Recently, CITIC (Beijing) Salt Industry Technology Innovation Research Institute Co., Ltd. applied for a patent entitled "A method for producing anhydrous lithium chloride from low magnesium lithium ratio salt lake brine", with publication number CN119976895A. This patent uses a combination of nanofiltration membrane separation and solvent extraction process to produce anhydrous lithium chloride products, with a lithium ion recovery rate of over 80%. The amount of fresh water consumed for 1 ton of lithium chloride product is less than 50 cubic meters, resulting in low production costs, fewer chemical units, and a high degree of automation.
Lithium chloride, as one of the important basic lithium salts, has a wide range of applications in new energy, medicine, metallurgy and other fields. According to the statistics of the Lithium Industry Branch of China Nonferrous Metals Industry Association, the production capacity of lithium chloride in China will be 30000 tons and the output will be 24000 tons in 2024, with a year-on-year increase of 37.1%, indicating a steady growth trend in production capacity. However, compared with lithium carbonate and lithium hydroxide, the production capacity of lithium chloride is still relatively small, and in recent years, its proportion in the total production capacity of the three major basic lithium salts has gradually declined.
The total proved reserves of lithium chloride in Xizang's salt lakes are about 15 million tons, but a considerable number of salt lakes have not been able to carry out detailed exploration of lithium deposits, which provides potential for the further development of lithium chloride resources in China. At the same time, lithium resource enterprises are actively expanding the production capacity of lithium chloride. For example, the 20000 ton/year lithium chloride production line of the Mariana Lithium Salt Lake project in Argentina, a wholly-owned subsidiary of Ganfeng Lithium Industry LMA, has been officially put into operation on February 12, 2025, which will help improve the company's lithium chloride supply capacity.