Company Announcements

25 October 2021

RNS REACH

Pensana Plc

("Pensana" or "the Company")

The Sunday Times selects Pensana as stock pick ahead of COP26 and 'EV boom'

Pensana has again been named a top stock ahead of COP26 as published in The Sunday Times yesterday. 

The article, titled Five shares you can buy to hitch a ride on the EV boom, notes Saltend's globally unique location in a Freeport and that the Company's £15m equity fundraising kickstarted early works on site in June 2021, among other strengths.

Earlier this month, British investment bank Liberum also picked Pensana as a top pick for COP26 and as one of three UK companies that meet the climate leaders gold standard.

Pensana's Chairman, Paul Atherley, said: "The electrification of motive power is the biggest energy transformation in history and is dependent on the supply of powerful rare earth magnets which is dominated by China.

Rare earth prices continue to rise and have pushed through US$100,000 per tonne as the awareness grows that China is going to need all of its magnet production for its $11 trillion Carbon Neutral plan.

Building a rare earth processing hub in a Freeport in the UK will be a major step in establishing an independent and sustainable supply chain for these critical magnet metals."

The Sunday Times article can be read here: https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/five-shares-you-can-buy-to-hitch-a-ride-on-the-ev-boom-mx6vc97vp 

About Pensana

The electrification of motive power is the most important part of the energy transition and one of the biggest energy transitions in history. Magnet metals are central to the transition and critical to high value manufacturing applications such as electric vehicles and offshore wind turbines.

Pensana plans to establish Saltend as an independent, sustainable supplier of the key magnet metal oxides to a market which is currently dominated by China. The US$125 million Saltend facility is being designed to produce circa 12,500 tonnes per annum of rare earth oxides, of which 4,500 tonnes will be neodymium and praseodymium (NdPr), representing around 5% of the world market in 2025.

The Saltend facility is located within the world class Saltend Chemicals Park, a cluster of leading chemicals and renewable energy businesses at the heart of the UK's energy estuary, and host to a range of companies including BP Petrochemicals technology, INEOS, Air Products, Triton Power, Nippon Gohsei and Tricoya. 

Pensana's plug and play facility will create over 500 jobs during construction and over 100 direct jobs once in production. It will be the first major separation facility to be established in over a decade and will become one of only three major producers located outside China.

Initial feedstock will be shipped as a clean, high purity mixed rare earth sulphate (MRES) from the Company's Longonjo low impact mine in Angola. The open-cast mine, state-of-the-art concentrator and proprietary MRES processing plant are being designed by Wood to the highest international standards. They will be powered by minimal carbon hydro-electric power and connected to the Port of Lobito by the recently upgraded Benguela railway line.

Pensana is of the view that provenance of critical rare earth materials supply, life cycle analysis and GHG Scope 1, 2 and 3 emissions will all become significant factors in supply chains for major customers. The Company intends to offer customers an independently and sustainably sourced supply of the metal oxides and carbonates of increasing importance to a range of applications central to the energy transition, industrial, medical, military and communications sectors.

For many miners around the world who are looking to access the European and US supply chains, it is becoming increasingly clear that the proposed EU and possible UK carbon border taxation would mean that it is no longer acceptable for manufacturers to source material extracted or processed unsustainably.

Pensana is aiming to establish Saltend as an attractive alternative to mining houses who may otherwise be limited to selling their products to China, having designed the facility to be easily adapted to cater for a range of rare earth feedstocks.