Altura Mining have made the transition from developer to miner, after the production of their first batch of lithium concentrate from the company’s 100 per cent owned, Altura Lithium Project, located in the Pilbara region of Western Australia.
This milestone comes 16 months after first ground was broken at the Pilgangoora site (approximately 123km drive from the town of Port Hedland) in mid-March 2017.
Altura Mining has tested the first ‘batch’ of Lithium Spodumene Concentrate product with laboratory operator, Intertek. The product survey outlined a concentrate product grade that exceeds the industry benchmark SC6 concentrate specifications and fits comfortably within those required by Altura’s offtake agreements.
Further plant optimisation is now set to occur as production on the Altura Lithium Project is ramped up in coming months.
Altura Mining has stated that they are now working through the final commissioning stages to progress the first delivery of lithium concentrate with their offtake partner, Lionergy, within the next month. An announcement has also been made (by Lionergy) that they would like to receive as much of the 100ktpa minimum supply allocation under the Binding Offtake Agreement (BOA) as production at Pilgangoora ramps up in H2 2018.
“We have always worked to a stringent and aggressive timetable with this project. As with any development, there are obstacles which occur, however, the entire team has worked tirelessly to be in the position we are in today, where we are in sight of delivering our first shipment of concentrate,” commented Altura Mining’s Managing Director, James Brown.
“Our focus now is to ramp-up production to full capacity overcoming six months and then we can turn our attention to the expansion project,” Mr Brown explained.
At full capacity, the Altura Lithium Project holds a capacity of 220,000 tonnes per annum (tpa) of quality spodumene concentrate that can be used for electric vehicles and the lithium battery market.
In other news, Altura Mining has also completed a Definitive Feasibility Study on a potential Stage 2 expansion to 440,000tpa, and a Final Investment Decision is due in late 2018.
More information on this project can be accessed here.