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Quebec junior miners pocket more than $43 million in federal critical minerals funding – by Ian Ross (Northern Ontario Business – February 7, 2025)

https://www.northernontariobusiness.com/

James Bay explorers cash in to carry out studies on road, power and innovation projects

Ottawa wants Canada to be the lead dog when it comes to developing and expanding its critical minerals value chain. That’s why the federal government is ponying up $43.5 million to advance road, power and research projects in Quebec.

Mining proponents on the eastern side of the James Bay region and northern Quebec were the recipients this week of a stream of program funding through the federal government’s critical minerals strategy. Federal Energy and Natural Resources Minister Jonathan Wilkinson delivered the news on Feb.6.

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Australian lithium player selects new site for proposed Thunder Bay refinery – by Ian Ross (Northern Ontario Business – February 5, 2025)

https://www.northernontariobusiness.com/

Green Technology Metals tests lithium sample in South Korea to develop a product for the electric vehicle market

An aspiring Australian lithium producer in northwestern Ontario is eyeing a new site in Thunder Bay to place a refinery. Green Technology Metals is scoping out a brownfield on the city’s waterfront to evaluate its suitability to host a lithium chemical conversion plant.

The Perth-headquartered has shifted focus away from the former Cascades Paper plant property in the city’s north end to the Midcontinent Terminal property on Maureen Street in the centre of the city, near a grouping of grain elevators.

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Bolivia’s Lithium Window Is Closing Rapidly – by Joseph Bouchard (Real Clear World – February 2025)

https://www.realclearworld.com/

In 2023, Bolivia signed multi-billion dollar deals for lithium extraction with Chinese and Russian state-owned companies, including the CBC consortium and Rosatom/Uranium One. Since then, despite these deals expanding further, very little progress has been made, with extraction and production stalling despite promises from all stakeholders about “rapid industrialization.”

Given Bolivia’s increasingly friendly relationship with American adversaries, the continuous problems plaguing Bolivia’s mining sector, and the growing alternatives for lithium development, it may be time for the U.S. and other democratic states to look elsewhere.

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Saudi Arabia of lithium: The future of mining in Afghanistan and Pakistan – by Gordon Feller (Canadian Mining Journal – December 19, 2024)

https://www.canadianminingjournal.com/

Afghanistan and Pakistan possess significant mineral resources that have attracted China’s interest. This fact has shaped what China does to grow its broader economic and geopolitical strategy in the region. This article provides a short survey, for both countries, of the mineral deposits, current mining production, and China’s efforts to increase its influence.

Afghanistan’s mineral resources

Afghanistan is estimated to have mineral deposits worth up to US$1 trillion, including vast reserves of copper, iron, gold, lithium, and rare earth elements. Some of the key mineral resources include the following:

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Winsome Resources begins permitting for Adina lithium project in northern Quebec – by Staff (Canadian Mining Journal – January 27, 2025)

https://www.canadianminingjournal.com/

Australia-based Winsome Resources (ASX: WR1) – a lithium exploration and development company – has submitted the preliminary information statement for its Adina Lithium Mining project with the proper provincial authorities that oversee mining project developments located in self-governing Indigenous communities in Northern Quebec that are signatories to the James Bay and Northern Quebec Agreement (JBNQA).

Winsome’s filing represents a milestone as it formally commences the provincial regulatory process in the James Bay region associated with permitting the proposed mine at Adina, as well as the proposed modifications to the Renard operation. Indigenous communities in the region refer to the James Bay region as Eeyou Istchee.

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Nevada’s Lithium Could Help Save the Earth. But What Happens to Nevada? – by Meg Bernhard (New York Times – January 24, 2025)

https://www.nytimes.com/

Many climate experts see its deserts as a place to build the green-energy future. For two local activists, the price is too great.

Few Americans follow the nation’s lithium-mining industry as closely as Patrick Donnelly. Since 2021, he has set up 30 or so Google Alerts for variations on the word “lithium,” and he uses the findings to populate an online map of projects across the West. It is so useful that one industry insider has referred to it as “an investor’s handbook.”

This is paradoxical: Donnelly, who works at an environmental nonprofit called the Center for Biological Diversity, is one of the industry’s most vigilant watchdogs. The true spirit of his monitoring and mapping efforts comes through in a Twitter exchange he had with one mining firm, Rover Critical Minerals, a few years ago.

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Chile Keeps Faith in Lithium Expansion Even as Glut Worsens – by James Attwood (Bloomberg News – January 23, 2025)

https://www.bnnbloomberg.ca/

(Bloomberg) — Chile, home to the world’s biggest lithium reserves, is confident that investors will compete for licenses to drill new deposits even amid a worsening global glut that’s squeezing the battery-metal industry.

“We’re convinced that there’s interest,” Mining Minister Aurora Williams said in an interview late Wednesday — a day before Chile warned that global oversupply is set to increase this year, despite some industry cutbacks.

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Bolivia steps up lithium dealmaking despite growing opposition – by Sergio Mendoza and James Attwood(Bloomberg News – January 21, 2025)

https://www.bloomberg.com/

Bolivia is stepping up efforts to tap the world’s biggest lithium deposits, readying deals with new investors to build processing plants despite low prices and growing opposition from lawmakers and citizen groups.

The Andean nation opened its first industrial-scale plant in late 2023, built by a Chinese group, and last year signed deals for further investments with Russia’s Uranium One Group and a Chinese consortium, which are awaiting congressional approval.

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Russia Targets Ukraine’s Key Lithium Reserves – by Wojtek Grojeck and Kian Sharifi (Radio Free Europe – January 2025)

https://www.rferl.org/

Russia has captured two of Ukraine’s four lithium deposits since it launched its all-out invasion in 2022, potentially depriving Kyiv of a key economic resource.

On January 11, Russia claimed to have seized control of Shevchenko, a rural settlement in Ukraine’s eastern Donetsk region. The settlement sits on top of one of Ukraine’s biggest lithium deposits.

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Stubbornly resilient lithium supply remains hurdle to recovery – by Annie Lee (Bloomberg News – January 7, 2025)

https://www.bnnbloomberg.ca/

A persistent lithium glut and the prospect that some mines could be restarted if prices rise means the battery metal is unlikely to mount a significant recovery this year.

Lithium prices have plunged since late 2022 on oversupply and slower-than-expected growth in electric vehicle demand. The rout has resulted in some mining capacity being suspended, but most analysts still see a surplus this year, although they forecast it will be smaller than in 2024.

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Rio Tinto’s $2.5 Billion Lithium Plan Is a Win for Milei – by James Attwood and Jonathan Gilbert (Bloomberg News – December 12, 2024)

https://www.bnnbloomberg.ca/

(Bloomberg) — Rio Tinto Group plans to invest $2.5 billion in a new lithium mine in Argentina in a win for President Javier Milei’s efforts to deregulate the country’s economy and lure foreign investment.

The UK company plans to build a processing plant at the Rincon mine with an annual capacity of 60,000 metric tons of lithium carbonate, it said Thursday in a statement. Work on the facility, subject to permitting, will start in the middle of next year.

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Child labour: Nigeria’s lithium mines reveal the dark side of our electric future – by Jerry Fisayo-Bambi and Ruth Wright (Euro News – December 13, 2024)

https://www.euronews.com/

Children as young as five-years-old were found to be working in one illegal mine.

Electric vehicles, laptops, battery packs, smartphones…it’s a long list of items we rely on every day that rely on a key material: lithium. But have you stopped to think who mines for this precious metal? In northern Nigeria, it has been found to be children. Lithium mining is dangerous and exhausting work.

Miners descend several feet into dark pits then wield axes to hack through rocks. In some old but viable mines, they crawl through yards of snaky, narrow passages, wedging themselves between unstable mud walls before starting to dig. Abdullahi Sabiu has spent years in these pits after he started working the mines at 20.

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OPINION: Study overstates lithium mining benefits – by Edward Bartell (This Is Reno – October 1, 2024)

https://thisisreno.com/

Edward Bartell is an Orovada rancher. His family ranch neighbors the Thacker Pass project in Humboldt County.

I am writing in response to the recent hype in numerous newspapers about the alleged benefits the Thacker Pass Lithium Mine will contribute to Nevada’s economy. Lithium Americas Corporation (LAC), which is developing Thacker Pass, is aggressively hyping a study pointing to these alleged benefits.

What LAC fails to mention is this study was conducted last year before the complete price collapse and assumes lithium prices to be more than double what they actually are. The touted study assumes lithium prices to be $24,000 per metric ton.

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Lithium leap: Brazil makes journey to become a leading supplier – by Anne Barbosa and Adriana Carvalho (S&P Global – August 15, 2024)

https://www.spglobal.com/

Brazil’s legislative overhaul in lithium export regulations has transformed the country into a burgeoning hub for lithium production, unlocking vast economic potential and attracting global investments.

“Thanks to a legislative change made four years ago regarding lithium exports, we can now transform this mineral asset into an economic resource,” Fernando Passalio, secretary of state for economic development of Minas Gerais, told S&P Global Commodity Insights.

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Lithium supply surplus set to stay with battery makers’ help – by Eric Onstad (Reuters – December 10, 2024)

https://www.reuters.com/

LONDON, Dec 10 (Reuters) – Many lithium mines, led by Chinese operators, are maintaining production of the raw material needed for electric vehicle (EV) batteries, in defiance of prices weak enough to trigger mass output cuts – providing a boon for battery makers.

The continued production raises the prospect of years of oversupply and of weak prices. Some battery makers own mines or have injected cash into operations to keep them operational, company reports show.

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