Galan Lithium will soon hit the go button on a long-term pumping test program at its at its wholly owned Hombre Muerto West, or “HMW” lithium brine project in the Catamarca Province of Argentina. The company says the results of the analysis will flow into a definitive feasibility study or “DFS” for the operation and is expected to be wrapped up by September this year.
The DFS is earmarked for an end-of-year completion date.
Galan says the test work is aimed at delivering essential data for its reserve model that will see its development led by leading mining consultancy group SRK Australia. The reserve model will feed into a DFS for the HMW project and serve as the foundation for the project's production figures.
Results from the trial will be used to calibrate a simulation that will predict how long it will take the pilot plant to produce the first batch of brine concentrate with a lithium content of 6 per cent — a figure that is significantly higher than other explorers' modest estimates of between 1-2 per cent.
The pumping test has three main goals. First, it will seek to determine the hydraulic properties of the brine reservoir for each aquifer unit; second to verify the maximum sustainable pumping rate for each well; and third to determine the hydraulic properties of the brine reservoir for each aquifer.
The first phase of the program aims to characterise the hydraulic data and will last one week. The initial program will comprise of a step-drawdown test, recovery trials and a constant rate test. Galan will look to collect brine samples at each interval.
The second phase will be a longer-term, 30-day production pilot test program.
Galan’s recent work comes after extensional drilling at HMW that has further highlighted the project’s potential to host a major lithium brine resource.
According to the company, the result of a recent probe suggests it could stretch its existing brine by 800m to within touching distance of revered New York Stock Exchange-listed Livent Corporation’s tenement boundary.
Another goal of the drilling campaign is to improve the company's knowledge of its Pata Pila licence region and strengthen its hydrogeological models in order to confirm reserve estimates at HMW.
HMW currently boasts a lithium equivalent resource that extends north of 2 million tonnes.
Earlier core logging at the project suggests the region's geology is dominated by rich sand-dominant lithologies — important markers of brine-bearing producing aquifers.
As Galan looks ahead to an end-of-year DFS completion date, all signs to-date point to an economical lithium recovery.
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By Matt Birney
