I’ve taken a look at ML’s Pastos Grandes project to see where it would fit into the LAC C-O pipeline. ML completed their DFS in July 2019, and at that time supposed a NPV of about USD $1.1B. They’ve had their pilot plant running for a couple of years and have sent samples to potential customers (the potential customers thing would be supplanted by LAC’s plans). Their June 2021 Corporate Presentation suggests that pond and well field was to commence this past summer and continue until mid-2022. This was to be followed by their plant construction and commissioning, with first production planned for Q1 2024, so a year and a half after having completed their ponds and well field, which makes sense.

However, I’ve been unable to find any indications that they actually did start their pond and well field construction, and I would posit that ML stopped this kind of development once they became a take over target. Jon Evans said that one of the first things they would do is increase drilling to confirm/expand the size of the resource. I’m not sure if they would wait for these results before starting their own pond and well field construction, or whether these could be done concurrently. In any case, realistically with the mine construction and evaporation timeline, we’d be looking at lithium concentrate production around two and a half years from the deal closure, so think Q3-4 2023. ML had plans to ramp up to 24K tpa production over a six-year period. This would no doubt be sped up under LAC. 

ML’s Cauchari East project is just in the exploration stage, so the timeline for any concentrate from here would be a couple of years later at least, I would think. They might even hold off on any immediate plans for this project because I think it’s significantly lower grade than C-O or Pastos Grandes. 

I still like the prospects of this acquisition.