ESG continues to spark controversy and pushback  with changing political landscapes shifting the dial on opinion and policy. The trends, however, are clear that ESG continues to play an important role in securing project finance and derisking projects. An overview of the ESG trends impacting mineral supply chains will be covered, along with strategies which mining companies can implement to ensure sustainable and ESG friendly operations.

The economics of early stage metal extraction projects do not improve as more time, effort, and money are invested into them. If the economics do not appear sufficiently favorable under initial, generally optimistic, assumptions, the project is not worth funding. This presentation is about how to evaluate the economics of metal extraction projects before significant money has been invested. If the resulting economics look good enough, there is a rational basis for development. A number of case studies will be presented to illustrate the methodology in two broad categories: exploiting a new deposit and comparing novel technology to established technology.  

This presentation explores the evolving demand for critical battery minerals in the energy transition, highlighting shifting supply chain dynamics, emerging technologies, and strategies for securing sustainable and resilient mineral sourcing to support global electrification and decarbonization efforts.

Changing trade policy is a central theme of commodity markets in 2025 with critical minerals being one of the cornerstones of how these policies are shaped. This talk will examine how these changes across the year helped drive critical minerals markets and Fastmarkets outlook on how they will impact markets in 2026.

The lithium industry is growing, but the production methods are not improved, and have high environmental impact and excessive production cost. Several production routes are analyzed that do not use soda ash and lime to make battery grade lithium hydroxide and carbonate.

A lot of emphasis is placed on the technology choice for Direct Lithium Extraction. However, as the technologies become increasingly ubiquitous, it becomes more apparent what the impact of brine chemistry and more importantly, the impurity removal required, is to make projects successful technically and economically. This talk will discuss some of the more common elements and gasses found in brines that need to be removed to successfully deploy DLE.

Among direct lithium extraction (DLE) technologies, ion-exchange (IX)—where lithium and protons are selectively exchanged—offers high recoveries, selectivity, low water use, and lithium product flexibility. We will provide a case-study in the development and scale-up of Lilac’s IX technology from laboratory to demo scale, and ongoing commercialization efforts. These latter efforts benefit from flexible process chemistries enabled by IX, which contribute to optimized economics at the project level.

The demand for lithium-ion batteries is driving the need for scalable, sustainable lithium production. This presentation introduces an electrochemical technology, providing a direct, flexible pathway from spodumene-derived intermediates to high-purity, battery-grade lithium hydroxide. An update on Mangrove’s first commercial plant in Delta, British Columbia will be shared along with the role of electrochemical refining in simplifying battery materials supply chains.

Sorbent-based DLE has become the predominant technology choice for near and medium term brine projects in South American salars and the Smackover region of the US. We will review factors in sorbent-based DLE commercial scale-up that impact OpEx, CapEx, and ESG. This includes column sizing, column optimization, sorbent performance, and component selections that drive total project feasibility in the LiCl plant's productivity, reliability, flexibility, freshwater use, and chemical use.

Magnetic forces and alternative ion exchange processing can be used to enhance rare earth elements separations. This presentation discusses these new and modified approaches to perform challenging REE separations and presents related results.

Cobra Resources’ Boland discovery presents a rare-earth opportunity within a palaeochannel setting, where heavy rare earths occur as ionically bound mineralisation in permeable clay-sand horizons. Metallurgical testing demonstrates strong response to low-acidity leach conditions and direct precipitation to mixed rare earth carbonate. The project exemplifies a low-impact, processing-efficient development model, highlighting the metallurgical advantages and scalability of clay-hosted REE systems in sedimentary environments

As mining operations confront complex ores, aggressive brines and intensifying water constraints, the margin for error continues to narrow. Engineers face rising operational risks and growing pressure to meet targets. For decades, the oil and gas industry has applied predictive chemistry and corrosion modeling to anticipate and mitigate these very challenges; many failures were prevented long before they surfaced.This session explores how mining professionals can directly benefit from these proven modeling techniques. With accurate simulations, engineers can extend equipment life and reduce chemical overdosing. These gains support not only cost-efficiency but also environmental performance by minimizing unnecessary water consumption and chemical waste. The next leap in mining efficiency will not come from additional sensors; it will come from more accurate models that provide engineers with greater control and foresight.