General comments/chat, page-1093

I wasn't planning to respond to this but now think what the heck.

At 80% recovery rate and a lithium deposit that grades 1.25% Li20 (PLS) it takes 6 tonnes of ore to get 1 tonne 6% grade spodumene. It then takes 7.5 tonnes of 6% grade spodumene to get to 1 tonne lithium carbonate. This process is very capital and energy intensive btw, and you can see that by the conversions.

The point of the above, it is a about the resource that allows you to go through the conversion and they are not simple conversions from DSO to concentrate to carbonate, requiring lots of experience, capital, different chemical processes etc.

The example you gave is irrelevant, because ADN is a supplier and that commodity can be transferred into different value adding commodities like HPA. It is no different to the complexity of going from DSO in lithium to carbonate, given the experience required, capital costs involved, chemicals used, energy required etc etc. It is why traditionally lithium carbonate and hydroxide were produced outside WA, but now Greenbushes through its JV back in 2012/13 when Greenbushes was taken over by Tianqi and then Albermale joined (who actually both operate in the carbonate and hydroxide market) are now wanting to do it in WA. It is what experience and cash do - having teh right JVpartner to take you through teh gambit of teh value chain.

ADN starting out on what it thinks it can do - DSO plus processing kaolin gives it teh cash flow to move to HPA - if it gets the right JV partner then HPA becomes a reality, but if it does not it needs to build its cash flow to be able to do that. A natural progression when you own the resource - it is how value adding opportunities are exploited.

All IMO