ASX Hazer Group produces synthetic graphite of 99% purity even under non-optimised conditions, and inches closer to potentially disrupting the entire graphite market

PERTH, AUSTRALIA; 2nd AUGUST 2016: Hazer Group Ltd is pleased to announce preliminary characterisation results for its initial synthetic graphite production from Hazer’s development work at the University of Sydney.

Hazer has produced graphite at 99% tgc (total graphite content), through initial methane decomposition and a single stage chemical purification. Importantly, the chemical purification can be undertaken without the use of hydrofluoric acid (HF). Prior to chemical purification, the graphite product harvested directly from the Hazer reactor under non-optimised conditions has tgc purity of 86%.

Not only is Hazer’s graphite of high purity, when benchmarking against commercial graphite the general characteristics of Hazer graphite show excellent comparison to high-end commercial forms of graphite, including primary synthetic graphite and synthetic spherical graphite, used for upper end lithium-ion batteries, and little resemblance to lower value amorphous carbon AC (Carbon Black).

The synthetic graphite produced by the Hazer Process comes from natural gas using iron ore as a process catalyst. The use of these low cost feedstocks, and the simple production of high grade graphite concentrates that can be purified to 99% tgc, gives Hazer the potential to become highly cost competitive in the premium graphite market.