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https://youtu.be/worsjz7-AFk

Good question Privinvest. Will erris bring Zinnwald into production on its own?
KC always said that Zinnwald had lower Tin and Tantalum credits and therefore worse economics, so perhaps they can produce at $5-6k against us at around $4k..... so, not a huge difference and still low on the global cost curve. The cost of building 25ktpa capacity is around $500m. To build 50ktpa $800m
To build 100ktpa ~$1300m
So there are economies of scale and so it seems sensible to build one huge plant.
The German and Czech auto economies are linked in many ways with much manufacturing in the CR and assembly in Germany. Germany is the most significant player in Europe and has the banks to fund these project (and we are using Germany engineers to design and build the mine/plant) Then, I guess, you bring in European politics and ask whether the Germans trust the Czechs enough to do a JV with them? Would the Germans trust CEZ?
I see little danger of over production in Europe for the next decade, besides, we will produce at globally competitive prices. Another good reason to bring everyone together in one large JV is the borrowing costs. A stand alone mine and processing plant would have traditional borrowing costs of 10-14% the automotives/battery makers probably
3-5% at the moment....... interesting times.

Howard Klein, Gerrit Fuelling and Rodney Hooper talk Lithium supply. Fuelling was with the European company Rockwood before it was taken over by Albermarle around 5 years ago, he has 30 years in the Lithium business. EMH were very much on Rockwoods radar back then but the take over led to a focus on Australian spodumene mining with Chinese processing for the company. Fuelling will know as much about our project as any one. Great publicity, we are starting to get noticed now.
https://youtu.be/SP35mosKqjI

Sorry for a clumsy post full of auto corrects.
A few people have commented that we were not warned about how the production numbers WERE going to look in Q3. Admittedly we could have been told things in an RNS but Dan mentioned a number of things during interviews during the quarter.
He warned that that the years ASIC would be closer to $1000. He talked of resequencing the mine plan because the higher grade pay dirt at the bottom of the pit was too wet which causes lower recovery rates. He also talked of stock piling vital products including reagents as the coup and Covid might cause disruption in supplies.
With reference to LOM: another consequence of the pit wall and wet season 2018 issues WAS that there was virtually no expansion drilling done in 2019 because of budgetary constraints, fortunately that has not been the case in 2020. I have no doubt that the gold is there and that we will announce a significant increase in our resource before the end of Q1 2021

A few people have commented that we were not warned about how the production numbers weren’t going to look in Q3. Admittedly we could have been told things in an RNS but Dan mentioned a number of things during interviews during the quarter.
He warned that that the years ASIC would be closer to $1000. He talked of resequencing the mine plan because the higher grade pay dirt at the bottom of the pit was too wet which causes lower recovery rates. He also talked of stock piling vital products including reagents as the coup and Covid might cause disruption in supplies.
With reference to LOM: another consequence of the pit wall and wet season 2018 issues wasn’t that there was virtually no expansion drilling done in 2019 because of budgetary constraints, fortunately that has not been the case in 2020. I have no doubt that the gold is there and that we will announce a significant increase in our resource before the end of Q1 2021

Really don’t want ‘a lot of news packed into’ any RNS. HUM, please deliver the Q3 results in one RNS; drill results in another; and any M&A info in a third.

Can't see a major going with a ‘start up’ battery supplier for anything but an experimental prototype...... yes the start up has 3-5 years to advance their tech, but so have L&G, Samsung, Panasonic et al

Agreed that the EU want to drive this but only because they want Europe to be self sufficient and carbon neutral. That is not going to stop them allowing L&G or Samsung to come into the CR and make batteries for Europe..... besides which, apart from Northvolt, name a European Battery manufacturer capable of producing for a mass market EV? So I suspect that the EU can’t achieve its goals without the Koreans and the Japanese making batteries for them in Europe.
I know that it will cost ~$500m to build a plant that can produce 25ktpa. From memory (can someone correct me if I am wrong) 25ktpa will service a 30GigaWatt Battery plant and that costs ~$3bn to build..... the scale of this and the most et required will Ben mind boggling, we can’t do it without Korea.
PS ..... KC has had meetings with Koreans much more recently than ‘ages ago’.

Yes Sid, finance, investment and offtakers in order to mine and process the ore; and yes, Northvolt will build a European Gigafactory. BUT, it will probably be the Koreans that build the battery plant in a JV with CEZ...... they are thick as thieves with the Czech govt...... and with a $4bn price tag, the Asian money will be useful.

Eob on HC comments ‘German investors must be happy with world class resources right on their border.
True value in Hard Rock Li being shown the way from PLL and Tesla deal.
Europe has to act and secure vertical integration for the Union!’

Totally agree Eob and what we need right now to sustain this rally is for one of the Lithium commentators to join the dots publicly between what Tesla is doing with Piedmont’s hard rock in the US and what the EU could do with Cinovec’s across Europe........ a bit of publicity of that sort might light the blue touch paper....

MrC. It appears that BCN have offloaded their interest in Zinnwald to Erris leaving the Sonora clay project in Mexico. Every Lithium comentator that I have heard discuss Lithium clay projects says that, whilst the chemistry is undeniable and proven on bench samples nobody has ever got conversion close to scale as the clay clogs the machinery. They do comment that having a partner in Ganfeng is a big plus but the jury is out in whether it will ever be commercialised...... where as, hard rocks such as pegmatites, spodumene and mica are all tried and tested at scale...... still not easy, but the process is know and understood. I know which project I favour.

A report on an interview with Herbert Diess, Chief Exec of VW ...... sounds like he knows where his priorities lie.

FRANKFURT - Volkswagen needs to change to stay relevant in the electric and digital vehicle era and will announce "important steps" to that end before the close of the year, Chief Executive Herbert Diess said on Wednesday.

"Volkswagen needs to change: From a collection of valuable brands and fascinating combustion-engine products that thrill customers with superb engineering - to a digital company that reliably operates millions of mobility devices worldwide," Diess told shareholders at the company's virtual general meeting.

Vehicles need to stay in contact with customers, offer new services and comfort functions on a weekly or even daily basis, he said.

"We will take further important steps to set the course for this in the rest of 2020," Diess said.

Senior executives told Reuters the company is reviewing what role its high-performance brands Lamborghini, Bugatti and Ducati will play as the company increasingly focuses on electric, digital and autonomous vehicles.

Volkswagen, which also owns VW, Audi, Porsche, Seat and Skoda, is looking at whether it has the resources to accelerate development of electric platforms for smaller brands at a time it is investing billions to transform its more mainstream cars.

Fpvone; we are in extraordinary times, the first energy revolution for 140 years. The likes of middle management at VW are used to clicking their fingers and getting 5 new quotes on supply of this part or that; never a thought of anything but absolute excitement in the eyes of the lucky contractor..... easy for the decision maker at VW........ right now the board members and managers within VW are making decisions that will either make or break VW, and likewise the careers of those in power. I use VW but read every automotive except Tesla.
These huge strategic decisions are a million miles from the modus operandi of businesses used to ‘evolving’ by 3-5% per annum in competition with Tesla who are ‘revoluting’ at 10-15% a year when they are already 3 years (at least!) ahead of any competition........on top of that, the chemical we produce is highly specialised with down stream users designing products in which they might give 10 year guarantees to their customers on the back of confidence in our production. Chuck into the mix the bigger potential offtakers who may bring finance and political influence over soft development grants and loans and you have a complicated jigsaw that needs piecing together.
I am comforted that in a recent video interview KC was talking about all the automotives and battery manufacturers who were planning to build and develop production within Central Europe when he was asked ‘How many of these people are you talking to?’ And KC replied ‘all of them’ ....... so, we are well placed, both geographically and project timescale wise. Things of this complexity take time. I am very confident.

Whilst optimistic medium term I think we should not get too over excited about the Q3 numbers just yet. We have been warned that the mine plan is being re-sequences and that the grades on the ROM pad were not as high as in H1. We have also been warned to expect the AISC for the year to be around $950. I will be pleased with 25,000 Oz at $1,050 for the wet season production.

Would not surprise me if BCN were busy setting up JV’s with German companies re the Zinnwald deposit on the German side of our Cinovec project. Not quite the same economics, probably 12-18 months behind us but nevertheless, attractive to Germanys future IMHO.

Another webinar by Klein and Hooper https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yrxN9w82SOA
fascinating stuff.. Which current OEM automaker will be the next Kodak?

I think the drill holes are only relevant to the financiers. KC not trying to find more resource at this stage (though i think that there is a whole other block to drill out) , only to move current resource up the JORC curve so that the banks and EU bodies will have more confidence lending against it.

Tsib....... I hate to think that it is a cynical political move after the play ground debacle of the 'presidential debate' but perhaps it is ..... roll on some good news.

https://www.******************.co.uk/companies/news/929785/european-metals--keith-coughlan-talks-appointment-of-sms-group-to-lead-engineering-at-cinovec-929785.html

P r o a c t i v e in v e s t o r s
Around 5.50 KC discusses drilling.

We are not drilling to find more Lithium, we are drilling to move our ore body up the JORC risk curve so as to make it more appetising to borrow against.