High grade aluminium is used as the feedstock for the pilot...

High grade aluminium is used as the feedstock for the pilot plant and this will also be the feedstock for the 1000tpa commercial plant. I'm not sure how much work has been done around using Kaolin with the Polar process (I'd assume not much) but this is really secondary and not critical to the current economics of the deal.

The forecast opex of the Polar technology using aluminium feedstock is comparable to any of the other HPA aspirants but the real kicker to this deal is the super low capex of $12m USD. This is clearly the lowest capital intensity project of any listed HPA project but more importantly is doesn't hinge on large scale funding to get off the ground. Every other company is searching for $150-300M USD while PUA needs just $30m AUD ($21M USD) to complete the deal and fund construction. Future expansion can be funded through profit. It's not an "all or nothing" venture like the others.

The aluminium feedstock is almost two thirds of the Polar production cost so it's understandable they have flagged substituting for Kaolin but focusing on this now would just be a distraction. Time to market is key.