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Mangrove Lithium CEO and founder Saad Dara joked that the facility is like a “clown building,” as he conducted a private tour.
“It just keeps going,” he said over the noise of machinery, as he pointed to areas of the facility, including the company’s research and development lab.
The company held an official ribbon-cutting ceremony Thursday, but Dara said it had been a “long journey” to get to this point. He said the idea began as a “one-man operation” and his own thesis project in 2013, which he spun into a company in 2018 and has been working to “commercialize the technology ever since.”
There are now about 75 employees at the facility, Dara said.
“We’ve been working on the design and construction of this first-of-a-kind plant where we’ve taken the work that we’ve done from our piloting operations and converted those into a fully operational facility,” Dara said.
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While Canada produces lithium, it does not have EV assembly, active materials or recycling, Dara said.
“We’re trying to do that but it will take some time,” he said.
But he said, with their refinery coming online, Canada is “starting to develop a lithium supply chain that has been missing.”
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Geoff McCarney, associate professor of environment and development in the school of international development and global studies at the University of Ottawa, agreed.
He said one of the “core challenges” in critical mineral production needed for energy transition, including lithium, is that “China tends to control the market.”
“They produce a lot, but more than on the production side, they really control the refining capacity,” he said.
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McCarney said, in that context, the opening of the plant is a “big deal” because it increases Canada’s resiliency.
“It’s a first drop in the bucket but it’s important in that regard to demonstrate we do have technologies, we are making the investments (and) we can start to bring this kind of thing online in Canada to secure our own transition.”
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Mangrove’s Delta facility, Dara said, has the capacity to produce enough battery-grade lithium for about 25,000 electric vehicles per year.
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