Sustainable Production

Our lithium extraction process in the Salar de Atacama is environmentally friendly and focuses on the sustainable development and production of lithium. By concentrating lithium solutions and depositing by saturation and gravity, without the use of external substances, eliminating most of the other elements and reaching an approximate concentration of 6% lithium, 30 times more concentrated than the extracted brine.

This stage of the process lasts more than a year, and most of the energy used corresponds to solar energy, approximately 95,8%. When lithium reaches the desired concentration, this solution is sent to the chemical plant located in the Salar del Carmen, on the outskirts of the city of Antofagasta, where lithium carbonate and lithium hydroxide are produced.

To learn about our entire sustainable lithium extraction and production process at SQM, we invite you to read our Reports on sustainable lithium production in Chile.

Measuring the carbon footprint in the lithium extraction process is a crucial aspect for both our operations and our products. In the case of lithium, the process is measured under strict, demanding and prestigious international standards, under the ISO standards 14040 and 14044. Currently, the company has been able to measure three measurement variables, based on energy use, water consumption, and CO2 in operations. This is a study carried out by Afry, the results of which are used to develop different processes in SQM's own operations and to communicate them, as appropriate, to different stakeholders. The LCA ISO 14040 and 14044 standards are applied to the calculations in these studies.

The study provides a document that allows defining the levels of CO2, energy and water consumption in order to keep the emissions from the operation and the product life cycle up to date and under control. This method allows calculating the contribution of emissions for the manufacture of cathode materials and lithium ion batteries. There is also a reputational strength, since it is a laboratory in the United States, which depends on the Department of Energy of that country, which provides support and credibility to the information that emanates from its studies.

SQM's lithium production process uses the lowest energy consumption compared to spodumene-based lithium production. This claim is based on the fact that in 2018, approximately half of global lithium production came from spodumene and the other half from brine, as is the case with SQM Litio. According to a life-cycle analysis conducted by SQM and the consulting firm Afry, SQM is known for using low energy consumption in its lithium extraction and production processes to minimize environmental impact.

According to the SQM Litio life cycle analysis provided by AFRY, the water footprint of brine production is significantly lower than that of Australian hard rock (spodumene) refined in China. For example, SQM requires approximately 22,5 liters of water per kilogram of lithium carbonate for the entire process, excluding water consumption from the supplied products (door to door). In the LCA, water consumption was calculated by SQM (cradle to customer) according to ISO 14040 and 14044.

In 2018, lithium carbonate and lithium hydroxide produced from brine and spodumene were consumed almost equally in northern Chile, and according to our estimates, we can say that only one-third of the total carbon footprint was generated by brine-based production, as is the case with SQM Litio. This means that SQM's lithium has one of the lowest carbon footprints in the world.
* Afry SQM study (2018 world data). The comparison was made with Australian spodumeno, refined in China.