Ann: Maiden Filling of Pond 1 Commences at Hombre Muerto West, page-33

it would be interesting to analyse what Galan’s operating costs are actually comprised of. The project is really very simple as there is no chloride processing plant. It is really just pumping brine, filling ponds, relatively simple processes to treat the impurities and loading the lithium chloride into tankers. Most of the energy used in processing is sunshine, which doesn’t cost anything. This is why the costs are so low and it is difficult to see how they could be significantly higher.

Don’t forget, they have been running a pilot plant for sometime so they should have a good handle on recovery rates and impurity processing for the particular brine they are operating with. This brine is high-grade and very low in impurities. Although recovery rates for brine projects are lower than hard rock, brine extraction and processing costs are also much lower. so it is easy to understand why brine projects are almost always lower cost than hard rock projects.