Evolution Energy Minerals reported the Company's first Life Cycle Assessment for flake graphite produced from the Chilalo Graphite Project in Tanzania. LCA is a method to assess the environmental impacts associated with all stages of a product, process or activity.1 Importantly, LCA makes it possible to evaluate indirect impacts that occur in the development of a product or process system over its entire life cycle, providing information that otherwise may not be considered. The cradle-to-gate LCA for Chilalo assesses the life cycle impact of the production of 1 kg of flake graphite concentrate (95-97% C) produced from natural flake graphite ore extracted at the Chilalo project in south-east Tanzania.

The total production chain includes mining, processing and transportation stages. The LCA was based on the 2020 Definitive Feasibility Study ("2020 DFS") and therefore does not incorporate the carbon footprint reductions that will result from the decision to introduce renewable power in the upcoming DFS. The global warming potential broken down by scopes (1, 2 and 3)2 is presented in Figure 2. The top contributors of scope 1 emissions are the combustion of diesel for the haulage fleet and co-generation sets within the mining and processing stages.

There are zero scope 2 emissions for the Chilalo project due to no energy being imported to site. The top contributors of scope 3 emissions are the embodied impact of producing diesel used for the haulage fleet and electricity source as well as the embodied impact of producing the reagents consumed within the concentration process. Transport contributes to the downstream scope 3 emissions of transporting the flake graphite concentrate to the port of Dar es Salaam.

Discussion and Comparative Review: The results above provide a benchmark that the Company assesses as the peak measure given that it is based on the use of diesel fuel for energy generation. The Company believes that mitigation initiatives, including the introduction of renewable power, will likely result in lower emissions in subsequent reviews. Even on this peak basis, the LCA for Chilalo demonstrates that the Project will have lower emissions than comparative production in other parts of the world, namely China, in particular the Heilongjiang Province where more than 50% of the world's graphite is produced.

This is shown in Figure 3 below where Minviro compared Chilalo with other known production. The impact of transporting graphite concentrate from Chilalo to Port has been removed, so the system boundaries of the comparison scenarios are sufficiently similar and comparisons can be made on a like-for-like basis.