5N+ Purity and On-Spec EBC Confirm Lac Knife's Potential as a North American Source of Ultra-High-Performance Graphite Applications
Ottawa, Ontario -
Newsfile Corp. - December 11, 2025 -
Focus Graphite Inc. (TSXV: FMS) (OTCQB: FCSMF) (FSE: FKC0) ("
Focus" or the "
Company") a Canadian developer of high-grade flake graphite deposits and innovator of next-generation battery technology, is pleased to announce that follow-on purification and elemental analysis of material from its Lac Knife deposit (concentrate Lot ID: GN25073005) achieved 99.9996 wt.% ("
5N+") and an Equivalent Boron Concentration ("
EBC") of 2.03 ppm, confirming the material is within nuclear-grade specification and meets the technical thresholds required for several high-value advanced materials markets. The test work, conducted using electrothermal purification with no halogen gases (e.g. chlorine) or acids, produced this ultra-pure result in two (2) hours, further validating a chemical-free, environmentally advantageous pathway compared to conventional purification methods. These results directly support Focus's ongoing engineering and scale-up programs funded under Natural Resources Canada's ("
NRCan") Global Partnerships Initiative ("
GPI"), under which the Company was awarded a non-repayable contribution of up to $14.1 million to accelerate North American capacity for clean, advanced material processing. Subsequent elemental analysis calculated in accordance with ASTM C1233-15: Standard Practice for Determining Equivalent Boron Contents of Nuclear Materials yielded an Equivalent Boron Concentration ("
EBC") of 2.03 ppm (Table 1), which falls below the critical 3 ppm threshold often cited for nuclear-grade graphite applications. The calculated EBC value is the most critical test of purity for nuclear industry use. These results suggest that Lac Knife graphite has the potential to serve markets requiring ultra-high-purity large and jumbo flake natural graphite. Achieving both 5N+ purity and a high proportion of large-flake concentrate is uncommon in the natural graphite industry and may provide Focus with opportunities in markets historically reliant on synthetic graphite or otherwise inaccessible to peers. These findings are consistent with peer-reviewed research published in
ACS Omega ("
Ultrahigh Temperature Purification of Graphite for the Development of a Continuous Process," ACS Omega, 2025), conducted by American Energy Technologies Company ("
AETC") and NRCan, which demonstrated that ultrahigh-temperature purification of natural Canadian graphite can produce materials exhibiting purity and crystallinity suitable for advanced applications. Focus's ongoing testwork indicates that residual impurities appear primarily on the surface of the graphite flake—as evidenced by ultra-fine features observed through scanning electron microscopy—suggesting that purification efficiency is strongly influenced by surface cleaning dynamics rather than structural defects within the carbon lattice. Dean Hanisch, Chief Executive Officer of Focus commented, "These results validate Lac Knife as one of the rare unique natural graphite deposits capable of competing in high margin advanced technological markets and as a potential alternative to synthetic materials that are more expensive and have a larger environmental impact. With support from Canada's Federal Government, through Natural Resources Canada's Global Partnerships Initiative, we are now positioned to accelerate our scale-up work and unlock commercial pathways across nuclear energy, defense systems, graphene production, and next-generation electronics." Lac Knife graphite's combination of ultra-high purity and large flake distribution positions it for a range of advanced industrial, clean energy, and high-technology applications.
Unlocking Advanced Markets Beyond Nuclear Beyond nuclear applications, the ultra-high purity and medium-grain morphology of Lac Knife graphite position the material as a strategic feedstock for several advanced technology markets facing supply shortages, performance bottlenecks, and increasing scrutiny over material purity.
Graphene & Few-Layer Graphene (FLG) Production In the graphene sector, precursor quality is the primary determinant of performance. Impurities commonly found in natural graphite—typically 0.5-1 microns in size, or roughly one thousand (1000) times thicker than a graphene layer—are known to disrupt electrical, thermal, and mechanical properties unless fully removed. Lac Knife's 5N+ purity eliminates these defects at the source, allowing the flake to exfoliate cleanly into high-value graphene structures. Peer-reviewed research published in
Carbon ("Influence of graphite geography on the yield of mechanically exfoliated few-layer graphene," Carbon, 2023) demonstrates the significance of geological origin in FLG production. In follow-on AETC—Yale University testing based on the methodologies outlined in that study, Lac...
