Marcia Clark 
South Korean company Posco Holdings is looking at investing in the exploration, growth and commercialization of lithium in Alberta.
The firm — which is ideal acknowledged for metal manufacturing but also invests in minerals, power and extra — signed a memorandum of being familiar with this week with provincial Crown corporation Commit Alberta.
Under the conditions of the agreement, Posco will start off checking out prospective customers for lithium investment decision in Alberta, when the province will support the Korean company’s ambitions by serving to them navigate the acquisition of mining rights as properly as regulatory and tax-framework specifications.
“By means of our strategic collaboration with Invest Alberta, Posco Holdings is not only advancing our determination to securing lithium but also reinforcing our standing in the world wide secondary battery source chain,” said Kyung Sub Lee, Posco Holdings government vice-president, in a information launch.
“When we make these community kinds of announcements, it can be a very clear signal to the market that says Posco is very intrigued, highly engaged,” claimed Rick Christiaanse, main executive of Devote Alberta.
“They are well innovative, so it is really definitely now just a issue of them choosing the suitable jobs and then transferring ahead.”
The progress is the initially public indication that key international buyers are eyeing Alberta’s lithium assets.
Lithium, a light-weight steel, is in need all-around the world suitable now simply because it is a crucial element in electric automobile batteries.
Now, the world’s most significant lithium producers are Australia, Chile and China. Nevertheless, it has lengthy been recognised that Alberta, a significant oil-and-fuel producer, is also household to 1 of the world’s most significant underground lithium deposits.
Right until not long ago, there has been minor desire in creating this deposit, but the advancement in electrical motor vehicles and exponential desire for lithium-ion batteries has adjusted that.
Lithium is now a key target of the government of Canada’s $3.8-billion, 8-calendar year significant minerals strategy, which aims to raise domestic extraction and generation of the steel together with other previously under-made assets this kind of as cobalt, copper, titanium and zinc.
The Federal government of Alberta has also determined lithium as a probable way to diversify its oil-and-gas-primarily based financial system.
One particular Calgary-based mostly corporation, a publicly traded junior source company called E3, has formulated its personal engineering to extract the lithium that takes place the natural way with Alberta’s oilfield brines.
E3 retains the mineral rights to an believed 16 million tonnes of lithium resource, and hopes to open a whole-scale business plant in the central portion of the province by late 2026.
But Christiaanse said Posco brings world heft to what is nevertheless a really new and burgeoning market for Alberta. He said the enterprise also has the money and skills to invest up and down the whole lithium source chain.
“What we’re really wanting for at the conclusion of the day is the stop-to-close provide chain discussion, so it truly is not just about mining the useful resource … it really is about manufacturing it, refining it, all the way to having it all set for consumer items,” Christiaanse said.
“That is exactly where the authentic worth-insert is for Canada. If we just export the minerals out of here, that’s not definitely a win in our minds.”
Posco has been actively searching for to develop its lithium footprint, to start with in 2018 by getting brine tenements in Argentina, the place it is at the moment developing commercial brine lithium crops with a overall ability of 50,000 tonnes per yr.
Moreover, Posco has agreed to create a joint lithium venture with Pilbara Minerals in Australia and is also developing a commercialization plant in Korea for tough-rock lithium with a ability of 43,000 tonnes per calendar year.
Christiaanse said while Posco is the initial main foreign business to publicly announce its fascination in Alberta lithium, he stated it will not likely be the previous. He described the surging need for lithium globally as akin to a “gold rush,” and stated the province has been in talks with a range of other potential investors from all over the planet, in unique from Asia.
“There are many others, both equally in Japan and in Korea, that are on a equivalent path [to Posco] and we foresee this remaining the to start with announcement of numerous,” Christiaanse said.
