Company: SQM
Filing Date: 2025-04-24
Form Type: 20-F
Source: 0000909037-25-000020
Chunk: 71

Company: CHEMICAL & MINING CO OF CHILE INC
Filing Date: 2025-04-24
Form: 20-F
Item: Item 4
Chunk 71
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aporation, results in potassium-enriched salts and lithium-concentrated brines. In the first stages of the evaporation process, sodium chloride salts (halite) precipitate followed by potassium chloride salts together with sodium chloride (sylvinite), which are used to produce fertilizer products. The brine that remains in the evaporation pond system continues its concentration, producing additional products of interest, such as lithium sulfate salts and a concentrated lithium chloride solution, which are used to produce lithium sulfate concentrate and lithium carbonate, respectively.
Lithium Chloride Solution and Lithium Carbonate
The concentrated lithium chloride solution obtained during the evaporation process contains approximately 4-5% of lithium. The solution is then transported by truck to the Lithium Chemical Plant located near Antofagasta, approximately 190 kilometers southeast of the Salar de Atacama. At this plant, the solution is further purified and treated with sodium carbonate to produce lithium carbonate, which is dried and then, if necessary, compacted and finally packaged for shipment to customers.
The production capacity of our lithium carbonate facility at the end of 2024 was 210,000 metric tons per year. 
Future production will depend on the actual volumes and quality of the lithium solutions sent by the Salar de Atacama operations, as well as prevailing market conditions. Our future production will also be subject to the extraction limit described in the SQM-Corfo Agreements discussed above. See “—Salar de Atacama Brine Deposits” and “Item 8.A.7 Legal Proceedings.”
Our lithium carbonate production quality assurance program has been certified by TÜV-Rheinland under ISO 9001:2015 since September 2018.
Lithium Hydroxide (from Lithium Carbonate)
Lithium carbonate is sold to customers, and we also use it as a raw material for our lithium hydroxide production, which started operations at the end of 2005. We currently have three lithium hydroxide plants in Chile, one of which has two production lines and the second of which came into operation at the end of July 2024. Together, they have a total production capacity of 40,000 metric tons per year. These plants are located at the lithium production chemical plant, adjacent to our lithium carbonate operations.
In the production process, lithium carbonate is reacted with a lime solution to produce lithium hydroxide brine and calcium carbonate salt. The calcium carbonate salt is removed from the process by filtration and the lithium