The word mica is derived from theLatin wordmica,meaning a crumb. Mica = silica
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mica#Ground_mica
Mica has many uses and is used in induction furnaces to insulate the coil of the Induction Furnace, It has excellent adhesion on copper and stainless steel with desire flexibility to withstand cooling and heating cycles normally encountered during operation of furnaces and provides electrical resistance to voltage developed between coil turns to protect from sparking. (Note; Good quality batteries require spodumene/concentrate converted into Hydroxide which needs to be heated to 1050°C in the roasting process
Problem is mica binds tightly with lithium so have to crush the shit out of it to get rid of it.
I reckon PLS are crushing too hard to get rid of the mica and iron oxide. So Ken stating 70% fines in their mix = 70% useless shit.
Hence Galaxy Resources at Mt Catlin is running 51% recovery. I suspect Pilbara Minerals is running similar to GXY. Time will tell if I am correct.
Fines are too small for battery grade and are useless.
1.8% Fe2O3 for PLS is also a big issue. High quality EV batteries require less than 0.5% iron oxide
Lithium can be extracted from spodumene concentrates after roasting and acid roasting operations. A concentrate with at least 6% Li2O (approximately 75% spodumene) is suitable for roasting. Roasting is performed at about 1050°C, during which spodumene will go through a phase transformation from α-spodumene to β-spodumene.
Excerpt from Nemaska
The presence of iron in the concentrate affected the conversion temperature. A higher temperature could be reached without causing the formation of glass beads when the iron was removed from the concentrate before conversion.
Deutsche Bank 101 report:
Spodumene ores are crushed grinded and liberated into a 6% Li2O concentrate that can be used in industrial markets or converted downstream into battery- grade products. High-grade (7.5% Li2O), low-iron (less than 0.1% Fe2O3) spodumene concentrates are known as technical grade concentrateand can be directly used by downstream “technical markets” users, including glass, ceramics, fiberglass and continuous casting without further processing into lithium carbonate.
Lithium concentrates undergo communition to further reduce particle size and are then decrepitated and/or roasted using various acids and then leaching to produce lithium sulfate or chloride in solution. The lithium fluids are then purified using hydroxide precipitation to remove impurities like aluminium, iron, calcium etc. Ion exchange is the next step in the purification process before a battery grade (99.5%)lithium carbonate is produced by carbonation at 80-100°C using sodium carbonate (Na2CO3). To reach higher levels of purity, the lithium carbonate can be redissolved into water using CO2 (to form lithium bicarbonate liquor) and is then passed through another phase of ion exchange to remove impurities trapped in the lithium carbonate precipitate.Following the second stage of ion exchange a 99.9% lithium carbonate is produced, which is used in high-end applications incl. medical applications and batteries.
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