Southern Hemisphere Mining Limited reported that Mn Energy Ltd. ("Mn Energy"), has completed the first stage leach amenability test-work on ore provided from the Company's wholly owned Los Pumas Manganese Project, with excellent results. The leach amenability test-work determined that the Los Pumas manganese ore was suitable for High Purity Manganese Sulphate Monohydrate ("HPMSM") for the battery metals market. The Los Pumas ore achieved 99% extraction of manganese under "standard" leach conditions, producing a leach solution containing 80 g/L manganese.

Of interest, as well as manganese extraction were no deleterious elements that would be cause for concern in future stages. The Mn Energy HPMSM production process is a significant improvement on current HPMSM operations, as it has six fewer processes in the stream, as well as other efficiencies. Compared to the flowsheet for Los Pumas, the Mn Energy approach, illustrated below, incorporates significant changes including the removal of the roasting step, reduction in the number of PLS purification processes and removal of the electrowinning step.

The potential benefits of this approach include reduced energy and reagent requirements. This has a significant positive outlook on the project economics as: Lower grade ore is potentially viable; noting that Los Pumas also has a large low grade indicated and inferred resource of 264mt @ 2.4% Mn. End product HPMSM is transported (minimal waste and associated costs vs a 38% Mn concentrate per a conventional manganese mine).

Lower Capex as 6 fewer processes to build in the plant and related Opex reduction. The location of the Los Pumas Manganese Project is also highly advantageous from a carbon footprint perspective: Close to the Chapiquina Hydroelectric Power Plant 55km via the town of Putre. 175km from the port city of Arica - La Paz railway line passes next to the project.

Elevation is advantageous for added solar power options. The town of Putre is 35km away for workers, logistics and equipment support. The next stage of work on the Los Pumas Project is processing with the focus on marketing to downstream partner(s)/offtake/JV in the battery metals industry.

The Chilean government has recently announced its intention to promote the development of related mining and downstream industries.