ACME Lithium advancing Nevada mining project, plans to increase North American supply

With a goal of increasing US lithium supply to help meet demand from electric vehicle manufacturers and other applications, ACME Lithium recently made an initial discovery in Nevada and plans to share a development update shortly, President and CEO Stephen Hanson said Sept. 14.

"I founded ACME Lithium due to my core belief that we are in a massive trend in this commodity and a real supply chain issue is going to significantly impact the market in North America into the next decade," Hanson told S&P Commodity Insights in a phone interview.

North America and Europe are far behind other regions like Australia, China, Chile, and Argentina in the lithium supply chain and yet will be some of the biggest users of battery metals in the world as the EV market grows, he said.

In addition to EVs, applications like consumer electronics, power tools and grid storage installations will add to the lithium supply challenge, Hanson said, adding that North American battery factory announcements are coming out almost every few weeks including one from Honda and LG last week.

"There are many, many new battery factories being built in the US and Canada and the crisis that we are now in is about where we are we going to get these core commodities and in particular lithium," he said.

The only place in the US currently producing lithium is in Clayton Valley, Nevada, according to Hanson, and his company made a brine discovery there in June. ACME also has a project in Fish Lake Valley, Nevada, which is to the west of Clayton Valley.

"We are actively exploring and developing in Nevada and then we have projects in Southeastern Manitoba" near a producing mine owned by Chinese company Sinomine, Hanson said.

Clayton Valley project

Following the initial lithium discovery made over the summer, the company is moving to a phase 2 program that is expected to start in the fourth quarter involving a pump test and then three new drill holes with the hope of commercializing the resource in 2023, he said.

In Fish Lake Valley, geophysical testing is expected to start in roughly two weeks followed by a decision about whether to initiate a major drill program later this fall. The lithium in that region is contained in clay deposits, he said.

Several companies have approached ACME regarding the brine discovery. These companies offer direct lithium extraction, or DLE, technology, which can be attractive due to its lower capital expenditure than other extraction technologies, lower water use, smaller environmental footprint and good recovery rates, Hanson said.

Once the Q4 pump test has been completed, ACME will send brine samples to the companies that have requested it and a collaboration agreement could be signed in 2023, he said. QR East, Panasonic and Schlumberger are constructing a DLE pilot plant near to ACME's discovery and Hanson said his company is closely watching the progress of that project.

EnergyX is another company with DLE technology that ACME would consider working with in the future, he said.

The lithium mining industry is receiving support in the form of investment, new technology and permitting from the federal level. Reducing greenhouse gas emissions depends on these core commodities, Hanson said, adding that automakers will not be able to produce the quantities of EVs and hybrids they are forecasting "if we don't have these critical minerals."

US lithium-ion battery imports hit a new quarterly high of 148,323 tons in the second quarter, jumping 94% from a year ago and up 4.4% from the first three months of 2022, according to data from Panjiva.

Asked about development challenges, Hanson said the extensive permitting process is where the biggest bottlenecks exist. The only way to improve the situation is for federal and state governments to provide more human resources to improve the speed at which they can analyze information and process the permits.