Atlantic Lithium

PROJECT DIRECTED BY Gary Smith

WRITTEN BY Romana Moares

Ewoyaa Project Mining Site

Charging the Change

Atlantic Lithium (formerly IronRidge Resources) is an AIM-listed lithium company advancing a portfolio of projects in Ghana and Côte d’Ivoire through to production. The company’s flagship project, the Ewoyaa Project, based in Ghana, is a significant lithium spodumene discovery targeting to become West Africa’s first lithiumproducing mine.

The demand for lithium has been increasing over the past few years and is expected to significantly grow in the next decade, as the global transition to a green economy accelerates. At the heart of it, lays the electric vehicle market, which accounts for almost 80% of lithium-ion battery demand.

With carbon limit regulations coming into play - for example the European Union has said that from 1 January 2026, lithium-ion batteries will have to bear a carbon-intensity performance class label and, from 1 July 2027, must comply with maximum carbon footprint thresholds – mining companies like Atlantic Lithium, a lithium exploration and development company with projects in Ghana and Côte d’Ivoire, are poised to expand exponentially.

Atlantic Lithium

A driver for growth

Atlantic Lithium is set to play a major part in the supply chain. The company was originally founded by Vincent Mascolo as IronRidge Resources back in 2011. In November 2021, following a demerger of IronRidge Resources’ gold assets, Atlantic Lithium was created and is now led by Len Kolff. In 2021, the company secured the fully funded status of its flagship project, the Ewoyaa Lithium Project, located in Ghana, thanks to an agreement with Piedmont Lithium - a US integrated supplier of raw materials and minerals, which has established relationships with Tesla and other US-based auto makers - to fast-track development of the project for $102m. In Ghana, the company holds 560 km2 of granted and under application tenure where a 30.1 Mt at 1.26% Li2O mineral resource estimate in Indicated and Inferred status at the Ewoyaa Project has been defined.

The company’s lithium assets have significant exploration upside - only 13 km2 have so far been drilled out of the total tenure package.

Drilling underway at IRR Ewoyaa Len Kolff, COO, Atlantic Lithium

Vincent Masolo, CEO, Atlantic Lithium

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The premium asset

The Ewoyaa Lithium Project, Atlantic Lithium’s flagship project, remains the current focus within the company activities. “Ewoyaa is an industry-leading asset and is transformational for Atlantic Lithium” said Len Kolff.

A robust Scoping Study completed in December 2021 indicated life of mine revenues exceeding US$3.4bn. The plan is to produce a premium product suitable for conversion for use in batteries.

The project has the advantage of low capital and operational costs due to the outstanding asset fundamentals with simple mineralogy requiring a gravity-only process flow-sheet and close proximity to excellent logistics and infrastructure, being only 110 km by road from the deepsea port of Takoradi, adjacent to highway and high-voltage power lines, including hydroelectric sources providing for a low carbon footprint.

“We have simple metallurgy, unique geology, proximity to operation and we are now fully funded for development. We have no debt, and we have a cash treasury of just over $20 million. The project is extremely exciting, and we are advancing rapidly to becoming West Africa’s first lithium-producing mine,” said Len.

Commenting on the results of the Scoping Study, he noted: “Our resource continues to grow, and the upside of the project is clear; not only do we believe that project metrics will improve significantly beyond the current defined mine life, we also see further potential for substantial economic improvement due to the recent increases in spodumene concentrate pricing which have far exceeded our initial SC6 price modelling parameters.” “Given these fundamentals, we are very excited by the resurgence and exponential growth potential across the lithium supply chain and reaffirm to the market that Atlantic is ideally poised to capture the lithium market going forward.”

With potential life of mine revenues exceeding $3.4bn, a post-tax NPV8 of $789 million, and an IRR of 194% over an initial life of mine of just 11.4 years, the project is one of the most exciting in the lithium industry today.

Atlantic Lithium’s workforce on site in Ghana

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IRR Ewoyaa drilling site

Supporting local development

The project is progressing in line with the company’s ESG initiatives and a strong environmental focus. “Sustainability as well as social corporate responsibility have always been very high on our agenda. We have strong relations with local communities and support their development, which is important for us as a company. It is essential that we contribute to the development of the local communities as they support us in ensuring the success of the project,” acknowledged Len.

The company, promoting strong national employment, has had no major problem with finding the right skills – 98% of the workforce are Ghanaian nationals and 85% of the company’s staff comes from the district where the project is located. Training from bottom up as well as career progression are part of the programme.

Atlantic Lithium’s external initiatives include establishing regenerative nurseries, educational support as well as donations to various causes as part of Ghana’s overall initiatives. As the mine develops, the intention is to assess the potential of ongoing developments in energy efficiencies and sustainable practices including solar power and stored energy options.

Atlantic Lithium

Sustainability as well as social corporate responsibility have always been very high on our agenda. “

Atlantic Lithium

We are very proud of our Ghanaian team; they worked tirelessly through the pandemic and have come out stronger. “

Spodumene contrentrate at the Aboko Quarry

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Significant player

As of early 2022, the company is fully on track with its plans. In March, Atlantic Lithium announced the start of drilling at Ewoyaa with about 20,000m of exploration, resource and mine study drilling planned. This includes 960 m of geotechnical diamond core drilling to test the proposed mine pit wall ground conditions for a detailed engineering design.

The drilling followed the Company’s recent success in upgrading the mineral resource by a further 42% to 30.1 million metric tonnes for Ewoyaa, grading an average of 1.26% lithium oxide.

“Ghana is a very friendly jurisdiction; mining has a long tradition here, especially in gold but now with lithium too and we get a lot of support from the government as well as the local communities across the board.”

“We are very proud of our Ghanaian team; they worked tirelessly through the pandemic and have come out stronger. We see a great future ahead for the company – we are ideally positioned to benefit from the growing lithium market, and we look forward to progressing the project towards production, establishing Atlantic Lithium as a new player in the lithium supply chain,” concludes Len Kolff.

www.atlanticlithium.com.au