Critical Elements Lithium Corporation reported results from the winter drill program completed on the Lemare Project in the James Bay region, Eeyou Istchee, Québec. During winter 2023, the Corporation completed a 5,554-meter drill program, encompassing thirty-one drillholes to test the known lithium bearing zone on the East-West extension, as well at depth. Selected drill intersection highlights include: LE-23-32: 1.04% Li2O and 67.91 ppm Ta2O5 over 33.85 m, including 1.42% Li2O and 74.24 ppm Ta2O5 over 18.8 m; LE-23-33: 0.88% Li2O and 113.92 ppm Ta2O5 over 12.90 m; LE-23-35: 1.63% Li2O and 104.30 ppm Ta2O5 over 5.25 m; LE-23-44: 1.51% Li2O and 54.15 ppm Ta2O5 over 4.95 m; LE-23-48: 0.89% Li2O and 48.89 ppm Ta2O5 over 7.10 m; LE-23-49: 0.97% Li2O and 64.43 ppm Ta2O5 over 8.85 m, including 1.59% Li2O and 61.34 ppm Ta2O5 over 2.40 m. Critical Elements controls one of the largest hard rock lithium exploration land positions in North America, totalling 1,050 square kilometres specifically assembled for their geological setting and proximity to roads and Québec's 100% renewable energy grid.

For example, its land position includes the Corporation's advanced Rose lithium-tantalum project ("Rose") and covers the extrapolated northeast and southwest structural extensions of the Nemaska Belt, which hosts the Whabouchi mine being developed by Nemaska Lithium. Critical Elements has outlined its exploration plans in several news releases, most recently on February 1, May 16, and May 31. In addition to demonstrating the value inherent in the Corporation's exploration land package, there are three goals: Extend the life of the primary Rose project; Advance the Lemare project toward an initial resource estimate and technical studies if warranted; and Demonstrate the potential of new targets highlighted via machine learning, or artificial intelligence.

The winter 2023 drilling program on the Lemare spodumene project confirmed the 400-metre extension to the southwest and the 500-metre extension to the northeast of the main known spodumene-bearing pegmatite with variable width and spodumene content. At least two different types of sub-parallel pegmatites were intersected by the drilling. The main spodumene-bearing pegmatite features coarse quartz-feldspar-muscovite, while the second pegmatite is aphanitic quartzo-feldspathic, is generally lower grade, and is only sporadically mineralized.

The main spodumene-bearing pegmatite is controlled by a northeast-southwest structure that is recut by at least two north-south oriented faults. The information collected during the winter drilling program will be useful to better define the 3D model and better understand the pinch-and-swell character of the pegmatites at Lemare. The confirmed spodumene-prospective pegmatite strike length at Lemare now exceeds 2.2 kilometres.

However, based on Goldspot Discoveries' machine learning methodology and surface sampling results, the LCT pegmatite trend on the Lemare property has been estimated to extend for over 5 kilometres. Critical Elements intends to pursue further work on Lemare over the summer with surface mapping and a sampling program followed by incremental drilling. Lemare is well-situated within 3 kilometres of road access and is an excellent candidate for initial technical studies.

At the moment, the Corporation has temporarily suspended exploration activities on the Nemaska Belt projects in the Eeyou Istchee-James Bay region of Québec in accordance with a directive from the Ministère des Ressources Naturelles et des Forêts, which has banned forest access on Crown land and closed roads to help combat forest fires across the province. Quality assurance and quality control procedures have been implemented to ensure best practices in sampling and analysis of the core samples. The drill core was logged and then split, with one-half sent for assay and the other retained in the core box as a witness sample.

Duplicates, standards and blanks were regularly inserted into the sample stream. The core samples were delivered, in secure tagged bags, directly to the ALS Minerals laboratory facility in Val-d'Or, Quebec. The samples are weighed and identified prior to sample preparation.

The samples are crushed to 70% minus 2 mm, then separated and pulverized to 85% passing 75 µm. All samples are analyzed using sodium peroxide fusion ME-MS-89L, with full analysis for 52 elements. Value over 25,000 ppm Li were re-assays using Li-ICP-82b and value over 2,500 ppm Ta2O5 were re-assays using Ta-XRF10.