Sayona Mining is targeting February 28 for re-opening North American Lithium Mine

The clock on Sayona Mining’s website clicks away the minutes, hours and days till its first production in 18 days on February 28 of the North American Lithium Project, in Quebec.
The North America Lithium project is located in the La Corne municipality, 60km away from Val d’Or city in Quebec, Canada. It is situated in the Abitibi‐Témiscamingue region, 15km west of Barraute and 38km south-east of Amos. The property encompasses a contiguous group of 19 mineral claims and a mining lease that is valid until May 2032.

Sayona Quebec acquired the North American Lithium Project  in August 2021 after  its previous owner, North American Lithium Inc went bankrupt. Sayona Quebec is a joint venture between Sayona Mining, which owns a 75% stake, and Piedmont Lithium, which holds the remaining 25%.

A pre-feasibility study (PFS) for the project was announced in May 2022 with a life of mine (LOM) of 27 years and an estimated capital cost of $69m. The North American Lithium project, previously known as the Québec Lithium, is located in Quebec, Canada. The mine ceased operations in 2014, however, they were resumed in 2017 following an acquisition by North American Lithium. Operations continued until March 2019, when production was suspended again due to financial problems. North American Lithium filed for bankruptcy protection in May of the same year.

Project location and geology
The project lies in the southern volcanic zone of the Abitibi Greenstone Belt of the Superior Province of Québec, within the Archean Preissac-Lavorne region of a tectonic intrusion. The spodumene pegmatites within the project area are very poorly exposed.

Mineralization and reserves
The host rocks at the property are split between granodiorite of the La Corne batholith, volcanics, biotite schists and pegmatite dykes.
The proven and probable mineral reserves at the North American Lithium project are estimated at 29.2 million tonnes (Mt), grading 0.96% Li₂O, with contained Li₂O of 280,300t.

Mining methods
The project will use conventional open-pit bulk mining methods with hydraulic excavators, dump trucks, and drill and blast. Ore from the blasted faces will be trucked to the run of mine (ROM) stockpile and fed to the primary crusher using a front‐end loader (FEL).

The proposed pit is expected to have a length of 1,350m, average width of 750m and final pit depth of 270m. Mining will be carried out using 2m and 3m flitches for ore and waste, respectively, and the minimum mining width in most areas will be 40m.

Phase one of the mining will commence at the south‐east limit of the deposit. Mining will advance to the north and in depth. To reach the ultimate designed pit, six mining phases are planned. The ultimate pit ramp system is designed to accommodate 90t haul trucks, although 65t‐class haul trucks are expected to be used in the initial years of operation.
Processing

The North American Lithium project will have a processing facility with a feed rate of 1.5 million tonnes per annum (Mtpa). The processing facility will include a conventional primary, secondary and tertiary crushing circuit combined with primary and secondary ore sorting.

The grinding circuit will constitute a rod mill and ball mill arranged in closed circuit with sizing screens. The ground product will be deslimed and fed to a magnetic separation circuit, and the non‐magnetic stream will be conditioned prior to spodumene flotation.

The flotation stage will consist of rougher and scavenger cells as well as three stages of cleaning. The 6% Li₂O spodumene concentrate product will be dewatered on a belt filter, while the tailings streams will be thickened and stored in the tailings storage facility.

The plant will receive supplementary ore feed from the Authier Lithium Project, which is owned by Sayona and located 30km from the North American Lithium project.
The composition of the blended feed to the processing facility is expected to include 67% North American Lithium ore and 33% Authier lithium project ore.

Off-take agreements
Piedmont Lithium Carolinas, a wholly owned subsidiary of Piedmont Lithium, reached an off-take agreement to purchase spodumene concentrate containing 6% Li₂O grade (dry basis) from Sayona Quebec for the entire project life of the North American Lithium and Authier projects. Sayona will supply 113,000 dry metric tonnes (dmt) a year or 50% of production from the North American Lithium project. The agreement also includes the supply of spodumene concentrate from the Authier project.

Contractors involved:
Jarrett Quinn Consultant, a mineral processing and hydrometallurgy consultant based in Canada, was engaged to perform metallurgical test work for the PFS in 2022.
Canadian mining consultant BBA was responsible for studies related to process engineering, mine design, mineral resource estimation, tailings and water management, and financial modelling for the PFS.
Golder Associates, part of WSP Global, was engaged to conduct geotechnical studies, and PwC Canada conducted a lithium market study as part of the PFS.

For more information:
+617- 3369-7058

info@sayonamining.com.au
Level 28, 10 Eagle St
Brisbane, Queensland
4000 Australia
GPO Box 1638
Brisbane
QLD 4001
Australia

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