Cornish Lithium said GeoLith had the best tender for the pilot plant, which is due to be commissioned at United Downs in Cornwall by the end of March 2022 with a nominal capacity of 10 tonnes of Lithium Carbonate Equivalent per year.
GeoLith has developed a novel "Li-Capt" process that allows direct extraction of lithium from all waters and brines. It also offers the "Li-Mag" process, which allows the purification of concentrated lithium brines. It can be intégrated into existing production facilities from salars evaporation processes to increase extraction yield.
The GeoCubed extraction plant is being built in partnership with energy developers, Geothermal Engineering (GEL).
The pilot plant aims to confirm that lithium can be produced in Cornwall from geothermal brine.
It will process the 140 square metres of deep geothermal water successfully obtained during GEL's recent testing at its United Downs site.
"The Pilot Plant being constructed at Cornish Lithium's test site at United Downs will enable us to demonstrate what modern, low-carbon mineral extraction looks like as well as demonstrating the viability of DLE technology on Cornish geothermal waters," Jeremy Wrathall, CEO and Founder of Cornish Lithium.
Jean-Philippe Gibaud, CEO and Founder of GeoLith said: "We are honoured to have been selected to provide our lithium filter technology as the 'technological enabler' of this clean lithium mining project."
