Bacanora to start production at Sonora lithium project plant in Mexico in 2023

London — Bacanora Lithium is on schedule to start production at its Sonora lithium project's plant in Mexico in 2023, with initial site works on schedule to start in the first half of 2021, subject to financing completion, after all offsite engineering work was completed.

The company said Sept. 10 that its joint venture partner Ganfeng Lithium was on schedule to deliver its final engineering packages at the end of Q4 2020, as it had completed the flow sheet design test work for the production of battery-grade lithium from the samples provided by the pilot plant and was integrating the results of the flow sheet design test work into a larger-scale design.

It added that Ganfeng was also working with its equipment suppliers to determine equipment delivery times and process guarantees.

Bacanora said the pilot plant had completed the bulk sampling needed for the plant and engineering designs and these had been sent to partners in the US and China for final design optimization.

The company said the expected start of the plant would coincide well with the anticipated increase in lithium demand from European, Asian and US electric vehicle (EV) manufacturers expected in 2023.

"Recent forecasts from Chile, the world's largest producer of downstream battery grade lithium products, indicate that, as EV sales in Europe and China continue to rebound post the COVID-19 downturn, the electric car industry is forecast to dominate demand for lithium over the next ten years," Bacanora said.

"By 2030, EV demand will account for more than 75% of consumption, up from 30% in 2019. As a result, demand for lithium for EVs would surge to 1.4 million mt by 2030, almost a five-fold increase from the current 300,000 mt of demand in 2019," Bacanora said.

The company also gave a COVID-19 update, noting that the number of new cases in the Sonora district of Mexico continued to fall and lockdown restrictions were slowly being lifted.

"New health and safety protocols and social distancing will remain in place at the pilot plant for the foreseeable future but will not impact the company's ability to continue to work on site. Most of the larger scale mining operations within the Sonora district, are now back in production and Bacanora will have employees back in the field in October to survey site access roads in preparation for site access works in Q2 2021," it said.