Lithium is sourced from 2 primary feed stocks

Fra globalstrategicmetalsnl.com, september 2013

- The Lithium Market Outlook 2017, by RIS noted that lithium consumption increased by a rate of 10% per year between 2000 and 2008. With few alternatives for lithium within portable devices, the industry is set for continuing strong demand, particularly for lithium-ion batteries and lithium compounds of which they are manufactured.
- The small battery market (calculators, computers, cameras, communications devices, etc) is forecast to maintain high growth levels (10% pa) whilst the emerging large battery market for electric bicycles, hybrid and all electric vehicles is expected to grow substantially (up to 28% pa) to 2020.
- Grid electricity storage is an emerging market for large lithium batteries and applications in solar and nuclear energy are forecast to emerge before 2015 (Byron Capital 2011). Lithium salts are intensively used as working fluid in utility sized concentrated solar power plants (CSP); which was estimated to grow from 1.5GW in 2010 to 25GW in 2020 (Greenpeace/IEA SolarPACES/ESTELA).

Minerals
- Lithium can be contained within hard rock minerals. There are three lithium minerals commercially mined today: spodumene, petalite and lepidolite. Spodumene is the most important commercially mined lithium mineral given its higher inherent lithia content. Both open pit and underground mining methods are used to extract lithium minerals. Typically, the mineralized rock contains approximately 12% to 20% spodumene, or approximately 1% to 1.5% lithium oxide.
- Once extracted, the lithium mineral ore is crushed and subjected to a number of separation processes to upgrade the lithium content by removing waste materials. Different separation processes will produce concentrate with differing levels of lithium content, which can be used in either the technical or chemical-grade markets. Chemical grade lithium concentrate sold to chemical producers undergoes additional processing through the sulphate route process to convert the chemical-grade lithium concentrate to a variety of lithium chemicals including lithium carbonate, lithium chloride and lithium hydroxide.

Brines
- Lithium brine bodies in salt lakes, or salars, are formed in basins where water which has leached the lithium from the surrounding rock is trapped and concentrated by evaporation. The process of extracting the lithium from brines involves pumping the brines into a series of evaporation ponds to crystallize other salts, leaving lithium-rich liquor. This liquor is further processed to remove impurities before conversion to either lithium carbonate or lithium chloride for further upgrading to lithium hydroxide. The majority of the products from the brine operations are destined for the chemical application markets, with the remainder consumed in technical applications.
- Nearly one-half of the world’s lithium production comes from lithium brines in an Andes mountains’ region encompassing parts of Argentina, Chile and Bolivia (no current production). This area is often referred to as the “Lithium Triangle” and the primary brines are illustrated below. In the mid-1990s, the development of these largescale, low-cost brine resources in Chile and Argentina by SQM, Rockwood and FMC fundamentally changed global lithium supply. With its cost advantage over mineral-based production, brine producers lowered prices to gain market share, resulting in closure of mineral conversion plants in the USA, Russia and China.


Lithium consumption:


Lithium Battery Grade and Price: