Good News & Bad News, page-35653

The official announcement from the 2nd of August spells everything out:
Description: "Demonstration plant"(p.1)
Cost estimate: $104.9m(p.1)
Construction start: Planned for June quarter 2024
When: steady state production March quarter 2026,
Production capacity: "The Project at full production capacity is estimated to produce more than 3000t per year of lithium phosphate". (p4)
There hasn't been any other announcements regarding the JV since then that I have seen stating that they were changing the size. I think if you make a FID and spend $100m+, then you have decided on what you are going to build.

They are obviously not going to throw the lithium phosphate away. So it will be of commercial use. They will sell it. I think it will probably use 3-4t of SC for 1t of lithium phosphate production. Don't quote me on this, I'm sure a number is mentioned somewhere, but I'm not going to go looking for it now. So I'm thinking the plant will use about 10-15t SC per annum. To consume all PLS production in 2026 (1m tonne SC), you would need 60 to 100 of these. That doesn't make sense given the cost($100m+ for 1st one and then hopefully cheaper later). I think they would scale it up at least 10x if not more if possible. If you can scale everything in size then good and well, but sometimes you need more of the same and not something bigger. Perhaps the process doesn't work if it is bigger, then you need maybe the 60 to 100 units equivalent in size to the demonstration plant.
The first one is costly to build: $100m+. I'd hate to think what 60 or 100 of those would cost even if they will get cheaper the more you build.

It looks like an exercise in being "green" to me, but if that is what needs to be done, then it has to be done. I would think it has to be possible to scale the process up to make it cheaper, else it doesn't make sense at this point.

I'm not trying to burst anyone's bubble. I'm just trying to make sense of this myself. It had always been in the back of my head that the Calix JV could be worth something, but doing the numbers it looks different. It may require a very positive lithium market for it to be persued further.

As I said, this is just how I see it reading from PLS announcements. Perhaps I got something completely wrong. I admit that I usually am conservative and can be a bit cynical also at times. That is why I'd be happy if anyone can shed some more light on the benefits of the Calix JV, other than being more green at what looks to be a substantial cost.