Talison gets environmental nod for lithium expansion

Perth-based Talison Lithium has received approval from the Western Australian Environmental Protection Authority to expand the Greenbushes lithium mine in the southwest of the state.

The state of Western Australia's environment minister needs to make the final decision for expansion work to go ahead.

Already the world's largest hard rock lithium mine, the approval of the A$512mn ($358mn) expansion — subject to the protection of some endangered species and following a four-week public review process — will enable the mine to increase its lithium concentrate output to well over 2mn t/yr within the next few years. It produced more than 724,000t of lithium concentrate in 2018.

Greenbushes, located around 250km from Perth, has been operating for more than 30 years, initially producing tantalum and then moving into lithium in line with demand for battery minerals. Its output feeds the downstream processing operations of Talison's owners — China's Tianqi Lithum and US-based Albemarle — both of which are developing battery-grade lithium hydroxide plants.

Talison earlier this month announced that it had appointed a contractor to build a $A100mn tailings treatment facility to extract lithium-containing material at the Greenbushes mine from the time it focused on tantalum.

Talison plans to commission an upgraded Greenbushes concentrate plant in the fourth quarter of 2020, with the possibility of a second plant being commissioned in 2022.