News Issue December 2020

Welcome to Issue Number 37 of the Calix Newsletter.

“In our last Newsletter for 2020, we reflect on our significant progress during the year across several of our businesses, as well as celebrate our acceptance into the United Nations Global Compact and our commitment to the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals.

In our Agriculture business, although the roll-out of our anti-pest product was impacted by COVID, our European partner – Afepasa – pushed ahead as best as possible with a product launch and achieved several successful trials with customers across numerous crops and pests, in multiple countries. Their relative success was all the more important given the tightening EU restrictions on chemical pesticides. The banning of one of the world’s most common anti-fungals – Mancozeb – was announced in October (joining a list of 44 other substances banned in the last 2 years in the EU) increasing the pressure to find new, safer alternatives such as Calix BOOSTER-Mag.

Following our Annual General Meeting in November, we also held a webinar updating our battery development program which outlined the significant steps taken over the last 12 months of research and development. We were very pleased to publish our early, but very encouraging, results into a new cathode material we are developing that could be cheaper, safer, and better performing than commercial materials. While there is much further testing and development to be done, the market potential is huge, as electric vehicles and base load storage systems are predicted to grow very quickly over the next decade.

We also feature two customer stories in this newsletter – both from the US. In the first, our locally-made magnesium water treatment product Amalgam-60 was successfully applied to remove heavy metals contaminants from a micro-electronics manufacturer. In the second, our Australian-made magnesium water treatment product ACTI-Mag was exported to the US and trialled in a Californian utility, achieving excellent odour control in a large and complex sewer system. Apart from being effective, both products are much safer and better for the environment than traditional chemicals such as caustic or lime – an additional article in this newsletter explains this difference.

We also feature the latest in our Low Emissions Intensity Lime and Cement (“LEILAC”) technology development. Our LEILAC-2 demonstration-scale project is well underway and our de-risking approach to the basis of design is outlined in the article.

Last but by no means least, in this newsletter we feature our new Board member Helen Fisher. With an impressive background in industrial biotechnology and finance, we welcome the considerable skills Helen brings to the Calix Board.

The team at Calix would like to take this opportunity to wish all of you a safe, healthy and enjoyable Christmas and New Year, and as always, we thank you for your support and interest in Calix.”