en.Wedoany.com Reported - Recently, Pilbara Minerals, an Australian company, successfully integrated Tomra Mining's sensor-based ore sorting technology as a core process in the P1000 expansion project at its Pilgangoora lithium mine in Western Australia. This marks the transition of large-scale hard rock lithium ore sorting technology from experimental application to an industrialized mature solution, with a sorting capacity exceeding 1,000 tons per hour.
Founded in 2005 and listed on the Australian Securities Exchange, Pilbara Minerals wholly owns the Pilgangoora lithium-tantalum project. Located approximately 120 kilometers south of Port Hedland in Western Australia, the project is one of the world's largest hard rock spodumene deposits, with proven and probable reserves of 214.2 million tons. Tomra Mining, a multinational company headquartered in Norway, specializes in the research, development, and manufacturing of sensor-based sorting equipment. Its X-ray transmission and optical recognition technologies are widely deployed in the mining industry, enabling efficient sorting by distinguishing ore from waste rock based on atomic density and color differences.
This integration represents a key step for the Pilgangoora mine following the P680 expansion project. The P680 sorting plant, commissioned in August 2024, is equipped with 4 COM Tertiary XRT fine particle sorters, 3 COM XRT 2.0 medium particle sorters, and 3 PRO Primary Color coarse particle optical sorters, totaling 10 units. Since the plant's commissioning, lithium recovery rates have improved, unit operating costs at the processing plant have decreased by 10%, and production in the fourth quarter of fiscal year 2025 increased by 77% quarter-on-quarter. The P1000 expansion, while maintaining a sorting capacity exceeding 1,000 tons per hour, has achieved carbon reduction benefits of 8 to 15 gigawatt-hours of annual electricity savings.
Chris Luke, Operations Director at Pilbara Minerals, stated that P1000 has increased the company's annual production capacity to 1 million tons and fully unlocked the ore body's potential. Gavin Rech, Regional Sales and Technology Manager at Tomra Mining, noted that sensor-based sorting has transitioned from the trial phase to industrial validation through repeated operational data. A feasibility study for the P2000 expansion project has now been initiated, targeting an annual production capacity increase to over 2 million tons, further solidifying the mine's pivotal role in the global lithium supply chain.
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