S2 E55: Aclara Resources: Pioneering Ionic Clay Extraction

Dustin Olsen (00:00)
Hi everyone, welcome back to the Rare Earth Exchanges podcast. You're joining me, of course, Dustin, my cohost Daniel. And today we've got our special guest, Hugh Brothurst, who is the COO of Aclar Resources. And Hugh, welcome to the show. We are really thrilled to have you here.

Daniel O'Connor (00:12)
Thank

Hugh Broadhurst (00:19)
Great, thank you Dustin and Daniel, great to be here.

Dustin Olsen (00:22)
Absolutely. Hugh, you guys are doing some really interesting stuff at Aclara but before we get into that, you've only been at Aclara for about seven months. We'd like to hear a little bit of what you were doing before and a bit of your background, and then we can dive into Aclara.

Hugh Broadhurst (00:39)
Great. Well, thanks, Dustin, again. And so my background, I'm a chemical engineer by training from South Africa, but did my postgraduate in the US. And then I worked in the specialty chemical industry in companies like Roman Haas and Syngenta, big multinationals. But I ended up getting into lithium and worked five years for Lithium Americas, where I was the general manager for the Thacker Pass project. There we were focused on lithium from clay.

And that project is we just had FID ⁓ last year and now I'm with ⁓ Clara Resources where we're doing heavy rare earths from clay and I'm very excited about ⁓ our prospects and what we bring to the rare earths industry.

Dustin Olsen (01:28)
exciting and it sounds like your background is perfectly poised for what you guys are doing at Aclara. So what was one of the things that attracted you to the company and getting you to pivot over to Aclara?

Hugh Broadhurst (01:46)
One of the beautiful stories of ECLAIRA is that we have two ionic clay deposits in South America, and then our plan to vertically integrate ⁓ to put a separation plant in US and potentially even take it to metals and alloys. And I was just very excited about the kind of deposit, ⁓ the focus on heavy rare earths, a real specialty product.

And then just the technical challenges of building a separation plant when 99 % or so ⁓ of heavy rare earths are processed in China today. So I love a technical challenge. I just love the base that Eclair has set. And ⁓ with our shareholders, ⁓ with Hochschild and CAP,

We just have a very long-term stable outlook, very supportive. So it's just the ideal place to do technology development. So really, you get the bug for these startups and ⁓ just the story of Aclara is just such a good fit and exciting. So I decided to join.

Dustin Olsen (02:53)
That's great. so speaking of you, you'll have a good challenge. ⁓ Can you go into just a bit more detail about what that challenge is and maybe educate some of our audience who is a bit unfamiliar with that?

Hugh Broadhurst (03:09)
Yeah, absolutely. There's challenge at each step of the way and that's both technically, commercially and regulatory wise. ⁓ But the big, certainly for me, the focus is we, heavy rare earths and ionic clays, we've all seen the articles of ⁓ the in-situ extraction techniques and the CLARA has got a patented process we call circular mineral harvesting.

and just developing a new technology up to the standard that our customers would expect. There's a lot of learnings there. There's a lot of technical details. So that's challenging and making sure that we can move as quickly as possible because obviously that's what the industry needs, but to do things the right way. So we talk a lot about speed with quality. ⁓ So that's a key focus for us. And then in terms of the separation ⁓ facility,

There's not a lot of ⁓ focus and resources like you would in other industries, as I saying, the center of gravity is in China. What we have done is we've got some amazing relationships. We've partnered with a company, L3 Process Technology. We've partnered with Virginia Tech. ⁓

We've partnered with Argonne National Lab, actually. We just had an announcement very recently on that. And we're really pushing forward using all the tools in our tool belt to make sure that we can both get this done quickly and reliably. So just lots of challenge and it's a very exciting, fast-paced environment to work in.

Daniel O'Connor (04:53)
I was going to ask a question, on the geology side. Can you shine a little light on the ionic ⁓ clay heavy rare earth deposits in South America, where it's at, some of the specifications of that mineralogy, just so we can understand how does this compare to some of the other zones like in Myanmar, for example?

Hugh Broadhurst (05:20)
Yeah, and my understanding in terms of the deposits in ⁓ China and Myanmar, that's the ionic clay deposits, we're very, very similar. But what you can imagine this deposit looks like, it's ⁓ a large mountain basically where rock has degraded, I'm simplifying this completely, a large mountain where rock has degraded and turned into clay.

but it's still sitting on top of the mountain and hasn't washed away. And that rock that broke down had ⁓ these heavy rare earths in them. And then the clay behaves much like a water softener in your house. And over millions of years, that heavy rare earths dissolve and then attach themselves to the clay. And what we're doing is very much like… ⁓

when you regenerate a water softener where you use a salt solution and you're able to regenerate it so that it can keep grabbing water hardness, we're doing the same with ammonium sulfate. And so it's just a very unique deposit, very similar ⁓ geology and properties to the heavy rare earth ionic clays that you mentioned in Myanmar and China. The key to us though is the way that we extract the heavy rare earths. ⁓

We mine the clay and then we put it into our circular mineral harvesting process. We call it circular because the clay comes in, we wash it with ammonium sulfate solution, dilute. Then from that solution, we're able to recover the rare earths. Then we actually have a backend of the process where we recover 99 percent of the ammonium sulfate. This is the big difference. The ammonium sulfate is going in circles instead of going into the environment.

Daniel O'Connor (07:14)
Right.

Hugh Broadhurst (07:14)
and then

we wash the clay and we're able to ⁓ deposit it back on the ground. it's just a very, very elegant process and something that when we show potential customers, it's something they can look at. It's simple to understand and it's up to this kind of standards that we expect today and these circular aspects of…

like 95 % of our water is recycled, 99 % of our ammonium sulfate is going in circles in our processes. It's just, it's what the world expects today.

Daniel O'Connor (07:52)
100%. And on a couple of questions, on the status of the mine, but first on the patent to you, where was the, who originally developed the technology? Was it internal to the company? Was it licensed by a university? And how old is the patent? When was it patented?

Hugh Broadhurst (08:11)
Although those are all good questions and a little bit before my time here, we worked with the University of Toronto to validate this process and ⁓ it started with our predecessor company in Chile where this whole process was developed, the patent. then ⁓ Hoxfield Mining ⁓ purchased the PENKO project in Chile and then ⁓ spun out a Clara.

and then Clara acquired the Carina project. So, you know, a big project in Brazil.

Daniel O'Connor (08:47)
Right, that's right.

And by the way, you all are ranked pretty high in our rankings. We like Aclara. We like that it's got, you know, ⁓ strategic backers, ⁓ very serious companies that understand mining and execution. So we really like Aclara. Now, let's get on the mine itself. Is it in production?

Hugh Broadhurst (09:15)
No, we are not in production yet. We are in the very final stages of ⁓ getting our permit in Brazil. So think of ⁓ getting an EIA through. We're in the final stages of that. And we're also working on our feasibility study. So one of the things that Clara falls under, are publicly traded ⁓ on the Toronto Stock Exchange. So we fall under

the Canadian National Instrument 43-101, which puts a whole, it's about the highest standard for ⁓ analyzing deposits and being able to communicate to the investment community to prove what's in the ground with a level of confidence, but then also how are we going to extract it and what the economics are. And all of this has to be signed off. ⁓

by third party ⁓ experts, they're called qualified persons. So when we put out a pre-feasibility study ⁓ late last year, that's a certain level of confidence and now we're working on our feasibility study. ⁓ that just gives confidence to the market that we're doing things right. It's not just hype. We have ⁓ expert consultants that they have to sign off. They have to actually qualify ⁓

with the regulatory commission. And so there's these whole steps of hoops we go through and what that does is it's, this is not just, you know, a few drill holes in the ground and claiming, you know, that we've got a deposit. The word reserve really means something. It's actually got a statistical significance behind it. So we're very proud of that. We're working with ⁓ Hatch as our engineering firm. So they're a

a very reputable multinational firm, well known in the mining and chemical space. And we're doing our ⁓ engineering now for that feasibility study. And so that will be coming out soon.

Daniel O'Connor (11:23)
So if we look at, ⁓ because I want to go into the midstream in a minute, but if we look at upstream and having that mine ready with the heavies, what are we looking at in terms of FID and then production? Like what's the timeline look like at this point?

Hugh Broadhurst (11:27)
Mm-hmm.

Yeah, mean, the timeline is that we have a plan to get us into production in mid-2028. ⁓ So it's an aggressive but very doable timeline. ⁓ And we're working with, like I said, we're working with Hatch on our project planning. ⁓ And we've got a very experienced team that we've assembled in Brazil, mining professionals, folks that have executed billions of dollars of capital. ⁓

Daniel O'Connor (11:50)
Okay.

Hugh Broadhurst (12:11)
So, know, and I think that's one of the things about a Clara is like, you look at our shareholders, they've done this before. You look at our team, they've done this before. And that's, you know, it's not just your resource that you have in the ground. It's the team that has to execute that you were alluding to before that is so important. But then also the financial backing and with the Hochschild Group and CAP, we just have a very

supportive and ⁓ investors that have a long term view which is so important in this world because it's a long road and ⁓ it takes ⁓ determination and a bit of patience to get there.

Daniel O'Connor (12:56)
There's no question, but 2028 really is right around the corner, ⁓ which is exciting. Now, the biggest bottleneck, as you know, with rare earth elements, and we try to educate ⁓ investors and markets all over the place, is actually in the midstream refining, separation refining. Doing that at scale is not easy. China has spent over two decades refining a industrial

know, gargantuan system that is very difficult to compete with. So, you know, now with the ECLERA strategy, what we know, ⁓ it's pivoted, it's tilted towards North America, there's partnerships in place. We're ultimately looking at a commercial refinery in Louisiana. Is that correct?

Hugh Broadhurst (13:50)
Absolutely, we've got a site secured near Lake Charles, Louisiana.

Daniel O'Connor (13:58)
And so now what we also know is that there's a partnership with Virginia Tech, ⁓ you know, where you're doing a pilot there. ⁓ Can you give us some sense of, you know, without going into details, you can't. What are the goals of this pilot? When will it be done? When will you launch the ⁓ Louisiana refinery construction?

Hugh Broadhurst (14:28)
All very good questions. Our strategy here, the first step was to, we're trying to go as fast as we can. As I mentioned, the center of gravity is in China, but it's not only in China. There are some groups that have been working on solvent extraction for rare earths, actually for many years in the States. We went through a process to ⁓ identify collaborators who can help accelerate us down this path.

Hence the reason ⁓ we've landed with or located at the Virginia Tech Corporate Research Center. And we have a very ⁓ strong connection ⁓ to Virginia Tech's Department of Mining as they've been focused on this. ⁓ so what we've done is we've leveraged the technical base that we have, and then we are ⁓ building this pilot plant. So we've got ⁓ a process flow sheet.

that's based on prior test work, but we need to validate it for our exact ratio of ⁓ rare earths that we're going to be providing. One of the important things that, you know, it's not just the rare earths, it's when you're shipping a concentrate, you know, it's not just the rare earth products you send, but it's potential impurities. So one of the differentiating factors of ionic clays, because we're not doing

a very strong leech like with sulfuric acid, like you're breaking down the whole clay, almost all the clay molecule and you get a lot of other things with your target product, so with the rare earths. One of the beauties of ⁓ ionic clay is it's a very mild leech, so we get a very pure product that ⁓ is going to be coming to the US. ⁓ So that gives us a leg up.

We've got the separation. We're doing the validation at Virginia Tech. That pilot plant ⁓ is in commissioning now. And then we looked later this year towards the end of the year to actually break ground on the site. And then by ⁓ the end of 2028 to be substantially complete on construction and ready for ⁓ the concentrate coming from our Carina project in Brazil that we were just discussing.

that'll be ready ⁓ mid 28.

Daniel O'Connor (16:55)
So it sounds, and that's all very exciting. And so urgently needed, Hugh. I this heavy, rare earth quandary, I mean, there's no way out of it right now. 98 % of this stuff is refined by China. And there's a lot of money flowing around the United States, but there's no, you all are some of the few people trying to solve this problem.

Hugh Broadhurst (17:24)
Yeah, and we've been told by people we're working with that in the heavy rare earth space, we're the only ones they know that have taken this vertical integration approach. So I just think, know, Calara is really uniquely situated. And I did misspeak just a moment ago, the ⁓ separation plant will be ready ⁓ at the end of, mechanically complete at the end of 27.

so that we have that commissioned and ramped up ready for mid-2028 for Carina. But it's like you said, it's something that I find very important and lithium is much the same way too. It's you have to control when you're in this market, these aren't commodities, these are specialties that are being sold and you can't look at it through a commodity lens. And so really,

The key is to control that resource of what's in the ground because you can have as much separation as you want, but the real value is actually the access to the molecules to begin with. So we're not dependent on someone else for our feed, and that's where we feel that ECLARA gives such a strong de-risking to the final end users. We're simplifying the supply chain. If you want ⁓

And we have all different ⁓ folks that are interested in our products. We can sell concentrate. We can sell separated oxides. We can also sell them individual metals. We can also sell alloys. we have this our job as a specialty provider is to ⁓ solve the problem of our customer. So whatever their supply need is in the heavy rare earth space, we need to be and will be ready to supply. So we've looked at

this and developing the integration all the way from the mine all the way through to the alloys for magnets.

Daniel O'Connor (19:24)
So Hugh, I have a question on that. And I know you're in operations and focused on technology. So, you know, only answer to the extent you feel comfortable. How does it work for the business development? I mean, you're essentially going to be producing product by the end of 2028. You know, let's just assume maybe there'll be a little delay. Definitely by 2029, you guys are going to be cranking. Now, do you sell?

Do you have a team that's reaching out to companies, magnet companies, whoever, defense companies, ⁓ to sell that now? When does that process start?

Hugh Broadhurst (20:05)
I would say we already have a very close relationship with VAC and that was announced quite some time ago, which is very good for us because that gives us ⁓ a connection to the end user. But even that, we've been having a lot of discussions with various people who are very interested and worried about their heavy rare earth supply. there are a lot of discussions. think that the challenge in the marketplace

Daniel O'Connor (20:11)
Yeah. That's right. Yep.

Yeah.

Hugh Broadhurst (20:35)
is ⁓ we only very recently have pricing indices being published for the Western market. And so when you start talking project finance and returns, that's where the challenge comes is what is the price. ⁓ So that's something where our industry is having to evolve from instead of

looking to China for the product, the pricing and everything, we're having to say, what is the value of heavy rare earths which have a supply that is robust, that is ⁓ traceable and something up to the standards that consumers expect today. And so I think that's something that's evolving and is very important.

Daniel O'Connor (21:24)
Well, on that note, we believe we need industrial policy. We're not socialists here. But our competition is very serious. So much like the government has extended some price floor to MP and now through their recent 232 action have said we're open to other price floors, we need to have a price floor.

for the heavy so you can start doing deals, right? And with confidence that you need that kind of industrial policy in this situation, right? ⁓ Would you agree with that?

Hugh Broadhurst (22:09)
Yeah, I mean, I definitely think there's a role for a government with the strategic nature of heavy rare earths. It's got so many implications, whether that's through, I think there lots of mechanisms that can work for that, including ⁓ low interest loans like ⁓ lithium Americas received from Department of Energy. The problem with ⁓ doing projects the right way

is that does make them more expensive. So you have a higher capital burden that you're having to justify. with the strategic nature and the fact that, you know, how do you define what the price is? But the other side of the equation is I think people will come to the realization soon that pricing won't be a problem soon. Because if you look at, you know, let's say in a vehicle, there's this

EV as an example, $200 worth of magnets, say that's $100 of raw materials, let's say that's $50 of heavy rare earths, a higher price is a very, very low burden to be able to cover the increased cost of being able to have a secure supply, a reliable supply, something traceable and that our consumers will accept.

Daniel O'Connor (23:37)
100 % agree with you. ⁓ Dustin, think ⁓ I'll have one more question then please jump in. Look, Hugh, we're excited about Aclara I think you all are, you know, we've been monitoring you. We've spoken with some another representative of your company ⁓ at one point. And we just feel like it's lined up the right way. You've got the right backing. You've got a lot of good people.

Dustin Olsen (23:48)
lost them. So going on with your comments about pricing, ⁓ China's been known to sell things at a loss. Do you think that they would continue to compete in that way? And even though you say pricing

Hugh Broadhurst (23:49)
Yeah

Dustin Olsen (24:06)
won't be a concern that, you know, there's enough margin there to cover the increase in costs. ⁓ But do you think China is still going to try to come in and

Daniel O'Connor (24:07)
You've got ⁓ what sounds like an incredible deposit of heavy rare earth. This is one of the key ⁓

Dustin Olsen (24:17)
you know, undercut everyone.

Daniel O'Connor (24:17)
choke points in the whole system. So I think we're pretty excited to watch how you all execute. We're hoping that, obviously, more and more people learn about your company, your stock, everything. So Dustin, do you want to go into a couple of questions?

Hugh Broadhurst (24:20)
I think that remains to be seen. ⁓ Past history probably predicts future results, but I'm an operations guy and I might stick to that.

Dustin Olsen (24:32)
Fair enough, fair enough.

Yeah, it's gonna be one of those things that we'll just kind of have to wait and see, but it is interesting. know, like I agree with you. think, you know, the Western markets will be willing to pay, but I think China is also one to be very competitive. But.

Daniel O'Connor (24:42)
Did I lose you guys?

you there.

Hugh Broadhurst (24:56)
Yeah, well, mean, it's one of those where, you know, it truly is a competition on more than price now. And I think the world has woken up to the fact that it's not a free market in terms of the price support or the subsidies that are happening to keep prices low. So it's going to be very interesting to see.

see how things develop.

Dustin Olsen (25:28)
It will be, absolutely. ⁓ I wanna talk about operations and scale. right, so a lot of what I've heard so far today sounds great on paper. A lot of it sounds very promising. We've probably seen a lot of it in practice, but if there's a big surge in demand with what Aclara is doing, there, do you have a lot of runway? Can you support demand? Does it scale very well with?

where you guys are getting your feedstock and everything.

Hugh Broadhurst (25:59)
Yeah, that's a great question. mean, in terms of the technology and technology deployment, it's very much a stepwise process where you can add extra capacity. when if you look at our pre feasibility study, we call it a four train project, right? And so we have a different number of trains and that determines how much production you're going to you will support. And that then determines how much mining equipment that you need.

All of that is quite flexible but what's not flexible is what's in the ground. So with four trains that gives us 18 years ⁓ approximately life of mine. And then we also have our other deposit ⁓ in Chile. Something that then starts to become the, so you have capacity but the big question is for how long. So something that Aclara is also doing in one of our key ⁓

value adders or value drivers is that we understand what these deposits look like, the kind of the recipe for their formation and how to find them. And so we've ⁓ partnered with Stanford and their Mineral X program to assist us to actually apply AI to assist us in finding these heavy rare earth deposits. very much at the forefront of our minds is that we've got two deposits

we need to be finding the next deposits because there is a time, know, there's a runway to be able to bring these ⁓ resources online. So we're very much looking to the future while, you know, accelerating what we have today.

Dustin Olsen (27:43)
That's great. And so I was actually going to ask about AI and if that was even a viable option in terms of just identifying ⁓ the resources that you guys are specializing in and how much of it is in-house.

Hugh Broadhurst (28:01)
Yeah, well absolutely. mean all the base exploration we do in-house and it's not just in the exploration space, also in process technology. have the process engineers in-house, have the exploration geologists in-house and what we're doing is we're bolting on the experts in those fields for AI because the world has changed and

we want to be at the forefront of it. on the exploration side, we're working with Stanford. And ⁓ on the process technology side, specifically focused on the separation process, we've just announced a ⁓ work we're doing with Argonne National Lab. ⁓ That gives us access to massive computing power as well. And the objective there and what we're going to do is apply it to the separation process to improve the controls.

and improve the understanding. ⁓ They're quite complicated when you start doing traditional chemical engineering models and we want to bring it to the forefront of science today. And so that's where we are leveraging ⁓ experts in the various fields when it comes to AI.

Dustin Olsen (29:17)
That's incredible. I mean, AI has accelerated so much of life as we know it. I can only imagine what that will mean ⁓ for mining and acquiring these resources out of the ground. it'll be fascinating. It'll be fun to get an update from you guys in the future to see just how quick you're progressing and hitting your deadlines and targets. ⁓ yeah, Daniel, any?

Any other questions?

Daniel (29:47)
Yeah, no, sorry, I had a ⁓ connectivity issue. No, I think you can you hear me? Can you hear me okay?

Dustin Olsen (29:51)
And we can't hear you. there you go.

Daniel (29:56)
Can you hear me okay?

Hugh Broadhurst (29:59)
Yes.

Dustin Olsen (29:59)
Yes.

Daniel (30:00)
Okay, good. ⁓ Yeah, no, I just want to second encourage that we're going to keep ⁓ following you guys and ⁓ reporting and hopefully no. weird. I'm not sure what's going on. Dustin, go ahead and just take it.

Dustin Olsen (30:13)
We can't hear you.

Daniel (30:24)
How about now, can you hear me?

Can you hear me?

Dustin Olsen (30:30)
I know what I'll be editing out of this show.

Hugh Broadhurst (30:32)
Hahaha! ⁓

Dustin Olsen (30:43)
sure.

Well, we'll keep going while we wait for Daniel. you guys are, it like you're doing some really interesting things with how you're mining the rares from ionic clay, you're incorporating technologies such as AI. Where in the supply chain is the Aclara going to stop? Are you guys trying to be more fully integrated, like end to end?

What is your perspective there? What does that look like?

Hugh Broadhurst (31:23)
In terms of what we're looking at today, like I said before, our job is to provide our customer what they need. And depending on who you're talking with, there's a whole range of what people are looking for. right now, we've taken it all the way through alloys. So if you need concentrate, we can help you. If you need separated oxides, particularly the heavy rare earths, we can help you there. If you need metal,

We've developed that technology. If you need alloys, we can do that. Now, we haven't gone further than alloys. So, obviously, the next step would be magnets. Perhaps that's something we could consider for the future, but I think for right now, we've got our hands full and we need to execute on that front end. I mentioned, the key thing is we have the resource. We have those ⁓ dysprosium and terbium molecules sitting in the ground in Brazil and Chile.

Daniel (32:14)
you

Hugh Broadhurst (32:23)
We've already got that and that's just tremendous value. So right now we need to deliver and we need to deliver with like I was saying before with speed and quality.

Dustin Olsen (32:34)
⁓ Great answer. So I do want to challenge you just on something you said is ⁓ trying to be whatever your customers need. So there's some opinions on being too much, right? Instead of niching down. ⁓ What are your thoughts on that? Maybe spreading yourself too thin to accommodate your customers needs.

Hugh Broadhurst (32:57)
I think that the other side to that is access to the market. And if you are now needing other people between you and your customer, you've just brought in supply chain complexity, which is risk. So I think one of the key things is it's important is to be able to go far enough down the chain to de-risk, then the end user is going to, they don't have to talk to four different people to get that product.

I think there absolutely is validity to that in that you can't be everything to everyone, but we've decided and we've broken our team up into different core teams and we can take it through alloys and we believe that's the right market offering for now and that's what we're focusing on delivering.

Dustin Olsen (33:51)
Yeah, it sounds reasonable to me and I very smart strategy there ⁓ to secure your network there ⁓ for you and your customers. ⁓

Hugh Broadhurst (34:05)
Yeah.

Well, and the other thing that we've also done to assist is like our metals and alloys business is a joint venture with CAP in Chile, a big iron ore producer. we ⁓ we've accessed actually a lot of talent through CAP for that from their Huchipato steel mill. ⁓ And so we've got a team of people. it's about these are actually quite different technologies. ⁓

So you have mining technology, have the processing side, there's a lot of crossover between the mining process and the solvent extraction, but then metal starts to be a little different. you know, we've just made, it's not the same people doing everything. And then my role in the company is to link all these projects together to make sure that we're coming together as one company and have continuity. So I think, you know,

I believe that Clara is in a very good position the way we're organized, but I think we've got our hands full for the next couple of years.

Dustin Olsen (35:14)
You absolutely do.

Daniel, any final thoughts as we get ready to sign off here?

Daniel (35:22)
No, again, I just, you sorry for the again, some kind of connectivity issue. I'm very bullish about Clara. Obviously, it's about execution. There's a bunch of moving parts. But we're rooting for you. We need supply chain resilience. We need us, North America, South America to have some independence. And you all are a leader in that movement. So we're we celebrate what you're doing.

Hugh Broadhurst (35:51)
Well, thank you and thank you for your time. It's been a real pleasure to talk to you about ECLARA and I'll just leave one last thought with you. know, ECLARA means it's clarity, right? And that's what we aim to bring to this very murky world of heavy rare earths. you know, we have a lot of work to do over the next couple of years, but we have an amazing team and folks who've done it before. And ⁓ we're here to deliver and I look forward to giving you updates in the future about our progress.

Dustin Olsen (36:20)
So like, and loved what she said there, you know, it's very murky industry and it's, it's a challenge of its own just to add some clarity to everything that's going on. So Hugh, thank you so much for taking the time being on the show with us and, and above all, just sharing your passion for, for the industry. ⁓ For those who are listening to the show, if you liked it, please give us a thumbs up wherever you're listening or watching this.

And if you don't want to miss the future show, please subscribe to the channel. ⁓ Hugh, thanks again. We would love to have you in the future on the show. Give us an update on where Aclara's at and the success that you're finding.

Hugh Broadhurst (37:01)
Great. Thank you so much. Great to be here.