:MN) to announce that – along with Kemetco Research -- it has been able to produce manganese sulfate with a purity exceeding 99.6% and very low levels of base and alkali metals (Cu, Pb, Ni and Zn below 10 ppm and Na, K and Ca below 50 ppm) harmful in battery-grade compounds.
Manganese X and Kemetco will continue to develop a competitive flowsheet in the next two quarters, in order to produce a high-purity (>99.9%) battery-grade manganese product for the growing electric vehicle and energy storage sectors, using the safe and sustainable North America mineral resource from Battery Hill.
Enthused CEO Martin Kepman, "This is a significant step for us towards the development of a battery-grade manganese product; we are particularly excited with the fact that many of the critically deleterious elements are extracted from our manganese product at the beginning of the flowsheet, without the use of expensive or highly hazardous reagents and processes."
Shares caught that enthusiasm, gaining two cents, or 13.8%, to 16.5 cents, on volume topping 103,000 by noon hour ET on Monday.
