A starter kit for a new south Arkansas industry started rolling from Canada toward El Dorado last week.
On Wednesday, Standard Lithium Ltd. of Vancouver, British Columbia, loaded a flatbed tractor-trailer with the first of 18 modules that will be assembled into a pilot plant for testing the industrial-scale viability of pulling battery-grade lithium from a saltwater sea 10,000 feet below the south Arkansas soil.
Standard’s CEO, Robert Mintak, stopped by Arkansas Business’ Little Rock offices on Wednesday before traveling to El Dorado, showing off video of concrete work being finished. The 12 by 12 by 36-foot modules will arrive in order as 18 separate flatbed loads from Ontario, where they were built. “We’re excited to see this taking shape before our eyes,” Mintak said.
The pilot plant will hook onto the brine infrastructure of Lanxess, the German multinational chemical company that has extracted bromine, an ingredient in flame retardants, from the Smackover brine stream for years.
In a test of the joint venture, Standard Lithium will give its proprietary extraction method a shakedown, hoping for “scalable” results in isolating lithium carbonate, a component of computer and cellphone batteries now sought after for electric vehicles and solar storage.
Mintak expects all the plant components to arrive by the end of the month, and for the demonstration plant to be ready for its first tryout in the fall.
Milam Construction of El Dorado is general contractor for the pilot plant site. Hunt Guillot & Associates LLC of Ruston, Louisiana, did civil engineering and utility connection work and will supervise installing and connecting the modules.
The components themselves were manufactured by Zeton Inc. of Burlington, Ontario, which specializes in pilot plants for petroleum and chemical companies. “They’re expert in modular building, so this is right in their wheelhouse,” Mintak said.
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