This week, Piedmont Lithium made two announcements regarding the acquisition of lithium assets in Canada and Ghana. The Superior Court of Québec granted approval of the company’s joint bid with Sayona Mining Ltd. for the acquisition of North American Lithium (NAL) by Sayona Québec Inc. Piedmont is a 25% shareholder of Sayona Québec and owns 20% of Sayona Mining Ltd. At the completion of the transaction, Sayona Québec will acquire all shares of NAL and substantially all of its assets.
NAL owns a large, past-producing lithium project located approximately 20 miles from Sayona’s core Authier project near Val-d’Or. It is fully permitted, has a mineral resource of 57.7 million metric tons (mt) with a grade of 1.05% Li2O, and more than $400 million has been invested in mining, concentrate and refining capacity. The project was operational and ramping toward nameplate production in 2018 when it was placed on care and maintenance due to weak lithium markets and a sub-optimal capital structure.
Sayona and Piedmont are proceeding with technical studies that contemplate integrating Sayona Québec’s Authier and Tansim projects with the facilities at NAL, including restart requirements, technical improvements, and optimization of NAL operations to fully utilize this competitive set of assets. Furthermore, Sayona and Piedmont will prioritize manufacturing of lithium hydroxide in Québec, capitalizing on Québec’s competitive advantages and its access to zero-carbon, hydropower, and the initiative of both the Canadian and provincial governments to develop the lithium-ion battery materials and an EV industry.
Piedmont plans to consolidate the spodumene resources in the Abitibi region of Québec.
“We will work closely with Sayona to refine the plans to unify the Authier and NAL spodumene operations, and we are both committed to building integrated spodumene to lithium hydroxide capacity in Québec,” Piedmont President and CEO Keith Phillips said.
Piedmont also announced plans to establish a strategic partnership with IronRidge Resources (IRR) through the purchase of a 9% equity stake in IRR, staged project investments to earn a 50% interest in IRR’s Ghana-based lithium portfolio (IRR Ghana), and a binding supply agreement for 50% of IRR Ghana’s planned spodumene concentrate (SC6) production.
IRR Ghana has a portfolio of spodumene prospects, anchored by the Ewoyaa Project, which has a current mineral resource of 14.5 million mt at 1.31% Li2O. It has the potential to be a large, low-cost SC6 producer.