January
The UK government
outlined plans to advance development of
graphene with a £21.5m ($35m) investment
fund announced at the end of December. This came after a new
report revealed the bulk of research into graphene is taking
place outside the UK, the country in which it was
discovered.
China imposed a
6.5% import tax on coated spherical graphite in a move to
strengthen its influence over on the lithium-ion (li-ion)
battery market. Certain countries, such as Bhutan, Palestine
and Serbia, will incur a higher levy of 35% but major
importers, like the US and major European countries, all remain
on the lower tier.
Manzhouli Customs
officials in Inner Mongolia, China, uncovered an
operation to smuggle large quantities of flake graphite out of
the country by reporting lower than actual export prices. By
reporting prices below the market value of the material, an
unnamed Chinese company evaded tax totalling Chinese renminbi
(Rmb) 486,400 ($78,000) on exports of more than 2,000 tonnes
flake graphite worth around Rmb11m ($1.8m).
March
London-listed biofuels producer
Biofutures International Plc said it is to use
graphene-enhanced drilling fluids made from biogases to tap the
booming shale gas market under the new name, Graphene
NanoChem.
Global defence contractor and
technology firm Lockheed Martin was awarded a
patent by the US Patent and Trademark Office for a
graphene-based water filtration technique, which it claims is
100 times more efficient at desalinating solutions than
conventional techniques. The process uses a material called
Perforene, which was developed by Lockheed Martin by puncturing
holes one nanometer or less in diameter in a graphene
membrane.
April
Sri Lanka’s
trade ministry approached the Chinese government for investment
in its mining and mineral processing sectors, with particular
emphasis on mineral sands and graphite. Rishad Bathiudeen, Sri
Lanka’s Minister for trade and commerce, was quoted as
telling China’s envoy to Colombo, Wu Jianghao, during a
visit to the island in March that “Sri Lanka wants to
upgrade its mineral sector,” and that it was looking to
Asia’s biggest economy to back its development
initiatives.
Canada’s Grafoid
Inc. signed a joint venture (JV) agreement with
CapTherm Systems Inc. to develop and commercialise
graphene-based thermal management systems for electric vehicle
(EV) batteries and light emitting diodes (LEDs).
The company later announced that it
signed a two-year R&D agreement with the University
of Waterloo, Ontario, to develop energy storage
materials for the automotive and portable electronics
sectors.
British science innovations such as
graphene and quantum computing were highlighted as being
targeted by industrial spies seeking to steal technology
secrets, the UK security service MI5 warned in
April.
Elsewhere, graphene’s ability
to penetrate multiple markets and command prices of over a
billion dollars for small quantities are purely conceptual
credentials, given that the material has yet to define a
market, was the message from graphene companies attending the
Graphene Live 2013 conference in Berlin.
One of Canada’s leading
graphite exploration companies, Mason Graphite
Inc, joined only a handful of juniors in publishing
production and cost details of its Lac GuŽret project in
north Quebec. Using IM’s
graphite prices as the basis for its preliminary economic
assessment (PEA), Mason expects to produce a tonne of flake
graphite concentrate for $390/tonne which, if realised, puts it
in line with the higher-cost Chinese producers.
Swiss graphite producer
Timcal SA, part of Imerys, has confirmed that
it is “seriously considering” graphene as a market
for its graphite products” Graphene production is one
potential route for natural graphite, as well as synthetic
carbon, and this is interesting to us,” Dr Sergio Pacheco
Benito, development scientist for Timcal, told
IM at the ImagineNano Graphene 2013 meeting in
Bilbao.
Two of the world’s leading
manufacturers of synthetic graphite products, Germany’s
SGL Group and US-based GrafTech International,
reported weaker than expected results for the first three
months of 2013, citing difficult market conditions.
Chinese exports of amorphous
graphite increased for the first time in April, with monthly
figures reflecting a more robust market for amorphous products
amidst continually sluggish flake demand.
May
Northern Graphite
Corp. (NGC) released a revised resource estimate of
almost 70m tonnes for its Bissett Creek property in Ontario.
Measured and indicated resources at the deposit were stated as
69.8m tonnes grading at 1.74% C, based on a 1.02% C cut-off
grade. The new estimate also contained 24m tonnes of inferred
resources grading at 1.65% C, using a 1.02% C cut-off, and was
calculated based on results from a 61-hole drilling programme
at Bissett Creek
The first trademarked graphene
product, MesoGraf was launched by Canadian mining and
technology firm, Focus Graphite Inc.
June
The Sri Lankan government revealed
that it plans to develop its domestic graphite industry through
the encouragement of foreign investment, state-owned
Kahatagaha Graphite Lanka Ltd told
IM.
Imerys-owned global graphite
producer Timcal suspended mining at its Lac
des Iles graphite mine in Quebec, Canada.
July
TSX-listed Flinders
Resources Ltd began selling reprocessed flake graphite
from the Woxna mine in Sweden, following a twelve year gap in
commercial production from the deposit. The first truckload of
graphite was delivered to a customer in Germany, having been
reprocessed from a stockpile built up when Woxna was last mined
by Woxna Graphite AB, between 1996 and 2001.
Meanwhile, a fire aboard an
Ethiopian Air Boeing 787 Dreamliner, which
grounded flights at London Heathrow, did not appear to be
linked to the aircraft’s li-ion batteries, accident
investigators said.The Air Accidents Investigation Branch
(AAIB) said that the fire, which took place while the aircraft
was parked on stand, was isolated in the upper portion of the
rear fuselage, a distance from where the aircraft’s
batteries are located.
Synthetic graphite manufacturer
SGL Carbon raised the price of its graphite
electrodes by up to 30% in a bid to mitigate a fall in the
value of the products, which forced the company to cut its
profit outlook twice in 2013.
August
China Carbon Graphite Group
Inc. (CCG), China’s largest supplier of
fine-grain and high-purity graphite, reported a net loss of
$10.96m for the first half of the year, down from a net income
of $1.11m for the same period in 2012.
September
China has sustained huge demand for
isostatic graphite for its photovoltaics (PV) manufacturing
industry, despite a worldwide slump in the solar cell market, a
new report, Global and China Isostatic Graphite Industry
Report 2013-2015, released in September said.
South Korean companies were moving
through the field in the race to secure patents for the
commercialisation of graphene. According to the Korean
Intellectual Property Office (KIPO), a total of 2,921
graphene-related patents were applied for in Korea between 2005
and June 2013.
Zenyatta Ventures
Inc. hit back at “misleading and inaccurate
commentary” which caused the TSX-listed graphite
junior’s shares to pitch sharply in September. Zenyatta
did not explicitly reference any comments, but its statement
was thought to refer articles published online in September,
questioning the miner’s alleged lack of evidence
supporting the geological credentials of its Albany
hydrothermal graphite deposit in Ontario.
Timcal was
rumoured to have recommenced graphite mining operations at the
company’s Lac des Iles deposit in southern Quebec,
Canada.
Hu Zijian, president of
South Graphite Co. Ltd, the world’s
largest producer of amorphous graphite, said that consumption
of Chinese graphite is still a long way behind mine output, and
that production was being cut back as a result.
October
Graphene-based capacitors, displays
and structural materials are set to be the biggest consumers of
graphene by 2023 accounting for a projected 56% of market
share, a report by Massachusetts, US-based BCC
Research found, in October.
US electric car manufacturer
Tesla Motors said that it was considering
building a li-ion battery factory which could be the biggest in
the world.
November
Dr Martin Kemp, theme manager for
engineering and applications at Nanotechnology
Knowledge Transfer Network, said at Innovation in
Materials that about 7,000 patents worldwide have been
developed since the discovery of graphene in 2004.
A research team from The University
of Manchester received a Grand Challenges
Explorations grant of £62,000 ($100,000*) from
the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation to manufacture condoms
out of graphene composite materials.
December
Big North Graphite
Corp. made a fourth sale of 125 tonnes amorphous
graphite from its Sonora, Mexico-based processing facility to a
local customer.
Stratmin Global Resources
Plc. completed a preliminary sales order of 200 tonnes
of +70% C graphite from its Lohorano graphite project in
Madagascar. The first shipment of graphite from Stratmin’s
project was received by Grafitbergbau
Kaiserberg in Austria, which confirmed grades of up to
78.5%.
Syrah Resources
Ltd upgraded 90% of the indicated resource at the
Ativa zone of its Balama West graphite project in Mozambique
into the measured category.The measured resource for the
deposit stands at 11.6m tonnes grading at 19.9% C and 0.4%
vanadium, which is sufficient to support a mine life of 11-12
years, Syrah said.