April Cornish Mining Sundowner with good news of tin and lithium mining in Cornwall

There was a good turn-out last night at Falmouth's Chain Locker for the April Mining Sundowner with a few new faces swelling the ranks of the regulars.

Three of the "regulars" Dean Eastbury, Pete Shepherd and Steve Barber

CSM mining and geology students making their sundowner debuts

I was pleased to see Andy Wilkinson, a 1991 CSM mineral processing graduate, now with Metso-Outotec, a sponsor of MEI's forthcoming Comminution '23 and Flotation '23. Andy was accompanied by his Ukrainian fiancée Iryna Shopska who has only recently joined him in St. Austell. Although Iryna enjoys living in Cornwall her thoughts were very much on her family and friends in her war-torn country.

With Andy and Iryna

Mining ventures continue to push ahead in Cornwall and it was good to hear that Cornish Metals Inc. plans to raise up to £40.5 million via a share issue to advance its development of South Crofty tin mine. The mining company has secured a £25 million strategic investment from Vision Blue Resources, a vehicle founded by former Xstrata plc boss Mick Davis. In addition, Cornish Metals plans to raise a further £15.5 million from a private placing and subscription. The money will be used for mine dewatering, resource drilling, completion of a feasibility study, evaluation of further downstream opportunities, and early works in advance of a potential construction decision.

Demand for tin is expected to grow rapidly as it is essential for the high-tech, low carbon economy, which makes South Crofty a strategic asset with the ability to provide a secure, traceable, sustainable supply of this important metal. Tin is primarily used in the production of lead-free solder used in almost all circuit boards and semiconductors, as well as renewable energy systems where tin is used in the production of photo voltaic cells, and there is growing demand from the automotive sector where it is utilised in EV components and has been shown to enhance the performance of EV batteries themselves. At the same time there is no primary mine production of tin in Europe or North America and the metal has been designated as a mineral critical to economic and national security by the USA. 

South Crofty has one of the highest grade tin mineral resources in the world not currently in production and has the potential to be among the lowest cost producers globally. Having previously operated until 1998, there is significant mine infrastructure still in place, most notably several mine shafts that can be used for future production and ventilation purposes, and the operation is located within an industrial area with access to the national electricity grid as well as existing transport infrastructure. 

Braving the elements outside the pub were members of Cornish Lithium and Geoscience, who are much involved in the development of extraction of lithium from deep and hot geothermal brines. Second left is Cornish Lithium's ESG & Sustainability Manager Lucy Crane and standing is Pete Ledingham, a founding member of Geoscience, which he joined following six years at the Camborne School of Mines Hot Dry Rock geothermal research project. He was Project Manager of the United Downs Deep Geothermal Power project from its inception until May 2020. 

It is well known that lithium is critical to electric vehicle battery manufacture and the UK government has been warned it is falling dangerously behind in its plans to build a British battery industry, with manufacturing capacity forecast to be barely half the needed level by the end of the decade, according to data produced by Benchmark Mineral Intelligence, one of the world's leading authorities on the battery industry. The report shows that the UK will have to increase the supply of lithium, cobalt and graphite, critical ingredients in battery production, by staggering amounts, as much as 90 times the current level, to have any hope of supplying that industry. 

Two Cornish companies, British Lithium and Cornish Lithium, are developing flowsheets for the extraction of lithium from mica in granite rocks in the St. Austell area and in west Cornwall Cornish Lithium is proceeding with its development of extracting lithium from geothermal waters and there was more good news that GeoCubed Ltd., a subsidiary company of Cornish Lithium, has successfully commissioned and delivered the Direct Lithium Extraction (DLE) Pilot Plant at Cornish Lithium’s Geothermal Waters Test Facility at United Downs. The DLE Pilot Plant has been designed to process Cornish geothermal waters using DLE technologies and is the first time that a DLE system has become operational in the UK. The £4.0 million Pilot Plant is being supported by the Cornwall and Isles of Scilly Local Enterprise Partnership with £2.9 million from the UK Government’s Getting Building Fund. The Pilot Plant was successfully commissioned at the end of March, on time and on budget.

The pilot plant is expected to confirm that lithium can be produced in Cornwall from geothermal waters, and the pilot plant is expected to provide sufficient information to enable the design of a commercial lithium plant in the County. During the course of 2022, different DLE technologies will be tested, utilising the pilot plant, with a view to establishing the preferred technology for future DLE plants in Cornwall. 

A very interesting evening, and the next Cornish Mining Sundowner to look forward to will be at the Chain Locker on Thursday 19th May, from 5.30pm.

@barrywills