International Battery Metals Ltd. (the “Company” or “IBAT”) (CSE: IBAT), provides the following operational update on our operations at US Magnesium LLC (“US Mag”). We are extremely pleased with the performance of our modular direct lithium extraction plant, (the “MDLE Plant”). The MDLE Plant was processing a solution produced from lithium containing waste salts derived from prior magnesium production generating a high-purity lithium chloride eluent. The lithium chloride eluent was further processed by US Mag’s on-site facilities to produce a lithium carbonate meeting US Mag’s specification. After lengthy discussions between the Company and US Mag it has been concluded that operating economics have been challenged due to the current price environment of lithium carbonate, and operations will be suspended until lithium prices recover. We want to thank US Mag for this collaboration and look forward to potentially working with US Mag in the future.
“While we saw lithium carbonate prices show stability and moderate price recovery in the first half of the year, since the beginning of June, there has been significant weakness in pricing,” Iris Jancik, Chief Executive Officer commented, “We still expect the lithium market to grow and are optimistic we will see better conditions in 2025. It is important to note that our combined operation with US Mag was able to achieve the targeted level of lithium carbonate purity and produced an extremely high-quality product.”
We previously discussed in our quarterly management discussions and analysis that the Company and US Mag had encountered operational challenges during the start-up of the MDLE Plant and incurred damage to some of the filters and equipment resulting in greater than anticipated downtime. The necessary repairs to the MDLE Plant have been completed and are not a contributing factor to the decision to idle the MDLE Plant.
The Company is currently evaluating options for the MDLE Plant. Given the MDLE Plant’s immediate availability and the high-quality results achieved at US Mag, combined with the modular, mobile design, we can offer customers rapid development of their lithium resources.