General Discussion Topics, page-144074

Meg - I haven't been following the discussion you are engaged in but just a couple of observations.

First up, it used to be argued that lithium hydroxide plants were better placed nearer where the product would be used than where the ingredients would be extracted because lithium hydroxide tends to break down into other chemicals over time. Clearly not a drop-dead issue otherwise why would anyone build a lithium hydroxide plant in WA. But I think it is a factor. Hence POSCO building its LiOH plant near battery makers in Korea and Arcadium building its LiOH plant at Becancour near where POSCO and EcoPro are building battery plants. Sure, there are probably efficiencies in building LiOH plants near where there are any other chemcials plants are but it is more the point those other chemicals plants use LiOH as an ingredient.

Also, on the haulage distances. I'm not sure how you calculated that the distance between Whabouchi and Becancour is about 1,300 clicks (via Matagami?). Dr Google thinks otherwise, see below. That the route is via Chibougamau introduces Winsome and Patriot. Winsome pretty much has to bring its product down the Route 167 road through Chibougamau and Patriot has said it makes sense for it to also bring its product from ex-Corvette down through Chibougamau. For a long time Winsome made a thing about there being a rail head at Chibougamau, implying that the product from its Adina mine would be loaded onto rail at Chibougamau to go either to port or to Becancour. But in the recently released Adina scoping study Winsome fessed up that while there is rail at Chibougamau it is no longer suitable for hauling minerals. However if Winsome and Patriot and Arcadium all pushed that they want to use rail from Chibougamau then maybe the Canadian authorities would fix that rail spur to Chibougamau.

I'm fairly confident that there is a currently functioning rail head at Matagami and I know there are plans to extend that line from Matagami all the way up the Jimmy Diamond (spelling?) Highway. For the time being it may be cheaper for Arcadium to truck its product down to Matagami seeing how much cheaper rail haulage is than road haulage. But in terms of distance, going via Chibougamau is much the shorter route for Whabouchi product. (I'm guessing the plan is for product from Moblan to go to market via Matagami.)