What is Direct Lithium Extraction, the technology that could be successful for Bolivia?

With 21 million certified tonnes of this metal, Bolivia has the world’s largest lithium reserves.

A few days ago, the government signed an agreement with the Chinese company CBC to exploit this resource through a new method.

What are the advantages for the country?

President Luis Arce announced the beginning of the “era of industrialization of Bolivian lithium” by signing a contract with the Chinese company CBC to construct two plants with the Direct Lithium Extraction (DLE) mechanism.

This will allow Bolivia to enter fully into the world trade of this metal, which is increasingly used in batteries for electronic devices.

In 2021, the Arce government expressed interest in exploiting lithium through DLE.

For this reason, seven companies have been competing, each with its pilot project in the Uyuni salt flat, department of Potosí.

In the end, the government opted for the CBC method, which would allow the recovery of more lithium from the brines, which contain a lot of water in Bolivia.

The advantage of DLE lies in the amount of lithium recovered from the extraction, industrial engineer Gabriel Campero told Sputnik.

This process “employs various chemical mixtures to have a higher percentage of usefulness. According to reports from several companies, the profit is over 90% through this mechanism,” he said.

The traditional method, implemented during the last decades, involved drying the lithium in huge pools. In this way, up to 50% of the metal was recovered.

“It consists of an evaporite system, in which the raw material, lithium carbonate, is obtained through an evaporation process,” explained Campero.

“It is very slow because of the degree of humidity that the Uyuni salt flat has. So this was not an optimal mechanism to obtain lithium carbonate in a much more accelerated way,” as proposed by the DLE.

Thus Bolivia is the first country in the world to implement the DLE model on a large scale.

Campero remarked that the great advantage is in time, “in the speed to extract the lithium carbonate”.

However, the state company in charge of the extraction, Yacimientos de Litio Bolivianos (YLB), must place emphasis on the environmental protection of the salt flat, precisely one of the most popular tourist sites in the country because of its particular beauty.

“Logically, every chemical has its respective characteristics, which can contaminate the environment. But in a controlled environment, it is a much faster mechanism, which gives better extraction results,” said the engineer.

LESS TIME, MORE WATER

Both Campero and government authorities remarked that the DLE affects the environment less, as it does not generate evaporation of the salt water.

“I support the DLE procedure over evaporation pools, which involves a long process. The EDL shortens the time to a few days to obtain the carbonate and, likewise, the lithium hydroxide,” Ricardo Cardona, also an engineer and a referent of the Coordinating Committee for the Defense of National Heritage (Codepanal), told Sputnik.

The engineer stressed that this mechanism “is ecological, as it saves water”.

Cardona considered adequate the Government’s plan to have two plants for extracting lithium carbonate in 2025.

“When both are in operation, they will add up to 50,000 tonnes annually. This would bring in an income of close to US$5 billion a year,” he said

The engineer recalled that his institution “proposes that the patriotic and sovereign government of Luis Arce invite Chinese companies to manufacture electric vehicles in the Uyuni industrial park and others”.

Cardona evaluated that in the first instance, could be assembly plants to use later parts produced in the country, such as lithium-ion batteries.

“We would export to the markets of Brazil, Mexico, Argentina, and the 33 countries of CELAC [Community of Latin American and Caribbean States],” Cardona said.

Argentina, Chile, and Bolivia comprise the so-called Lithium Triangle, where 68% of the world’s lithium reserves are located. This percentage could be higher if the first unofficial reports on the recent study in the Coipasa salt flat, department of Oruro, which will be presented in the coming weeks, are confirmed.

With information from Sputnik

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