Lithium production plant opened
Lithium, an important raw material for car batteries among other things, is to be extracted from the Upper Rhine Graben on a large scale. The company Vulcan Energy (Karlsruhe) opened a plant for the production of lithium on a tonne scale in Landau, Palatinate, on Thursday - as a preliminary stage of a commercial plant.
From 2026, lithium chloride is to be pre-produced in this plant and refined into the end product lithium hydroxide in Frankfurt-Höchst, as Vulcan founder Horst Kreuter said in Landau. "We expect to produce 24,000 tons per year in project phase one, which is enough for 500,000 car batteries per year."
The plant presented on Thursday cost around 40 million euros, and Kreuter put the total investment volume for the first project phase, including drilling, at around 1.4 billion euros. "Estimates assume that 40 percent of the European demand for lithium and even 100 percent of the German demand could be covered in the Upper Rhine Graben," said Kreuter.
At the so-called Lithium Extraction Optimization Plant (LEOP) in Landau, the company wants to train its team with a view to commercial production planned for 2026, among other things. The aim is to use deep geothermal energy to extract CO2-neutral lithium from thermal water in the Upper Rhine Graben. Geothermal plants use the heat of water from the depths. The thermal water in the Upper Rhine Graben contains lithium, which is to be filtered out before being returned to the ground.
Along with cobalt, lithium is one of the most important raw materials for batteries. In charged form, it is important for storing electricity. Lithium-ion batteries are also used in smartphones and computers, for example.
The lithium chloride produced in the current plant is converted in Höchst into the end product lithium hydroxide, which is then tested by Vulcan partners such as Stellantis, Volkswagen and Renault.
Source: www.dpa.com
