ASX-listed Prairie Lithium has started with factory acceptance testing at its commercial-scale direct lithium extraction (DLE) unit, representing another important step towards commissioning of the Prairie Lithium project in Saskatchewan, Canada.

The DLE unit, once commercialised, will be the largest of its kind in North America.

Upon successful completion of the factory acceptance testing, the commercial-scale DLE unit will be transported to Prairie’s Phase 1 production facility in Saskatchewan for installation.

The commercial-scale DLE is about four times the sale of the single commercial-scale DLE column deployed by Standard Lithium at its Arkansas project, where a single column was installed in March 2024 and is achieving industry-leading results.

The Standard Lithium facility has already completed 15 000 cycles of DLE from the processing of one-million barrels of brine, averaging recovery rates of 95% lithium.

Prairie considers the successful testing and deployment of its four-column DLE unit to be a major milestone in validating the company’s scalable development model. Phase 1 is designed to establish commercial scale proof of concept before potential expansion through Prairie’s repeatable pad-by-pad development strategy.

Additionally, Prairie has its Phase 1 production fully secured under a binding offtake agreement with Hydro Lithium in South Korea – equivalent to 150 t/y of lithium carbonate equivalent.

Hydro Lithium is also providing A$10-million of proprietary refining equipment to the company, which reduces Prairie’s upfront capital requirements for producing an upgraded intermediate lithium product for downstream conversion into battery-grade material.

The company expects first production shortly after commissioning in the fourth quarter.

Prairie MD Paul Lloyd says starting factory acceptance testing at the commercial-scale DLE unit is a critical milestone for Prairie as it moves closer to first production in Saskatchewan.

“The unit itself represents the largest DLE unit ever built in North America and we look forward to getting it installed in Saskatchewan in the very near future.

“Standard Lithium has demonstrated tremendous success with its single DLE column in Arkansas, and we are very excited to build on that success at four times the scale. Deploying one of the largest DLE units globally not only allows us to derisk and rapidly scale our project, it also positions Prairie to generate revenue as we produce and sell lithium into our recently announced binding offtake with Hydro Lithium,” Lloyd explains.