Hi Strat,(just for the record I’m no brains trust) but happy to share my understandingie Direct Lithium Extraction (DLE) technology applies strictly to removinglithium compounds from the geothermal ‘brine’ waters = lithium carbonate.
ZEO on theother hand is targeting a cleantech solution, that revolves around theproduction of lithium hydroxide, produced from spodumene concentrate that isderived from hard rock spodumene and, where Australia has one of the world’slargest resources ie presently there are some large-scale lithium hydroxiderefineries under construction in WA, although the world’s largest producer isin China ie Ganfeng Lithium, who only in the past week or so, tabled aninvestment circa $250 million for a 50 per cent stake in a hard-rock lithiumproject controlled by a ASX listed Firefinch (m/c was less than $15 million 12months ago). So I think its safe to say, the production of lithium hydroxide ison the up and in its production (at the refinery level) out of 7 tonnes ofconcentrated spodumene feed going in, 6 tonnes go to process tailings wastestream, so there looks to be heaps of Li process waste feed coming ‘globally’which one would think, is looking for a management solution and the sector isrelatively new, so I imagine not a lot of solutions uncovered yet either.
So DLEprocess can’t be a threat, as in my reading although DLE is touted as the mostenvironmentally friendly way to extract lithium from brines – many will firmlysay that brine production of lithium carbonate is much less environmentally friendlythan going the hard-rock spodumene route to lithium hydroxide (Ganfenginvestment in Firefinch, IMO is an indicator in which form lithium ispreferred, moving forward)
As foryour comment will there be enough demand for Li – that’s a much bigger questionand in my humble view, will primarily be driven by the uptake in EV’s to thedemise of ICE’s , several global auto makers have already slated production ofEV only vehicles in the near future, so pretty sure that Li demand is notdropping off and both Li carbonate and Li hydroxide prices have moved stronglyhigher over the pass 12 mths (EV’s are the only consumer of battery gradelithium, the solar industry is also a player)
Simply,DLE is not threat to ZEO’s technology when applied to the downstream managementof Li process residue (waste) produced by lithium hydroxide refineries – ZEOjust needs to prove up the tech works economically, so I suppose that’s whythey’ve gone with dual-feed pilot program.
