Controlled Thermal Resources has initiated drilling two wells at its Hell's Kitchen lithium and power project in southeast California.
The company is on schedule to deliver Hell's Kitchen's first 50 megawatts of renewable power in late 2023, chief executive Rod Colwell said in the statement.
The Hell's Kitchen project is in the Salton Sea geothermal field.
For the wells, CTR plans to reach target depths of approximately 8,000 feet, which CTR says can provide power for decades.
Following the drilling of the two wells, CTR will conduct brine-testing to prepare for the scale-up to convert to lithium hydroxide.
CTR is working on its construction program for Stage One of mining, while engineering firm HATCH is engineering the second stage of the project.
Stage One construction will create 480 construction jobs, while Stage Two will create 930 jobs.
The Salton Sea has an inferred lithium resource of 15 million tonnes, with the CTR project's capacity estimated to produce 1,100 MW of baseload power and 300,000 of lithium carbonate equivalent per annum.
CTR is aiming to deliver the first 49.9MW baseload of power in the fourth quarter of 2023, while production of 20,000 tonnes of lithium hydroxide is planned for 2024.
