The commissioning of the Pilgangoora lithium-tantalum project in Western Australia has continued, with the company racking up 1,000 tonnes of coarse and fines concentrate from its plant.

Plant performance, component operation and timing are all in line with expectations, with Pilgangoora on track for the first shipment of next month.

Pilbara Minerals’ project is expected to produce around 330,000 tonnes per year of spodumene concentrate when phase one is complete. A phase two expansion could see this rise to more than 800,000 t/y.

The company produced first coarse (dense-heavy media separation circuit) concentrate last month (pictured).

With both primary sub-circuits (fines and coarse) successfully commissioned, fines concentrates can undergo final processing through the dressing circuit, which is one of the last sub-systems to be commissioned within the concentrator.

Pilbara Minerals Managing Director and CEO Ken Brinsden said all of the plant’s components had, so far, met or exceeded expectations.

“The extensive planning and due-diligence undertaken by our engineering, construction and production teams is now well and truly paying dividends as we progressively bring the plant on line and ramp-up its capacity,” he said.