Lithium deposit in deep aquifer: from resource evaluation to risk analysis
Résumé
Lithium extraction form clastic salars appears as an economically efficient option. However, evaluating the Lithium resource in an aquifer is a real challenge because one cannot separate the problematic of metallic quantity from the hydrogeology context.
Based on a real case-study, we propose a methodology that chains geostatistical techniques and hydrogeology pumping simulations, for evaluating different pumping scenarios and quantifying the risk uncertainty.
Three parameters have been evaluated for the moment: the resource geometry (top and bottom limits of the deposit), and the grade uncertainty.
After presenting briefly the methods, we focus on the difficulties inherent to the Lithium in deep salars. This work is in progress, the next step will be to take into account the porosity and permeability spatial heterogeneities.
No mathematical formulas, just concepts and results.