Producing 20t (or thereabouts) and saying 'it works, let's scale it by 100x now' doesn't work like that. They had more chance stress testing the whole process up to 100t, 200t, or nameplate at 500t, then scaling from there once they knew the equipment could handle larger scale.
They may have run into the same issues scaling 4x from 500t, but I dare say it wouldn't be as severe as it is now as they would have a better understanding from the pilot plant.
They used the pilot plant as proof of concept (battery grade production successful), sent one or two samples out, sold some product and called it a day.
Ignoring some of the misinformed info being told here, their intention was always to continue producing from that plant, and sell that product, as stated by themselves. They wouldn't have constructed a "500tpa" plant otherwise.
~5t production in 3 years tells me that Stage 1 plant is incapable of producing any faster than it can (as they had produced and sold 25t in 2020-2021). Otherwise, why haven't they ramped up production to maybe 200t per year, stored the lithium (as they have been doing) and sold at spot for revenue?
AGY Price at posting:
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