Chile lithium dispute: project, capex and schedule risks for mine planners
Reviewed by Joe Ashwell
First reported on MINING.com
30 Second Briefing
France’s Eramet and Chile’s state miner ENAMI are heading to court over the Salares Altoandinos lithium project, a Cold War-era CEOL licensing relic now colliding with Eramet’s 1,200 sq. km of claims covering 99% of the La Isla and Aguilar salt flats in the Atacama. ENAMI has selected Rio Tinto’s $415 million bid, which includes its direct lithium extraction process and access to the Rincon pilot plant, for a project estimated at 4.5 million tonnes lithium and $3 billion capex. A dispute lasting up to two years, possibly moving to international arbitration, could delay Chile’s plan to double lithium output to about 500,000 tonnes annually by 2035 and complicate Kast’s new mining agenda.
Technical Brief
- Cold War-era CEOL regime means lithium extraction needs a special state permit, unlike other brine minerals.
- Eramet’s 1,200 sq. km of concessions cover 99% of La Isla and Aguilar salars in Atacama.
- ENAMI-Rio Tinto JV capex exceeds $3 billion, with Rio’s bid including $415 million in cash and technology.
- Eramet is filing easement and water-extraction applications over the project area to reinforce its concession leverage.
- Legal challenges to Rio Tinto’s selection could run at least two years and may escalate to international arbitration.
- Chilean lawyers warn ENAMI’s choice of a partner without underlying claims risks being interpreted as de facto expropriation.
- Eramet is now signalling interest in co-extracting boron, iodine and potassium from the same brines as lithium.
- CleanTech Lithium secured Chile’s first private CEOL at Laguna Verde in 2023, largely due to near-100% claim coverage.
Our Take
With Salares Altoandinos estimated to host about a quarter of Chile’s lithium resources and CleanTech Lithium’s Laguna Verde PFS targeting 15,000 t/y over 25 years, our database suggests that disputes over Atacama-region tenure now touch both mega-scale state-linked projects and smaller DLE-focused juniors, complicating long-term supply planning for battery-metal offtakers.
Eramet’s $900 million Centenario facility in northwest Argentina and its IRMA-audited Grande Côte operation in Senegal indicate the group is positioning itself as a ‘responsible’ large-scale producer; any prolonged Chilean legal stand-off could push Eramet to prioritise jurisdictions where ESG credentials and permitting pathways are clearer.
The projected ability of Salares Altoandinos to supply lithium for 1.5 million EVs per year by 2035, set against only a handful of other lithium mega-projects in our 1209 Mining stories, means that multi-year court delays would likely tighten the pipeline of Tier-1 brine projects just as downstream policy in the US and EU is trying to diversify away from existing suppliers.
Prepared by collating external sources, AI-assisted tools, and Geomechanics.io’s proprietary mining database, then reviewed for technical accuracy & edited by our geotechnical team.
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