Battery-grade lithium can have a significant carbon impact through its production, refining, and transport stages. Yet, an Australian company with a European project may well have found the solution with its Zero Carbon Lithium: Vulcan Energy Resources. And its product is flying off the shelves… years ahead of its actual production. How’s that possible? Let’s explore:
(Also check my entire Lithium deep dive!)
with 🎙️ Cris Moreno – Deputy CEO at Vulcan Energy Resources
💧 Vulcan aims to decarbonize the transition to electric mobility through its world-first Zero Carbon Lithium Projects for electric vehicle batteries and its renewable energy business.
Zero Carbon Lithium – Slider
1660914_Lithium-Slider-4_061423What we covered:
🥇 How Vulcan aims to become the world’s first integrated lithium chemicals company while also producing renewable energy…
0️⃣ … and how they do all of this with net zero greenhouse emissions and without using any fossil fuels in their process
🔁 How Vulcan’s Zero Carbon Lithium projects feature a 24’000 t/y first stage and what might be the next ones
💰 How Vulcan leapfrogged its path by acquiring an existing geothermal power plant in Hinsheim, Germany
👨🔬 How the company tested various Direct Lithium Extraction (DLE) methodologies to end up developing a proprietary sorption process
🇪🇺 How this sorption material belongs to the Dow / Dupont / FMC / Livent family, but with the added touch that it’s made in Europe
🌊 How Vulcan desorbs it with fresh water, and how water availability is one of the perks of producing in the Upper Rhine Valley
🤑 How the company plans an 84% EBITDA on its Zero Carbon Lithium product, despite a forecasted lithium price way below the current spot
🚗 How, to whom, and under which conditions Vulcan sold its Zero Carbon Lithium product to battery and car manufacturers years ahead of actually producing it
🏗️ How 2023 shall be pivotal for Vulcan to transform from a development company into an actual production company
📈 How the Company has €120 Million in its bank account… and actively looks to increase its financing in order to cover for the first phase of the project
🫰 How the Upper Rhine Valley is Europe’s largest lithium resource, and a globally relevant one and how CAPEX might be the only thing to slow it down to cover for the entirety of Europe’s lithium needs
🛢️ How DLE combined with geothermal energy production might be seen as a complex mining project… or as a very easy oil and gas one!
📅 Kicking off production in 2025, producing renewable power & heat, next projects in the Upper Rhine Valley – and on the French side, building the right team to execute the project, kicking off the commercial scale in Q3 2023… and much more!
🔥 … and of course, we concluded with the 𝙧𝙖𝙥𝙞𝙙 𝙛𝙞𝙧𝙚 𝙦𝙪𝙚𝙨𝙩𝙞𝙤𝙣𝙨 🔥
Resources:
🔗 Come say hi to Cris on LinkedIn
🔗 Check Vulcan’s website
is on Linkedin ➡️
Teaser
Table of contents
Introduction: Zero Carbon Lithium
This exploration of the Lithium World has taken me far from home. Canada, USA, Mexico, Australia, Argentina, Bolivia, UK… But one of the most exciting projects in this new wave actually happens to be a dozen kilometers away from where I cut my wastewater engineering teeth, and Vulcan, the project developer, just signed an off-take agreement with a car factory I can see if I climb up my village’s hill.
And this makes sense for a ton of reasons! First, the Rhine Valley used to be a Salt Flat, exactly like the Atacama Desert nowadays, and this was just 35 million years ago. So on the geological scale of things, it makes sense.
Then, it is a geothermal region, and Germany actively pushes to add more geothermal plants to its energy mix, which means thousands of cubic meters of water that are pumped from that lithium-rich aquifer anyways, which allows you to emulate the example we heard from Standard Lithium, piggy-backing on Lanxess’ Bromine business.
Europe builds Gigafactories: who will feed them Lithium?
But maybe most importantly, Europe is actively building about 30 battery gigafactories. And that’s a staple in the zero-carbon transition of mobility! But to feed those factories, Europe will need lithium at some point. Today, 97% of that lithium is imported from China. And with China’s own plans to further build up the battery value chain, they may well use all their lithium themselves, which would leave Europe without any white oil.
So Vulcan’s endeavors in the Upper Rhine Valley, today on the German side and anytime soon on the French side, would not only be one of the largest lithium projects in the World. But from 2026 on, it might also be Europe’s EV strategy lifeline – as long as I’m not fully up to speed with my own backyard project.
So what’s Vulcan’s plan to a – quote unquote – “Glorified Water Processing Facility” able to deliver 24’000 tons of lithium hydroxide in its first phase, but also 300 GWh of renewable power and 250 GWh of renewable heat? Cris will be our guide.
Full Transcript:
These are computer-generated, so expect some typos 🙂
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Antoine Walter: Hi Cris. Welcome to the show.
Cris Moreno: Thank you. nice to be here.
Antoine Walter: I’m excited to have that conversation with you for many reasons. So let me jump straight into it. You are here to represent a company I’m following for a while, which is called Vulcan. But for anyone which wouldn’t be familiar yet with what you’re doing, what would be your elevator pitch?
Cris Moreno: Vulcan is a unique company. We’re basically aiming to become the world’s first integrated lithium chemicals company and renewable energy producer. And we’re doing all this with net zero greenhouse emissions and not using any fossil fuels in our process. So that’s what we’re aiming to be.
Antoine Walter: What would be your definition of integrated?
Cris Moreno: I mean, integrated as a term we use to say that , in the same process. As we drill into our reservoir down in the upper Rhine Valley, we can use the heat that’s generated from our geothermal resource the brine that’s in the ground. We use that heat to basically create renewable energy, green energy for heating of communities and for people’s homes producing green power that can be used obviously to power our lives, but the same heat can also be used and the same power can help to generate and process our lithium.
And this lithium is actually contained in that same brine. So this green energy actually drives the processing of that lithium. So we don’t need any fossil fuels and we have all the energy we need to actually create our lithium hydroxide monohydrate, which is what goes into batteries that you need for cars and hopefully in the future, planes and trains and everything else.
Antoine Walter: mentioned this lithium hydroxide monohydrates your definite visibility study is just out, and if I’m not mistaken, you will project to produce 24,000 tons of that lithium hydroxide. There are also. Many other perks and big numbers in that dfs. Pretty impressive. If I had just to take out three key facts about your project, what would it be?
Cris Moreno: there’s lots of numbers in my head, but I’ll give you, I’ll give you three. The one that you said at the beginning was important. So our phase one is targeting 24,000 tons of lithium hydroxide monohydrate as a product that’s already been sold to our customers. So that’s one.
We are also targeting to produce 300 gigawatt hours. Of renewable power and 250 gigawatt hours of renewable heat each year. For our communities. And probably the last number that we can probably talk about now is we’re trying to do this at speed and hopefully by the end of 2025, we’ll have all of this in production.
We’ll up through 2026, but our target at the moment is to be in production with our renewable heat renewable energy and our lithium by the end of 2025.
Antoine Walter: For that exploration of the lithium world. I’ve been talking with companies at different phases of the development of their projects, and some were just starting out and having a PowerPoint and a great idea. You are far beyond that point. If I’m right, you’re running a pilot now for a while. How long are you running that pilot and what did you learn on the go?
Cris Moreno: that’s a really good point. I mean, we’ve been operating our pilot for two years now. We were strategically well positioned a few years ago to actually buy an existing geothermal power plant in a place called Hinsheim down in the upper Rhine and. Once we brought that power plant, we were able to actually connect live to that, live well.
Our pilot plants, these pilot plants have given us a lot of valuable data. And we’ve been able to use that data and refine that process in our main design for our big commercial plants. It’s pretty typical. in these type of projects where have it like a geophys type chemistry. So by having this data, we’ve been able to optimize our commercial design with this data. and it’s given us a lot of confidence as we’ve tried different absorbance and we’ll probably come onto absorbance soon. The main heart of the technology is this adsorbent or absorbent, as we call it, technology.
We’ve been able to try different absorbance to really understand what is the most optimal absorbent in our process, and what are those parameters that really absorb. And extract as much lithium as possible. On that topic, we’ve, because of this pilot plant, we’ve actually been able to design and develop our own absorbent, which is really important actually, because currently inside Europe, there is no absorbent production.
In fact, most of the absorbent production comes from China or Russia. And you know, we are trying to be a company, European company where we’re, you know, the. The sources in Europe, we want to produce that heat for Europe and we wanna produce that lithium for Europe. But if we’re starting to rely on supply chains that are outside of Europe, particularly in China and Russia, then we’re at risk.
So what we’ve been able to do the last few years, predominantly through our expertise with our chief technology officer, Dr. Steven Harrison, is actually developed our own absorbent now this absorbent. Is pretty much the same. Family of absorbance has been around since the sixties when Dow actually developed this.
And in the nineties was actually commercially made available by a company called FMC now Livent. So it’s actually been in production since 1996, so it’s commercially proven this sorbent, but it’s always good to use a pilot plant to really design out these process parameters. So we’ve been lucky.
We’ve got two years of data underneath us.
Antoine Walter: So that’s, so which you’re using is, it’s one which you backwash with water, or one which you backwash with acid. I’m just trying to put it for the muggles here.
Cris Moreno: Yeah, no, awesome questions. So there’s an umbrella term called DLE, direct Lithium extraction. Unfortunately it captures a lot of different chemical, physical type extraction methodologies. One’s called direct lithium extraction is called absorption. Absorption.
There’s other ones called solvent extraction, and then there’s ion exchange. Now, the absorption one that we’re doing, we can. adsorb the lithium onto our little beads that we’ve got, which is the absorbent beads, and we are able to then desorb with fresh water. So it’s, very I guess friendly.
We’re not using harsh chemicals which also have their own issues, not just a cost issue, but a carbon issue because it’s not easy to make these chemicals, these acids and bases. So we can desorb with fresh water. And what that means is that we can recover the lithium in this fresh water.
And what we do is use the heat from the geothermal brine to basically concentrate up that lithium into lithium chloride. And that’s actually what we send up to our electrolysis plant up in Höchst in Frankfurt to basically use electrolysis technology to convert the lithium chloride into lithium hydroxide.
Now some of the other DLE technologies like solvent extraction and ion exchange, they use heavy amounts of chemical and base. It’s always about precipitation and trying to get the pH right. So we got none of that. So it’s a super friendly process in that respect.
Antoine Walter: According to your dfs, you will be able to produce lithium at 4,539. That’s very precise. Euro perton. Today’s lithium spot price is hovering around 70,000 euros. Perton, does that mean you’re printing a lot of money?
Cris Moreno: I think what it means is that we’ve got a really robust business case. And I think a lot of people are printing money at the moment. That’s the advantage of those producers at the moment. But I think what it means is that, you know, we don’t foresee that price forecast staying around 70.
I think that’s, Probably a little bit unhealthy actually. We’ve got a much lower forecast. We’re also lucky we’ve already sold the first five years and in some cases 10 years of our production to some of the largest manufacturers of Battery Valley chain. So we’ve. Volkswagen with Unior, with LG Chem, Stellantis and Renault.
So whether it’s a cathode manufacturer or a car manufacturer, or a battery manufacturer. So we’ve basically fixed in some of those prices and we’ve got some that are floating and we’ve got some that are a basket of those. So we feel very comfortable with our, as you said, 4,000 plus um, type production costs.
We’re gonna be really robust no matter what happens in the future compared to some of the other projects which can hover between 8,000 and 15,000 a ton. So it starts to become a bit more scarier when the price starts to drop.
Antoine Walter: You mentioned this offtake agreements you have with these large car manufacturers. Again, for the mug. Which is me in that room. How does that work? What do they exactly buy? The lithium in the future, the promise of the lithium in the future, A piece of paper. How, How is it?
Cris Moreno: Yeah, so these are binding offtake agreements, which is important. So, they’re not non-binding, so they have secured the lithium. They’re aware of our development timeline. So we’ve said that we would be producing lithium by the end of 25 and ramping up through 26. secured the lithium that we start producing in that year, in 2026.
Now, Also with these manufacturers, they’ve got like a validation period. Because what happens is when they take the lithium, they can’t just straight away put it into a cathode or into a battery. So they typically take, six to 12 months of validation where they take our lithium test it, make sure it’s good, they optimize their battery or their cathode a little bit, and then they’ll take their full production or full quota from their KN board.
So, so it is a binding agreement. It’s a paper today, but that’s secured the production in the future. And. Hopefully we’ll continue to see more and more of those contracts as we start producing. And obviously yeah, we’re looking to expand to more and more companies once we start producing phase one.
But then phase two and future phases,
Antoine Walter: So phase one is these 24 kilotons a year. Phase two as similar in size or what’s your long term vision? How much can you produce on the long run?
Cris Moreno: Yeah, I mean, this is a really important point because what we did during the dfs, we actually announced an update in our resource. Now currently in the Uper Rhine Valley we have 15 licenses, either exploration or production licenses. And we basically did the dfs really around the first five licenses because we’ve already got two, we’ve got this producing.
Geothermal plant already at enzyme, and we’ve got another joint venture and offtake brine offtake in Landau. So we’re very confident in this central part of the core of the field. But for phase one, we’re basically looking at five licenses. And those five licenses account for around 5 million tons of lithium carbonate equivalent.
But our actual lithium resource across all of our licenses actually equates more towards 26, 26.5 in terms of lithium carbonate equivalent. So what that means is for phase one, 24,000 tons of lithium hydroxy monohydrate, you know, we can see a phase two, phase three. Phase four, maybe even phase five to be honest, we’re trying to look at phase one.
And then once we’ve designed phase one, it’s like a cookie cutter. We design phase one, it’s a cookie cutter. We take it to the next one so we can expand as and when the market needs it or all our customers need it. how we’re looking to expand, you know, with the market growing.
Antoine Walter: you mentioned how you start producing in 2026. What’s your roadmap towards stats? What do you have to do and what are this? In between steps, which tell you you’re on track.
Cris Moreno: that’s where we are as a company at the moment. We’ve been this really awesome , development company the last four, four and a half years. So that’s got us to this point. 2023 is like a transition or transformation year where we transform from a development company into an execution and production company.
So for us this year, we’ve got a number of key milestones. Some of them are about we’re building these larger commercial demonstration plants. We talked about the pilot plants previously, but we’re actually building these larger demonstration plants right next to the existing pile of plants actually.
And so they’re looking to be complete around middle of this year. They’re really important because they’ll be used to train our operations team in like a pre-commercial setting. We’ll also be able to like tinker with some like process parameters and become really comfortable with the equipment. So we’ve got those demo plants being built this year which will also produce lithium chloride and lithium hydroxide.
We will also then start to move into real hardcore, like execution stuff. Like we’ll be awarding major long lead items of equipment. So we’re buying big crystallizers and we’re buying electrolysis units and things like that. It’s important right now because the supply chain around the world is quite stretched.
So it’s important that we order these, but we’ll also start to then really award our big EPC like engineering, procurement, construction contracts or EPCMs, engineering, procurement, construction management contracts. can’t do this on our own. We need lots of partners. So this is about securing those partners towards the second half of this year because during 2024 and 2025, we’ll do the hard stuff.
We’ll be engineering, we’ll be buying, we’ll be building the plants and installing the pipelines and drilling the wells. And we’ll also start drilling at the end of this year. So we’ve actually purchased two rigs within the Vulcan group. Strategically. I think that was actually a really important part of securing our future.
You think about what’s happening in Germany right now and we’ve had the, our chancellor announce there’s gonna be another a hundred geothermal projects before the end of the decade which is quite amazing. That shows how the energy mix is really going to change within, within Germany and so, It should be when we’re reliant on other exports from Russia and other things.
We’ve got multiple execution type activities ongoing. We’re still getting some permits. We’re doing a lot of our drilling, we’re doing execution and setting ourselves up for the remainder of the execution phase.
Antoine Walter: you mentioned the partners you will need for the execution. Do you already have some which are lined up or is it. It’s all prepared to be tendered and to be decided later this year.
Cris Moreno: it’s a mixture actually. So for some of the technology we’re very confident working with one or two suppliers. They’ve actually been with us for a long time already, whether that’s based on the extraction part or the conversion plant. We’re using those supplies and working with them actually to really fine tune some of the design.
So they will probably just go ahead and be a, negotiation and a supply agreement. Other things we will have to competitively tender because we obviously want to achieve the best outcome and the best value of really, partner with the. Companies that really, believe in our project and our behaviors and our mindset.
So we want to look for like-minded partners. So that’s what that tendering process will do also.
Antoine Walter: I’ve been discussing with standard Lithium headquartered in Canada, having the project in the us. I don’t know if you consider yourself competition because you’re really at two different ends of the world, but it was interesting to see how they developed that project and it really explains that they focus on their one project and then of course if something else comes, they might support it, but they really need to deliver the first one. You have phase one, phase two lined up and more projects in the pipe. Is it a different approach or do you also say the number one thing is phase one has to deliver?
Cris Moreno: I think right now it’s al always about phase one. share and echo that with Standard lithium. The reality is your whole sort of business case is, Predicated and premised on getting that phase one right, because then that’s how you can expand and expand with speed and with quality and, and all those things.
So you learn from that first one. , but at the same time there’s a need. I mean, the world is growing much faster than phase one. So where we are getting really good within, at least the Vulcan group, is that we’ve got a very much an execution mindset and a group looking after that.
But then we also have a development group who’s also looking at what is the next part of that pipeline or funnel. So we don’t wanna sacrifice one for the other, so we’re trying to move fast in execution. Phase one is our focus, but we are also looking at what is the next thing that we’ll bring into our pipeline.
Antoine Walter: Your DFS mentions you have 1.5 billion euros of CapEx to find for this phase one, do you already have all the money in the bank or do you still need to raise some money?
Cris Moreno: we don’t have all the money. That’s for sure. We’ve got about 120 million euros still in our bank which is good. We obviously do have a gap between that and trying To obviously finance the 1.5. We’re tackling a number of finance streams at the moment. and we’re being advised by BNP Paribas which people know.
So we’re looking at the debt side and the equity side. On the debt side we’ve had BNP really help us and we’ve started to talk to a lot of banks. We’ve just started that process. There’s been a lot of interest for a number of like, Commercial and standard banks to really support this type of project.
It’s a very green project. In fact, we do qualify underneath the European sort of EU taxonomy type rules, which means that we’re hopefully able to access green funding, green financing, which is really important. The other thing is that we’ve had really strong support from the export credit agencies around Europe, so whether it be France or Germany, or Belgium or Italy, and this is really important.
Because these export creditors can actually underwrite the banks. So obviously it provides, you know, much more assurance that, we’re a good bet. BNP have said that we can probably do 60, 65% debt and the rest have to be equity sort of 30, 35%. And so in that side, we’re actually talking with a lot of strategic.
Corporate partners. At the moment we’re talking to major oil and gas companies because they have a lot of similarity in the experience of our upstream, like they’ve drilled lots of wells, lots of geothermal wells, pipelines, processing power plants, that’s really quite a standard upstream oil and gas play.
oil and gas companies, they’ve got. A mandate to decarbonize. So they have to start transitioning themselves. So, that’s a pretty natural partner for us to say hey, you know, oil and gas company, do you wanna, you know, work with us? And transform in the downstream part though, the lithium chloride conversion to lithium hydroxide.
That’s actually standard chlor-alkali technology. So there’s like 11 chloride parts in Germany. I found out not too long ago. Germany’s one of the biggest chloride alkali supplies in the world but they’ve been taking what is sodium chloride using electrolysis to create sodium hydroxide and hcl.
We’re doing the same, but we’re just taking lithium chloride. So for us, we’re looking at number of chemical players big chemical players to really then, be equity partners with us at the project level for the downstream. So between the two we’re trying to balance the needs and also we’re obviously, we are looking for support from the EU and from the state.
A process from our member state Germany. Because at the end of the day, if you look at what’s happening in America, in the US, They’re getting a lot of funding support from the US through the IRA, this inflationary reduction Act. So that’s propelling, it’s shifted the balance actually quite badly from even China and EU over to the US.
That’s been because there’s been a lot of investment. And therefore investment in follows investment. So public investment will follow the government investment. So we’re really looking at the EU to step up and really help a lot of these critical raw materials and these, net zero type projects like we are.
Antoine Walter: Well, if they don’t help you, I don’t know who they are gonna help. I mean, 84% projected EBITDA zero carbon only project of that magnitude in Europe and Europe building all these giga factories, someone will have to supply the lithium to them. So just my layman view on that. But
Cris Moreno: I’m glad you echoed the same as us. I mean, we are the largest lithium resource in Europe by a significant margin. We’re actually globally an important resource and something that we could almost provide all of Europe’s lithium needs if we could have the capital to develop our projects.
So yeah we’re hoping there’s common sense that at the level and the members state to support us.
Antoine Walter: So let me give you my anecdotal input here. I started all that. Lithium deep dive because I myself found a brine, which is lithium rich, which happens to be not that far from yours. I would say 80 kilometers south. What I verified, you don’t have a rides on that one yet,
Cris Moreno: Good.
Develop it.
Antoine Walter: I’m running a podcast.
I’m not running a lithium company. And my question is if I come to you with, have two analyzers. One is at 300 PPM of lithium. The other is at 400 ppm of lithium. Of course not the perfect thing. You also have all the staff inside, but you have a good lithium content. Are you actively looking into this kind of new projects or with everything you already have in your pipe?
I mean, you’re sitting, as you mentioned, on a resource which could be supplying the entirety of Europe. Maybe you don’t need to have additional projects.
Cris Moreno: I mean, we’re always looking for opportunities. There’s value, in, in creating partnerships. You know, we see ourselves as a technology company as well. We’ve developed our own. Effectively absorbent. So therefore we’ve created the heart of the DLE or DLS technology.
So, we are not that type of company. We want geothermal brains to work globally. If we wanna decarbonize the current world’s passenger fleet and electrify them. That would release over a billion tons of carbon to the air if we were to follow traditional hard rock or brine conversion.
That’s something that doesn’t sit well with the Vulcan people. So if it came to me and somebody said, can we do another geothermal brine, develop lithium? We’ve said, hell yeah. I mean that, that’s gonna help us in the world not just a company Vulcan. So, absolutely, and the upper Rhine and the French side is obviously, the Upper Rhine is one-third French, two-thirds Germany, so we know that the French part will have a big part to play as well.
Antoine Walter: Okay. I can’t crack you all my secrets, but it’s not exactly, I would say the middle line,
Cris Moreno: Okay.
Right. Gotcha.
Antoine Walter: Last one You have a lot of technical challenges because nobody, Ever did the DLE the commercial side you are really well aligned to overcome that DLE challenge and you’re tackling at the same time the DLE, so extracting the lithium, the heat production, and the energy, that sounds incredibly ambitious.
Are you sometimes looking at think, oh, maybe we can drop one of the three and go on the safe side.
Cris Moreno: I have to respectfully correct you. I think the DLE or the dls the absorption has been around for a long time commercially. There’s LIvent and had been operating their plant in South America. China’s actually got four absorption plants. The exact same ab absorbent that we’re using in China have been operating for decades.
Rio Tinto are doing another absorption plant in Argentine as we speak, and they’re called the Rincon Project, and so is Eramet good French company also in South America. So there’s actually a number of commercial scale absorption. In fact, at the moment, as we understand it, absorption accounts for 10% of the lithium supply globally.
So that definitely underneath the DLE umbrella is commercial. But I know, I know what you’re saying. We’re combining different things. What may be seen for the first time I’m typically a individual. But the way I see this upstream, it’s a really, some people see it as a complex mining project.
I see it as a very easy oil and gas project cuz I come from complex oil and gas projects where we spend 20, 30 billion, not 1 billion to produce the upstream where we drill wells, we install pipelines, we recover that, we process it, and we create our own power and then we sell that to a refinery. So that’s how an oil and gas project works in Australia, Europe.
You know, anywhere in the world. So for us, we just feel like we’re bolting together and combining proven technologies in a clever way, which doesn’t mean we need fossil fuels and that’s really what we’re trying to do. And so that’s the non-humble part of me. But it’s also about engineering those technical interfaces to make sure they’re good.
So most of our focus at the moment is really working those technical interfaces between a well, a pipeline. A glorified water processing facility, cuz that’s what the lithium extraction is. It’s just a water processing facility and we create some geothermal power and then we sell that to a chloride plant and that makes hydroxide, so we feel pretty comfortable to be honest.
Antoine Walter: Well, I have to be respectful of your time. Thanks a lot for all these very open answers. Chris. It was pleasure to have the discussion with you. Your DFS is just out. I’ll link it in the notes of the episode. Of course. What’s the next milestone where people can follow you?
Cris Moreno: So I think for us, we’ve got a big two quarters. Those two quarters really a big focus around our demo plants to be up and running probably in the beginning of q3. Those demo plants are really important for people to see that, this thing can be extracted, the lithium can be extracted in big numbers.
And operate with our operations team and probably the wells. We’re gonna start drilling our first wells in Q3 as well. So Q2 is about preparation. And then Q3 is about execution of our first major projects. And yeah, I mean, we’re 300 people at the moment. We’ll be 450 people by the end of the year, so Vulcan’s growing pretty quickly.
And yeah, we’re getting ready for that next chapter.
Antoine Walter: Well, I’d be very happy to have you back to discuss that next chapter, and thanks again for the in-depth answers you’ve provided us today.
Cris Moreno: It’s absolutely my pleasure, Antoine. Thanks a lot.
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Conclusion: Zero Carbon Lithium
No rapid-fire today, as Cris was kind enough to find a slot in his otherwise very busy calendar, so I really focused the conversation on the core of Vulcan’s endeavors. But this closing segment enables me to remind you once more – sorry for that – that you are the engine of this podcast’s growth. I do my best to serve you high-quality content; if you agree it’s good, share it around, and if you have any criticism or remarks, please send me a message on LinkedIn or a mail: antoine@dww.show.
I’ve been teasing you about my red-thread backyard lithium project since the first episode of this mini-series; as I’m recording this, I’ve made good progress on geological surveys, various assessments, meet-ups with experts and even preliminary testing of the brine to check how a certain technology would deal with it… I can’t tell you more today, but I can guarantee it’s the most ambitious project/piece of content/video I’ve ever produced, and I can’t wait to share it with you!
This time I stop talking; see you next week with Chris Wyres, the CEO of Evove, to discuss membranes, scaling up a promising tech, successful fundraising, graphene, and of course, in this series, also a bit of how all of that applies to lithium extraction. Cheers!
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