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Comment by traveler01 | Hacker News Reader

We have a deposit here in Portugal too. Didn't know Lithium production had all those complications. But wouldn't mine it and move it away to processing be an alternative? I don't know, the US has a lot territory and probably lithium, wouldn't mine it and move it be profitable?

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Yes. This is what happens in Western Australia. Hard rock mining and selling is possible. Even then however the processor has to basically make the process specifically for the deposit.

So its not as easy as just selling it to the lithium ore market. You need a project partner that develops the project with you.

The only group currently processing spodumene to lithium are in China. Others want to make such project but I don't think they are online.

I'm not saying this deposit is worthless, I'm just saying 'this much lithium is there' is really not a good way to evaluate the actual value of a deposit like this.

Generally the location of mines like this is quite relevant, and a place that have bad regulation to begin with are very unattractive.

The traditional lithium belt in the US is in North Carolina, lithium was mined there for decades. Starting a new mine there, is already incredibly difficult. Doing it in a place with no such history will be far more difficult.

Lithium mining isn't like gold/iron/other metal mining. It's more like salt harvesting. So trucking away loads of dirt/salt/rock/ore to a processing plant isn't viable. You have to process it on site which means huge ponds for evaporation.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u8-YDMzg2bY Interesting video on the Lithium extraction

This is not correct. Lithium Spodumene Ore is often transported from West Australia to China for processing.

Do processing facilities like this exist closer to Maine than China? If not, a new one would need to be built, so I think the GP is still generally correct about the local impacts.

Tianqi built a converter in Kwinana for hydroxide (I was part of the build). But yeah you are correct for all the other small mines all sell to converters in China often through offtake agreements.

I knew there were projects going on didn't know any of them were done yet.

As I understand, Kwinana plant is done but closed for now. I found a Reuters article dated 2020-03-23, China's Tianqi postpones commissioning of Australia lithium plant amid liquidity problems.

https://www.reuters.com/article/tianqilithium-australia-idUS...

Your thinking of salars not hard rock deposits

The issue is that the further away from the mine you do your refining, the higher your transport costs are. All else being equal you’d rather transport a refined product a long way, rather than a product that’s 90% useless other rock.

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