With the recent announcement from China that they will seek to develop Lithium-Iron-Phosphate (LFP) batteries, it is clear that interest not only in lithium but also sources of phosphate will be under renewed focus. Phosphate extraction for chemicals and fertilizers has been undertaken on a large scale for decades, however sources of high-grade phosphate ores for the battery sector will restore interest with a potentially larger economic return. In addition, some phosphate deposits are strongly enriched in Rare Earth Elements (REEs), doubling the economic value of these deposits.
X-ray Mineral Services (XMS) Ltd has developed robust analytical capability to characterise phosphorites using our META workflows. This includes the acquisition of c.50 major, trace and REEs by ICP along with WD-XRF & ED-XRF. The quality of our data are highlighted by the results on a recent GeoPT Proficiency test for POLC-1 (Phosphorite from Arkansas). The plots clearly highlight a very close correlation between our ‘measured’ values and those of the proposed standard. In addition, XMS performed QXRD analyses to determine the mineralogy. XMS now has the capability to routinely characterise phosphate ores and to assess the REE content.
Posted 11th June 2021
