Great questions for debate
@wallaby1964. And everyone will have a different view and timing no doubt.
So in so far as your FIRST question , I think it reasonable to suggest that given the sheer length of time it has taken to bring to conclusion the NAL SISP ( almost 2 years ) ......together with the multiple levels of Consultation Entities comprising the Sayona BID team - Is that plenty of work has most likely already been going on behind the scenes in regards to combining some of the economic numbers which will be associated with a combined SYA / NAL DFS.
So much in the same way that the ICS group with their Environmentally friendly Lithium Hydroxide ' Closed Loop ' processing method would have ALREADY produced the Lithium Hydroxide for the Novonix testing which began in May 2021 , much of the known areas of economic factors will have been looked at by the various Consulting Groups involved in the BID . Else you wouldn't or couldn't of had a BID right. It would have only been guesswork right ? So you can't submit a BID based purely on guesswork.
But like any DFS for a mining operation , the whole economic premise of a NPV valuation is based on the CAPITAL required which then based on a discount rate will return you an payback of that Capital and IRR calculation.
So given there would obviously be inter-relating upfront Capital and ongoing Capital savings on the Authier contributing project , on the other hand , there will be offsetting upfront capital and ongoing capital on the NAL end of things. On top of that there will be operational changes to the whole ' Truck & Shovel ' aspects of the Authier project outside of the excavation and then beyond into the fleet and logistics of the Spod ------> to Concentrator aspects. So obviously changes to the Workforce and distributions of those resources between the 2 operations.
We also know that the ICS closed loop system of Lithium Hydroxide production comes with many of its own Capex savings. To what extent they are across the whole of the project given they are only at what we would call ' Pilot ' plant stage is another question. Having said that , and again , ICS has obviously already produced the Lithium Hydroxide sample for Novonix so much of what is supposed to be know about the Quality of the Hydroxide in my opinion would have already been known by ICS . It's just that the ' High Purity ' 99.97% lithium hydroxide has to be confirmed in the Lab . And so that's where Novonix comes in. So in other words if ICS couldn't of already have produce high quality Lithium Hydroxide , then their GIG would just about be up right.
And so that also answers that other fellows question about what happens if the Authier spod doesn't prove up to the requirements. There will be means and way to ratchet it up to the desired levels.
So coming back to your first question - YES , I believe there will be a revised combined economic DFS presented. And probably within 3- 4 months after completing the acquisition transaction. I also believe the DFS will be ' multi layered ' with several comparative discount rates being applied with NOT necessarily the 8% being the one which will be the main focus.
O.K so in answer to your SECOND question which will be very short. I do not think it prerequisite that Tansim has to produce a separate DFS . And the reason is that it will be enough to simply show and define an initial JORC resource followed by increasing JORC tonnages at various intermittent intervals over the life of the combined Sayona Quebec Lithium operations. So no costly DFS outside of Pit design , mineral modelling and excavation required in my opinion on Tansim because even mined byproducts might be able to be sent directly to Piedmont for processing. So as I previously asserted , the SP increases from simply drilling and defining JORC tonnages out of Tansim will almost be just as ' sweet ' in the earlier stages as any economic extraction of resources resulting from longer term DFS economic analysis down the track.
So coming back to the Hydroxide ' Purity ' results from Novonix. It is the LAB proven results and the confirmation to the Markets of this ' Purity ' that will ultimately move the markets despite the fact ICS may already know. Because it is this confirmation to the off-take investing community that the Authier Ore is definitely of high value and will be the deciding factor in turning the whole NAL operation around with greater uncertainty. And I guess what I am saying is that I reckon they already know this to be the case so it's just a matter of ticking the box and going through the ' official ' process. And then there is also the $100 million baked in potential turnaround figure in the NAL numbers PLUS the game changing economic and capital savings from deploying the ICS closed loop lithium hydroxide conversion process.
So lots of BIG numbers which are ALL coming back to the Quality of and the production of Lithium Hydroxide. And they are HUGE numbers indeed. Apologies for long post .....but there are lots of things to be stated and reinforced.
(20min delay)