High-purity lithium discovery

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Lithium carbonate, which can be used in electric car batteries, has successfully been produced from mines in Cornwall and Scotland.

The announcement was made by the Faraday Battery Challenge-funded project, Li4UK, a consortium comprising Wardell Armstrong International Limited, The Natural History Museum and Cornish Lithium Ltd.

It is the first time that lithium carbonate has been produced from UK sources and could have a significant impact on the Cornish economy.

Cornish Lithium CEO, Jeremy Wrathall, said: “Given the potential that has been established by this project to exploit lithium resources in Cornwall, it is possible that the UK could produce a significant percentage of its lithium demand domestically; thus creating a vertically-integrated supply chain and generating additional value for the UK economy.

“Cornwall also provides access to renewable energy from solar and wind, and offers established infrastructure such as rail, road and port facilities – which represent a considerable advantage over other European lithium projects.”

2 COMMENTS

  1. At British Lithium, we are very excited for our friends at Cornish Lithium, Wardell Armstrong and Natural History Museum. Their achievements are undoubtedly many, but do not include having “produced lithium carbonate for the first time from UK sources”. British Lithium began testing hard-rock lithium in Cornwall in 2017, and perfected the concentration of lithium-rich mica from Cornish granite in November 2017. In February 2018 we produced near battery quality lithium carbonate from that mica. We have worked hard to maintain our technical lead and have built the only dedicated lithium research laboratory in the UK. British Lithium was also the first company to drill a hard-rock lithium deposit in the UK, in April 2019.

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