Battery market provides jolt to lithium explorer: Avalon Advanced Materials sees huge customer potential for its Kenora lithium deposit.

• Author: Ross, Ian
• Position: MINING

The burgeoning electric car battery market has compelled a northwestern Ontario lithium mine developer to take a second hard look at its property near Kenora.

Last year's release of a preliminary economic assessment (PEA) by Toronto's Avalon Advanced Materials showed good potential to recover lithium material at its Separation Rapids project that would be suitable for the rechargeable battery market.

"It's kind of opened our eyes to what other possibilities there are," said company president-CEO Don Bubar. "The more work we do, the more we keep discovering other possibilities."

A planned 2,000-metre summer exploration drilling program at their project, 70 kilometres north of Kenora, was focused on getting a better geological interpretation of the property.

Their previous exploration work focused on recovering petalite, the main mineral in their resource, but the high-purity deposit could produce a wider array of lithium-based products serving multiple markets.

Bubar said the upcoming field work was "a step back" to reassess the whole project.

That includes examining the potential for other byproducts using the feldspar, silica, rubidium, cesium and tantalum found on the property.

"You have to be pretty adaptable and keep your ear to the ground on what's happening and the innovation in new technology that's being created in the battery space," said Bubar.

When Avalon staked the property 20 years ago, their intention was to prove up a resource that would serve glass and ceramic manufacturers.

The new buzz around electric vehicles has rodeo-clowned the attention of many lithium producers toward servicing that growing manufacturing sector.

The battery market takes up 39 per cent of U.S. lithium demand. But the glass and ceramics industry still takes up a sizeable 30 per cent chunk of the pie, according to the U.S. Geological Survey.

"The glass industry is still a big consumer of lithium," said Bubar. "It's just not as high profile. The battery industry has stolen the headlines."

Lithium demand is expected to double over the next five to 10 years.

It's creating some security-of-supply issues for glass producers and some low-hanging fruit for Avalon.

"People tend to think of glass as old technology," Bubar observes.

"It's not. There's a huge amount of innovation happening in the glass industry too."

Glassmakers are constantly developing stronger and lighter glass products, such as Coming's Gorilla Glass.

The company's development plan is to start...