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Orbite Provides Update on Production Activities at High Purity Alumina Plant

Orbite Technologies Inc. (TSX:ORT)(OTCQX:EORBF) ("Orbite", or the "Company") today announced that, further to its press release of October 13, 2016, production activities continue as planned at its high purity alumina ("HPA") plant.

  • Feedstock digestion, which commenced on September 30, is now operating automatically, smoothly and as anticipated, and production times have come down, as planned.14 digestion batches have been completed, and batch production times have decreased to four hours per batch, well within design parameters.
     
  • The digestion liquors continue to be transferred to the crystallisation circuit for the production of Aluminum Chloride Hexahydrate (ACH) crystals, the precursor to High Purity Alumina (HPA). To date, 35 tonnes of ACH crystals have been produced, corresponding to close to 10 tonnes of HPA, once calcined.
     
  • Purity levels of the ACH crystals, produced in the first batches, were in excess of 5N, ahead of expectations. This corresponds to HPA purity levels in excess of 4N5. Recently produced ACH purity levels have increased further and are very close to reaching the levels corresponding to 5N HPA.
     
  • Based on this positive progress, the company will commence decomposer and calciner heat up in the coming days to commence calcination of ACH crystals into HPA.

"Purity of the initial batches of ACH crystals is excellent, and continues to surpass our expectations so soon after start of production," stated Glenn Kelly, CEO of Orbite. "Operations to date clearly validate our technology for the production of ACH and we look forward to commencing the conversion of the ACH crystals into HPA of 5N+ levels. As we intend to be a producer of ultra-high purity alumina, our production sequence is to only transfer ACH crystals to the calcination circuit once the required purity levels have been achieved. While we could have started HPA production with earlier batches, we aim to deliver higher purity and therefore higher value HPA to the market in response to demand from our potential customers."

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