Resumen de Lithium: : Year in Review 2015

Industrial Minerals

• Separately, SQM's stand-off with state-owned Corporacion de Formento de Produccion (CORFO) over lease payments at the Salar de Atacama continued, with CORFO pushing for the repeal of SQM's extraction rights at the salt flat. A decision on the arbitration process is expected in mid-2016.

  The company signed two separate supply agreements with lithium producers to secure raw material for its Reno, Nevada, US-based Gigafactory, scheduled to be brought online in 2016. One was with the Sonora lithium project in Mexico, owned jointly by Bacanora Minerals Ltd and Rare Earth Minerals Plc, which aims to produce lithium from hectorite and polylithionite clays. The other was with Pure Energy Minerals Ltd for supply from its Clayton Valley brine project in Nevada, US. Both deals were for prices below market levels and are subject to a number of conditions.

  Stormcrow Capital Ltd predicted that demand for lithium in Li-ion batteries will almost triple from around 69,000 tonnes lithium carbonate equivalent (LCE) in 2015 to around 200,000 tonnes LCE by 2025, moving from 38% to 49% of the total market.