WA Kaolin on track to complete construction and installation activities at Wickepin Project by year-end

WA Kaolin Ltd is on track to complete construction and installation activities at its Wickepin Kaolin Project southeast of Perth in WA by the end of 2021, as building work at the end of the June quarter reached a completion target of 92%. To date, 100% of the structural steel building and roofing has been completed by AUSPAN, one of Australia’s leading steel frame construction companies, while walls and doors hit 85% completion and civil works and concrete floors holding 95% completion. Final inspections are expected to be complete by the end of this month and the internal fit-out and cladding of the site laboratory and control room is expected to be completed in early August. Stage 1 work program. As construction and installation activities continue, the next steps the company will focus on are: Equipment fabrication, and commissioning; and Equip and start-up Wickepin laboratory. The mining campaign at Wickepin is underway with high-grade material extracted from Pit 2 Equipment Engineering design works on the fixed plant at Wickepin are all completed and signed off – only minor items await construction drawings, whilst the main kiln is expected to be complete and be delivered by the end of August 2021. A purchase order and contract are in place for the product collection, one of the largest equipment components of the plant, which is used to capture the kaolin during the separation process to be transferred for packaging. WAK estimates, whilst delivery will be progressive, with structures arriving first to allow wiring to be readied, all components will arrive at Wickepin by the end of September 2021. New customers Throughout the quarter, WA Kaolin continued to build its customer base. Under the guidance of the newly appointed sales and marketing manager, Justin Swan, the team has delivered an increase in new customers. New customers include a brick company in Australia, a ceramics company in Vietnam, a fibreglass company in Japan and a rubber company in China. All new orders were contracted at prices higher than the Definitive Feasibility Study (DFS) value for each grade. 15-year LNG supply contract In May, WA Kaolin announced the signing of a 15-year contract for the supply of Liquefied Natural Gas (LNG) for the Wickepin Kaolin Project, with Mid-West LNG Pty Ltd, a group company of Clean Energy Fuels Australia (CEFA). CEFA is an established Perth-based company that provides, as part of its energy transition platform, integrated solutions developing small scale LNG infrastructure assets for remote mining operations and communities within Australia. Through Mid-West LNG Pty Ltd, CEFA is in the process of building a new LNG plant in Mount Magnet, approximately 600 kilometres north of Wickepin. WAK will be the second customer supplied from this new facility. The Mount Magnet LNG Hub, once completed, will have the ability to supply in excess of 500 tonners per day of LNG. This supply of LNG to Wickepin will be used to fire the rotary kiln that dries the kaolin ore, which is the first step in the Company’s proprietary K99 dry processing method. The contract, valued at $22 million includes the supply of commissioning gas from September 1, 2021, to the end of 2021 will begin on January 1, 2022, and will run for 15 years with reviews at year 5 and year 10, and provides for two options to extend for a further five years respectively.