Good afternoon, ladies and gentlemen. Welcome to the 2021 annual general meeting of Pilbara Minerals Limited. My name is Tony Kiernan. I'm the Chairman of the company. Our annual general meeting is being delivered from the traditional lands of the Whadjuk people of the Noongar nation. I'd like to acknowledge them as the traditional owners, traditional custodians and pay our respect to their elders, both past, present, and emerging. We wish to acknowledge and respect their continuing culture and the contribution they make to the life of the city and this region. I've been advised that a quorum is present, therefore I declare the meeting open. It's wonderful to see you all here, and I really appreciate you coming to the meeting today. With us today is our manager. Going up the table here, Ken Brinsden is second from my position, Ken.
Next to him is Alex Eastwood, our Chief Commercial Officer. Sally-Anne Layman. Nick Cernotta is hiding in there, the little Italian fellow. He's in. Yes, I can see him. Then next to him, Miriam Stanborough, our latest director, and at the end, Steve Scudamore. I'd also like to acknowledge some of our senior executives here, in particular, Brian Lynn, our Chief Financial Officer, waving his hand there, and our Chief Operating Officer, Dale Henderson. Both of those are instrumental in the senior management team with Ken and Alex. Also in attendance today is Rob Soames from the company share registry, Computershare.
Before we get onto the business of the meeting, I'd just like to deliver a brief chairman's address, and after that, I'm gonna have to go through a bit of a boring process of explaining the online process, because this meeting is both virtual and in reality. I think it's fair to say that the past financial year has been a remarkable one for Pilbara Minerals with a strong turnaround in the global lithium market. That, combined with responsible business and operational management, has underpinned a period of exceptional growth and performance for the company. When I stood before you at last year's annual general meeting, Pilbara Minerals had a solid foundation.
We had a world-class 222 million ton lithium resource at our Pilgangoora operation and has successfully weathered a very tough 15-month period in which spodumene concentrate prices had fallen by around at least 30%. We had the emerging COVID situation, which was impacting on global markets and lithium producers. A number of them were struggling to stay afloat. Throughout this time, Pilbara Minerals maintained a sensible improvement operating strategy that saw production from our Pilgangoora operation moderated, as you'd appreciate, to align with customers' requirements and conserve our working capital. In addition, we completed a range of important improvement projects across the operation to optimize our mining and processing regime. All of these measures were designed to ensure that Pilbara Minerals was positioned to capitalize on what we believed would be an inevitable turnaround in the lithium market.
Today, I stand before you having witnessed a significant increase and resurgence in global commodity prices in recent years. Just on that, I'll just make a point. I'll come off script here. Obviously, Pilbara's enjoyed the benefit of very strong lithium prices and spodumene prices over the last year. In addition to that, I think you find that the operating performance of the company has been exceptional. A bit like cricket, you know, there might be a good cricket wicket. Unless you've got the ball in the hand and you're bowling, you won't get the wicket. Obviously, as I said, we've had the benefit of very strong prices, but I think our operational performance, including what I talked about, the moderated production to preserve our working capital, has now got us into this position now.
Over the course of the past financial year, spot prices for spodumene concentrate, which is what we sell, have increased from around $400 US dollars per ton, which is normalized to 6% concentrate, to as high as $975 per ton at the end of the reporting period. The end of the reporting period, of course, being 30 June 2021. Since then, they've continued to climb quite strongly, with the company recently receiving a sales price equivalent of $2,629 per dry metric ton via the online sales platform. In response to growing customer demand, the Pilgangoora operation was able to rapidly scale up production over the course of the year, with shipments of spodumene concentrate more than doubling between the first quarter and the final quarter.
I think the first quarter was somewhere in the vicinity of about 45,000 tons, and in the last quarter, it was 95,972 tons in the June quarter. That's the last quarter of the reporting period. This rapid pivot away from the previously moderated production regime to achieve record sales at Pilgangoora in financial 2021 reflected an operating strategy that is a credit to our entire workforce, and by that I mean the entire workforce. When I say that, I mean people both on-site and off-site. Mining operations, you tend to think the people on the site are the superstars, which of course they are, but we have a Perth office, too.
In my view and the view of the management and the board, is that each and every individual is part of that workforce, irrespective of whether they're on reception or they're running the processing plant up in Port Hedland. As I said, it's a credit to our entire workforce. That includes all employees. Importantly, we also delivered record plant throughput and high recoveries at Pilgangoora, reflecting the successful plant improvement projects undertaken over the past 18 months. Additionally, and further enhancing the company's position within the global lithium supply chain, the strategic acquisition of the neighboring Altura Lithium operations in January this year was a pivotal development. This acquisition has positioned Pilgangoora as one of the largest hard rock lithium operations in the world, providing Pilbara with a substantially increased resource base with strong operational and geological synergies.
Together with our drilling and exploration programs, the Altura acquisition has increased our consolidated mineral resource base at Pilgangoora to 309 million tons, which is an increase, a staggering increase of 39% in total resource tonnage compared to the previous depleted resource statement as at 30 June 2020. Following the completion of the successful integration studies, we've recently commenced the coarse production circuit at the renamed Ngungaju Plant. That's what we call the Altura plant, which formed part of the Altura acquisition. The first spodumene concentrate was produced from Ngungaju in October this year. Just at that point, I'd just like to pause. Dale, who's our Chief Operating Officer, and others, was very responsible for bringing the Altura plant online. It's a credit to the guys up on site and once again to those in the Perth office.
I think we settled that transaction, I think in January this year. The board probably made a decision to put it into operation around about June or July, I think, Ken. The guys then moved over the road and started the plant up with teething problems. We had to spend capital on it, obviously. The first product came out in October this year, so it's a great credit to our guys. Ngungaju, which is that Altura plant, is expected to be at full capacity by mid-next year, increasing our global production by up to 200,000 tons of spodumene concentrate per annum, for a target total over the two projects of between 560,000 and 580,000 dry metric tons per annum across those two processing plants.
Beyond these strong operational results, the past year has also seen positive progress towards growing our sales and diversifying our product portfolio. As you'd be aware, we've recently finalized a joint venture with the large South Korean industrial company, POSCO, to develop and operate a lithium hydroxide monohydrate conversion facility in South Korea. The new facility will form an important part of POSCO's overall supply chain for the lithium raw materials market, both in South Korea and abroad, and supports Pilbara Minerals' strategic objective of becoming a fully integrated lithium raw materials producer, while also diversifying our global customer base. Production at the new POSCO Pilbara Minerals facility is scheduled to commence from the second half of 2023, which is expected to coincide with increasing global lithium demand as we move forward.
Other strategic initiatives include work on the development of a midstream lithium salt product and development of a new electronic trading form, the Battery Material Exchange, which facilitates direct sales of Pilgangoora ore into the buoyant spot market. Ken will cover both of those initiatives in more detail shortly. The point, though, once again, I'll pause. As you see, we're moving slightly away. We're not moving away. We'll always be a miner, and that's what we are. With the midstream, the salts being worked on onsite and also the investment in the POSCO thing, you can see that what we're trying to do is we're diversifying ourselves just a little bit, but once again, maintaining the fact that we're a mining company, and we can then form part of the total overall supply chain.
Having cemented our status as one of the world's biggest suppliers of lithium raw materials over the past 12 months, we're conscious more than ever of our role in driving the global green energy revolution. In keeping with this status, we're working to develop a best-in-class climate strategy with a focus on minimizing our impact and mitigating the potential financial and operational risks of climate change, while maintaining a focus on worker health and safety and building up on our strong culture. Our annual report this year contains the sustainability report, which I'm sure you'd appreciate is quite a comprehensive thing. The chairman of the Sustainability Committee, Nick Cernotta, is here should you wish to bounce any questions off him.
I'm very proud of our achievements over the past 12 months and would like to acknowledge the outstanding hard work and commitment of the entire Pilbara Minerals team. As I said, that's everyone from reception through to on-site and all that sort of stuff. I'd also like to thank shareholders for their ongoing support. That concludes that part of my address. Look, it's been a terrific year for us, and I think I was saying to someone out before. I remember my words last year at the AGM was, "Don't lose faith." Mind you, at the time when I said it, I probably had my tongue in my mouth. I took my tongue in my cheek. We had confidence in the market.
not only confidence in the market, but confidence in our operating ability. It's all at this point in time, it's all going well, and I see no reason for it not to continue that way. Moving on, as I said at the beginning, I'm gonna have to detail some meeting procedures here, given that, this is being done online. This year's annual general meeting is being conducted as a hybrid meeting, being held physically at the University Club of Western Australia, which is here obviously, and online via the Lumi Meeting platform. All online attendees can watch and listen to a live webcast of the meeting. In addition, shareholders and proxyholders have the ability to ask questions either verbally or in writing and submit their votes online.
Further detail on the process for the meeting will be outlined when we move to more formal part of the meeting. The company recently released the notice of meeting for today's meeting, which includes the live webcast details. These outline how shareholders can participate in today's meeting, including instructions on voting and asking questions. The notice of meeting can be viewed on the ASX and the Pilbara Minerals websites, as well as the Computershare website. There is also a Lumi online meeting guide available on the company's website. For those in attendance, persons entitled to vote on the poll are all shareholders, representatives, and attorneys of shareholders and proxyholders who hold a green admission card. On the reverse of the green admission card is your voting paper and instructions. Proxyholders have attached to their admission card a summary of the proxy vote which details the voting instructions.
By completing the voting paper, you are deemed to have voted in accordance with those instructions. In respect of any open votes a proxyholder may be entitled to cast, you need to mark a box inside the motion to indicate how you wish to cast your open votes. Shareholders also need to mark a box inside the motion to indicate how you wish to cast your votes. After the final resolution, Computershare will collect all green voting cards. Very easy to follow, isn't it, folks? Anyway, online attendees can submit questions at any time. To ask a question, select the Messaging tab on the top of the Lumi platform. I'm talking to those which are online. At the top of that tab, there is a section for you to type your question.
If your question relates to a particular resolution, please identify the resolution number at the start of your question. Once you have finished typing, please hit the arrow symbol to send. Please note that while you can submit questions from now on, I will not address that particular question until the relevant time of the meeting. Please note that any questions submitted online may be moderated, particularly if we receive multiple questions on one topic. For those shareholders who wish to ask a verbal question, an audio question facility is available during this meeting. To use this service, please pause the broadcast on the Lumi platform and then click on the link under Asking Audio Questions. A new page will open where you'll be prompted to enter your name and the topic of your question before being connected.
You will listen to the meeting at this page while waiting to ask your question. If you have any issues using this system, please return to the Lumi platform. Finally, due to time constraints, we may not get to answer all your questions. If this happens, we'll answer them in due course via email or posting responses on our website. Voting today will be conducted by way of a poll on all items of business. Those shareholders present here will be given poll papers, as I outlined, to complete. Those online can use the online facility. In order to provide onliners with enough time to vote, I will shortly open voting for all resolutions. At that time, if you are eligible to vote at this meeting, a new voting tab will appear.
Selecting this tab will bring up a list of resolutions and present you with your voting options. To cast your vote, you simply select one of the options. There's no need to hit a submit or enter button as the vote is automatically recorded. You have the ability to cast and change your vote on all resolutions up until the time I declare voting closed. In order to provide onliners with enough time to vote, I now declare voting open on all items of business. The voting tab will soon appear. Please submit your votes at any time. I'll give you a warning before I move to close voting. If you experience any difficulties during the meeting, please refer to the Lumi online meeting guide available on the Pilbara Minerals website.
We understand there is a slight audio delay with the Lumi platform, and as such, we'll pause at appropriate junctions, junctures, sorry, to allow any questions to be put to the meeting and for voting to occur. With regards to proxies, these numbers will be displayed on the screen in relation to each resolution. Please note that the number of open proxies have been received at the chairman's discretion, and advise that I'll be directing those in favor of each relevant resolutions. Right. Okay. I now turn to the formal matters to be considered today. As I mentioned previously, all voting will be conducted by way of a poll. Proxy votes which have been submitted for each resolution will be shown on the screen at the relevant time.
Rob Stone from Computershare has agreed to be the Returning Officer today, and following confirmation by Computershare, the final results of the poll will be announced on the ASX later today. This release will also be available on our website. At the conclusion of the formal part of the meeting, Ken will make a presentation. There'll be an opportunity to ask questions during and after his presentation. I now propose the notice of meeting is taken as read. Happy for that to be done. Any objections? No. Thank you. I'll now move to the business of the meeting.
I confirm that all voting on all resolutions is now open, and onliners, I like that phrase, onliners may vote online as I outlined, and those physically here will utilize the slips, sorry, which were given to them. The voting icon will soon appear on the onliners screen. Please submit your votes at any time. I'll give you a notice before I move to close the voting. Okay. The first item of business is to receive and table the annual report, which includes the financial report, the sustainability report, the directors' report, and the auditors' report for the financial year ended 30 June 2021 for consideration by members. Representatives of the company's auditor, KPMG, Derek Meeks and Glen Dietrich, are available to answer questions from members in relation to the conduct of the audit and anything in relation to their report.
At this point, I'll now pause to allow shareholders to comment or ask questions on the financial report or the report of the directors and auditors. Okay. Alex, I assume there's no questions online, is there?
No, Tony, no questions on the annual report.
Okay. Thank you. I'll now proceed to the specific resolutions of the notice of meeting for shareholder discretion. Resolution 1 relates to the remuneration report, which is included as part of the directors' report that can be found on page 78 of the company's 2021 annual report. Voting on the adoption of the remuneration report is for advisory purposes only. The proxies in relation to that are on the screen.
The resolution itself is that pursuant to and in accordance with Section 250R subparagraph two of the Corporations Act, and for all other purposes, approval is given by shareholders for the adoption of the remuneration report as contained in the company's annual report for the financial year ended 30 June 2021 on the terms and conditions in the explanatory memorandum. I invite shareholders to ask any questions or make any comments or observations in relation to the remuneration report. No questions from the floor or comment from the floor. Is anything from the onliners, as we call them, Alex?
No, Tony. No, no questions on Resolution 1.
Thank you very much. As I said, all questions, all matters will go to a poll. Resolution number two relates to the re-election or the election, sorry, of Miriam Stanborough as a director. Miriam was appointed by the directors as an additional director on the fourth of October 2021. In accordance with the company's constitution, Miriam now retired from office and seeks election from shareholders as a director. Details of her background and experience are set out in the ASX release, detailing her appointment and also contained in the explanatory memorandum. Proxy votes received on this resolution are displayed on the screen.
Resolution is that pursuant to and in accordance with Listing Rule 14.4, clause 11.13 of the Constitution and all other purposes, Miriam Stanborough, Director, who was appointed as an addition to the board on fourth of October 2021, retires and being eligible, is elected as a Director on the terms and conditions in the explanatory memorandum. Feel free to ask her questions. She's up there. Waiting for the question. We're very pleased to get Miriam on the board. With that, if you have a look at her experience on there, you'll see that she'll be able to make a great contribution to the company. I invite any shareholders to make any comment, questions, observations in relation to Resolution 2. No questions from the floor or comments from the floor. Alex, online?
No questions online, Tony.
These folks aren't online, Miriam. Okay. Thank you. I now move to Resolution 3. The notice of the meeting relates to the approval of the issue of employee options performance rights to Ken Brinsden under the employee award plan. Full details of these are set out in the explanatory memorandum and make it clear that the hurdles that apply to these performance rights and options. It's quite clear that approval of this resolution does not mean the options or performance rights will be converted to shares. Conversion into shares depends entirely on Ken meeting the performance hurdles and vesting conditions within the defined three-year vesting period. The performance vesting condition of the employee options and employee performance rights are weighted 50% towards what we call relative total shareholder return, 30% toward a specific production target, and 20% towards a specified sustainability target.
There is also the service condition that Ken remains employed by the company for the full three-year vesting period. These are what we call stretch targets and, to be clear, are performance and achievements above what is his normal day-to-day job. Proxy votes in relation to resolution number three are on the screen. Resolution is that pursuant to and according to Listing Rule 10.14, Part 2D.2 of the Corporations Act, including Sections 200B and 200E, and for all other purposes, shareholders approve the issue of up to a maximum of 493,326 employee options and up to a maximum of 302,684 employee performance rights under the employee award plan to Mr.
Ken Brinsden and/or his nominee with the vesting conditions and on the terms and conditions as set out in the explanatory memorandum. Now, invite any shareholder to ask any questions or comment in relation to Resolution 3. I think you'd all appreciate that Ken has done a great job over the last year, and this is a great opportunity for me to thank him for his leadership throughout the year. So there's nothing, no question from the floor. Anything online, Alex?
No questions from the onliners, Tony.
Okay. Thank you very much. Now put the resolution and those online should now cast their vote if they haven't done so already. Ladies and gentlemen, that concludes all the resolutions to be put to the meeting, and I ask that all shareholders complete their voting before I close the poll. You got your slips here, please.
There one at the back there, Tony.
Everyone in?
Oh, there's a couple over the right of the other one, mate.
Thank you very much. Computershare will now proceed with counting the poll and collating the results. Those results will either be announced, well, if we've got time, they'll be announced today. In any event, they'll get released to the stock exchange and appear on the Pilbara Minerals website. Well, that formally closes the meeting. I'd like to thank you all for your attendance and the continued support of the company. As I said, it's been a good year and there's no reason as to why the next couple of years won't be as strong and as solid. Thank you for your attendance. I'll now ask Ken if you'd like to make a presentation.
Sure would.
Please feel free to ask him any questions. Thank you.
Thank you, Tony. Thank you, ladies and gentlemen, for your participation in the room today here in Perth and for your support of Pilbara Minerals. For some of you being very familiar faces over many years. Thanks also to those participating online. I can see on Alex's screen there that there's pretty healthy participation in the online universe as well. Thank you very much for your participation and support too. It's a pleasure to be speaking to you today about well, really what was an incredible year. FY 21 marked a watershed for Pilbara Minerals really, because we'd been through the hard yards and been through the wringer.
It's exactly that effort that ultimately has set us up for what we now consider to be Pilbara Minerals very finely poised for maximum participation in this phase of the lithium raw material cycle. I really feel like Pilbara Minerals could not be better placed for maximum participation, and I'll explain a bit about why I think that's the case. A huge year. One in which we finished the process of consolidation. The team has done an incredible job getting our Pilgangoora plant to its peak performance. We did that in an environment where it wasn't easy because our market was getting crushed and pricing was heading in the wrong direction.
It didn't stop the hard work, the perseverance, the perspiration, and it's full credit to Dale, Brian, Alex, and the entire team at Pilbara Minerals for what they were able to achieve. It culminated in, you know, quite difficult decisions, but I think part of what characterizes Pilbara Minerals' performance is the really sort of deep relationships that exist in the company from the board level down. I feel like Pilbara Minerals is a relatively exceptional company in that regard. There's a very interconnected, you know, workflow from the board to the executive to the rest of the operating team and vice versa in the other direction.
That's one of the reasons why, even though it was the toughest of environments in the second half of last year, selling our product for about as low as it had ever sold for, we committed to making an offer for the Altura assets. That's a relatively rare phenomenon that emerges. Making very, very difficult decisions in a difficult time in the market that ultimately translate to setting up the company for future success. That's just one example. There's many more I could reel off. As a result, we consolidated the Pilgangoora asset base. Two plants now ready for expansion in an environment where we should get due credit for the product that we produce and ultimately the right price.
That's one of the themes I'd like to touch on in a little bit more detail in the presentation today, is to describe a bit more detail about the dynamic in the market and how we're taking advantage of that. Then, in respect of price discovery, I mean. Then explain a little bit more about what we expect to be able to achieve with the asset base at Pilgangoora. I'm keen to share a few thoughts about how we feel additional value can be added. Tony's alluded to some of that. Deeper levels of vertical integration that get us into some value-added product. I'd like to explain in a little bit more detail why that makes sense and the tools that we're looking to deploy to make that happen.
They're all important themes and keen as to what I'm sharing today. I feel like I'm probably preaching to the converted. I suspect most of you know what we're on about, but we're in the Pilbara. We've built a big lithium raw material center. The Pilgangoora asset is pretty exceptional. There's not many like it around the world. What I consider to be sort of the big four now of hard rock lithium assets, Pilgangoora is definitely one of them. Wodgina, Greenbushes, and potentially over time, you might put Mt Holland, the assets owned by Wesfarmers and SQM in the same category. What makes them special? Well, they're all very large. They're all well-located.
Ultimately, they can all generate economies of scale with bigger mining operations that are accessible to sort of downstream infrastructure, whether it's ports or roads or even chemical plants in some cases like is the case down here. That's all relatively exceptional. When people say to me, "Well, you know, how do you imagine the lithium world is going to unfold?" They say, you know, we still hear it quite a bit, "There's lots of lithium in the ground." The truth is, there is lots of lithium in the ground. It is a very rare occurrence that you end up with large scale, well-located, relatively easy to recover, albeit there's nothing easy about the lithium world, and accessible infrastructure. We have one of those rare breeds.
We're well-placed for taking advantage of growth on the back of the Pilgangoora asset. In the background, you have this incredible demand growth. Now, one of the things that's particularly exciting about this wave of growth in lithium raw materials, and especially post the impact of the COVID pandemic, is the demand centers that have emerged at scale beyond China. The first round, so let's say from 2014 through to 2018, that was pretty much all about China. China's stimulating its new energy economy, of which the batteries were a key complementary element. By virtue, they're stimulating the battery industry and lithium-ion batteries, now the rechargeable battery platform of choice. That was all about China. We all got crunched when China made the decision to pull back the subsidy support in their industry.
COVID hits, and we all wonder what's gonna happen next. You know, normally this sort of stuff comes in threes. Actually, our world turned on its head because the rest of the world woke up to the opportunity in the new energy theme, so electrification of the transport industry and energy storage in support of the mass rollout of renewables. These big demand drivers have been driven both within China, 'cause by the way, China is also selling a lot of EVs and rolling out a lot of energy storage, but it's happening beyond China now. Europe is the next largest EV market with some exceptional penetration rates. If you're a German consumer now, roughly one in three of you is buying an EV as your next new car. In France, it's about 25%.
In the U.K., it's about 20-22%. They're very high penetration rates. I think that's happened much faster than most people would have imagined. It's valid to ask yourself why. Well, there's a couple of things going on there. There is a little bit of policy support. If you're buying an EV, you will get a bit of support from the government in those jurisdictions. I'd argue that's what governments should be doing to build out this important new industry, that's going to change the world of EVs rather than get left behind. I won't take that any further 'cause that just gets way too political. That's their response in Europe, and it's working because consumers are now well and truly switched on.
They're genuinely buying the option of stepping into an EV rather than balking at it. Of course, that translates to a lot more lithium raw material is required, and Pilbara Minerals is a net beneficiary. Another layer of detail, the effect of the battery technology, and my take on where this is headed is that it's all good news. Without getting too bogged down in the battery technology, there's different types of lithium-ion batteries. They're all the same platform. They're a lithium-ion battery, but they use different technologies for accessing either more efficiency or lower cost or higher energy density. The two big subsets of the battery industry that are you know, you would say competing, is lithium iron phosphate batteries, iron, I-R-O-N, iron phosphate. Then there's the higher nickel battery chemistries.
They're the sort of two main subsets of the lithium iron battery platforms that are getting attention today. The reason I'm dwelling on this is there's a debate that sort of goes on in industry and in investment circles that says, "Well, if one battery emerges as being better than the other," and it could go either way, "you know, how does that affect the lithium raw materials world?" Well, I can tell you, they'll both be successful. It doesn't matter which of those battery technologies is more successful than the other. It doesn't really matter in the short, the medium, and the long term because they all require lithium. They all need lithium. Some of them actually need more lithium than the others. From my point of view, I'd say a lot more lithium raw material has to come out of the ground.
You can be a little bit ambivalent about which of the technologies gets chosen. They're all required, and all those lithium units are required. I think today's price is a key indicator that a lot more lithium is required to come out of the ground. There is a massive incentive price there today. We've done our best to respond, and the team has done an amazing job. I'm very, very proud of what they've achieved at all levels in our organization. We went through the pain and heartache of slowing down production. We showed, you know, the discipline that was required at the time to back off from the market and try and let the market rebalance.
We lowered the cost of operations even though we were slowing down, and we principally did that by cranking up the recoveries that we achieved at a site level. As a result, our team now has this intricate set of skills and IP that puts us right at the forefront of lithium flotation. A key skill set for the future growth. Well, actually, not just even in our company, but other companies that might yet emerge. A lot more of that has to be learned, and I can tell you that Pilbara Minerals and our team is right at the forefront of it. That's how we continue to grow capacity like we have in the last 15 months. In fact, in the September quarter, we were only operating with the Pilgan plant.
That's the original Pilbara Minerals plant, and it achieved higher than design capacity. We produced about 345,000 spodumene concentrate tons equivalent on an annualized basis for the quarter, as compared to the design capacity of 330,000 tons. That's how far we've come as compared to, you know, the days of the, of our startup, back in 2018. It's an incredible effort from the team. And there's more. There's more coming. We've been providing quite detailed guidance about what we're up to during FY 22, so I won't dwell too much on the detail there other than to say we're doing our best to ensure that we're still competitive from a, from a cash cost point of view.
We do have to move more waste over this year and a little bit into next. That's all part of getting access to more ore as we continue to grow our production footprint. We've also been impacted by the effect of sea freight. If you're getting an incredibly high price, of course, you have to pay more royalties. That's actually a nice problem to have, but nonetheless, it all contributes to your overall cost base. From my point of view, we are still ultra-competitive. We made cash flow from operations. There was money being spent elsewhere in the business, but cash flow from operations, I think was a pretty good effort during FY 21, especially in light of the first half of the year.
We're still suffering from the moderated production strategy, and I'm pleased to say that the cash flow from operations increasingly looks like it's going to be very strong this year. We're continuing to invest. This is a little bit more about our response to the current market conditions. We've restarted the Ngungaju operation. We've produced the first concentrate from the heavy media circuit at the Ngungaju operation, so the former Altura operations. The team is working as hard and as fast as they can to bring back the whole operation. We expect to have done that by about the middle of next year. It does require some investment, so we're spending money to improve the performance of the facility at Ngungaju, at least as compared to the historical norm under Altura.
We'll be overlaying our if you like, operating expertise and techniques to ensure that we maximize the performance there. In parallel, we have the plant improvement projects at the Pilgangoora plant, where we're squeezing the lemon and we're de-bottlenecking the Pilgangoora plant to realize more capacity. That'll take the Pilgangoora facility to 380,000 tons per annum. Combined effect of all that is 580,000 spodumene concentrate tons per annum by the middle of next year. During the course of this year, quarter-on-quarter growth in underlying spodumene concentrate capacity right at the very time that the margins are expanding as a function of price. Price is obviously heading in our direction. This is a sort of step-by-step growth profile as it relates to our entire Pilgangoora capacity.
You can see the first two steps there, by the end of this year, plant improvements at Pilgangoora, and then by the middle of next year, the full capacity coming through from the Ngungaju facility. Over time, the potential in continuing to expand the Pilgangoora plant. That was the plant that was always designed for subsequent expansion capacity. We designed and built it with a layout that meant that it could be reasonably, readily augmented to facilitate additional capacity. That's where we go next with a view to targeting over 1 million tons per annum of spodumene concentrate at Pilgangoora over time. That's why it's one of the big mines globally. Fantastic scale.
Yeah, I'm pleased to say one of the reasons why originally, back in 2015, I was happy to get involved in the project 'cause the geology supported some serious scale. All right. Price discovery. Where do I start? The challenge that was presented, when we first started down the path at Pilbara Minerals in lithium and spodumene was that you would go to China, and you could only realistically speak to a handful of people that would logically buy your product. They were a very select group. The good news is, we've got to know them over the years, and they're now fantastic customers. I feel like all of that investment in getting to know the key players in the lithium-ion supply chain in China has been an important part of Pilbara Minerals' development. Why so?
Well, because they're the guys that are the ones deeply integrated through the lithium-ion battery supply chain. They're the ones supporting, you know, battery grade hydroxide going to Japan for Panasonic batteries in a Tesla or going to Korea with LG Chem for batteries in the Chevy Volt. You know, those are the key guys. They're the tier one supply chain, and a couple of them are also in China. CATL being a notable example and an important customer to Pilbara Minerals. In the intervening period, there was a big change emerging, and what was happening was new entrants were coming to the market, and especially in China, a little bit elsewhere around the world, but mainly in China.
They were building lots of chemical conversion capacity, and they were sort of knocking on our door saying, you know, "Can you help out? We need some product in 2022 or 2021." We're sort of saying, "Well, maybe. But we're going through this horrible period where we're not getting much for our spodumene. Come back and talk to us in a couple of years time." Then the market turned, you know. The whole world turned on its head as a result of the effects of COVID that I described. You know, stimulus going through the global economy, people buying EVs, demand growth emerging. As a result of all of that, those combined effects, those plants now want to run.
That new capacity, those new players want to take advantage of the demand growth that's emerged. They can't run, at least not at full capacity, because there is insufficient spodumene. In the knowledge that all of this was unfolding, Pilbara Minerals was getting ready. Building out the BMX platform, a tool to efficiently access multiple buyers in a very short period of time, and then make the product available and in effect, discover the real market price, the price for the product for those that are most desperate to secure it. That's why spodumene has gone from $375 a ton back in September 2020 to $2,600 a ton today. That's the evolution, and that's the innovation that Pilbara Minerals brought to the table as a function of what was going on in global markets. Right.
Having explained all that, we've got this market price. It's been discovered. The true price that someone's prepared to pay in the public domain, if you like, for an available spodumene ton. We'll continue to take advantage of that as we bring back the Ngungaju capacity, and we build out the available tons for the spot market. There's another important dynamic. Having discovered the true market price, we've then taken that price back to our existing offtake customers and said, "Well, hang on, guys. You're now not paying the right price even though you're under contract. In which case, we should talk about it." To their credit, they've been pragmatic in that discussion. They've recognized the structural shift that's emerged in the market. In effect, they've agreed it is valid. We should discuss the price, and we should.
Well, actually, the end result is, of course, their price has gone up, and not by an insubstantial amount either. We've guided to pricing in the range of about $1,650 a ton to $1,800 a ton for the December quarter. That represents a key change compared to the historical norm as a function of those, primarily, offtake renegotiations. Really important developments for Pilbara Minerals and one of the reasons why we remain confident about, you know, success of our business. All right. That's the pricing discussion. Now, out of all that, little old Pilbara Minerals has had its own effect on the rest of the world because as the spodumene price increases, it's natural for the chemicals industry downstream to want to pass on that cost.
That's now driven chemicals pricing. In fact, it's driven chemicals pricing recently to record highs. The previous record was in about November 2017, and it was sort of $24,000-$25,000 a ton. For a period in the last four or five weeks, it's just cracked $30,000 a ton in China. We're already back into record territory, and it feels like incentive pricing is going to be required for some time in support of future growth in lithium raw materials. Let's hope that's the case. All right. Lastly, a couple of points about the future of Pilbara Minerals, part of which has already been fleshed out. You've heard us talk about POSCO and the relationship with POSCO to build out chemical capacity in South Korea.
That's all now happened and confirmed and agreed and signed off. We're really pleased to be working with POSCO. As much as it's been a long-standing process, it's now complete. Our experience in dealing with POSCO is that when they get on the ground and they start construction, it all starts to happen pretty quickly, and looks like that's the effect that's gonna happen here. POSCO is already into the early works for the construction of the facility in Gwangyang, and they expect to be commissioning their first facilities under our joint venture arrangement by about the middle of 2023. That'll be coincident with us sending more tons from Pilgangoora in support of the chemical facility.
You know, obviously our part to play in that is underwriting raw material supply, getting a healthy price, I might say, for the product delivered there, but also having the economic participation in the chemical plant itself, where we have the option to own up to 30% over time. That's an important part of our future. Deeper levels of vertical integration. There's a bit more to come in that regard. We also think there's a big opportunity in recutting the supply chain for spodumene. How best to describe that, I guess, is to say, just because spodumene went from Greenbushes to China for the last 30 years, doesn't mean it's the right answer for the industry. Really, our industry is actually very young because there was only that one player, Greenbushes delivering to China.
Now, multiple miners, multiple chemical players. There's an opportunity, oh sorry, and of course, demand emerging elsewhere around the world, particularly Europe, and ultimately, we think North America. What if we recut the supply chain to value-add some products from a Pilgangoora base, from our Pilbara project, and sends the product direct to those markets? That's the opportunity in the midstream product. What we're talking about doing is creating an industrial salt that has a very high lithium credit, much, much higher than spodumene. The benefit you get out of that is being able to ship them a higher value product than spodumene.
Really importantly, deal with the waste at the mine where it should be stored, instead of sending it all the way around the world, and then doing it in a carbon efficient manner, which is why the relationship with Calix is so important to Pilbara Minerals and vice versa, Calix working with Pilbara. An opportunity to take their very smart, innovative technology that electrifies the calcination process by using their technology with a healthy match from our fines flotation concentrate. That's the key to electrification of the calcination process, and that's the way to materially lower the carbon footprint in the hard rock supply chain. We've heard a bit of flak over the years.
There's people that say, for example, "Oh, you know, the hard rock supply chain, it's gonna suffer in years to come because it's too high a carbon footprint compared to the brine sources of supply," for example. What I say is, "You've called it way too early," because there is heaps more innovation to come in our industry, and this is just one example that will materially lower the carbon footprint in the hard rock supply chain so that we are ultra-competitive, especially into European and ultimately North American markets, where they're really gonna value that sort of stuff. We think that's an important part of our future and one of the reasons why there's a lot more to come yet for Pilbara Minerals. All right, moving on. Well, I've already touched on some of the sustainability initiatives.
Pilbara Minerals has been actively working on all of its sustainability initiatives, and thanks very much to the board and the subset of the board for their support in this area, culminating in all the work that's going on that ultimately achieves, you know, net zero carbon emissions in the decade beginning 2040. Part of that is achieved through some of the initiatives I've already discussed, things like the Calix project, haulage initiatives. We're also very deep into measuring the Scope 3 emissions all the way through the supply chain, and we're rolling out renewables. The renewables is a relatively recent commitment. We've committed to 6 MW capacity, which by the way is pretty substantial for a mine of our size.
That's a big part of the first of the series of steps that get us towards net zero carbon emissions. So another important initiative, and as I said, thanks very much to the board for their continued support in those and the other projects that we have underway. All right. In closing, apologies if I've filled you with too much information. I'd just like to say a big thank you. A thank you to the board for their participation in our business. As I said, I think our board is pretty exceptional for the passion and the enthusiasm they bring to the company and their deep levels of participation. It's fantastic. It's really important and a big value add for Pilbara Minerals. I'm certain I have the hardest working executive in the mining industry in Australia.
I don't think you can look past Dale, Brian, and Alex for the number of hours that they put in. It is absolutely incredible. They too have a passion for the company. They must have, if they're prepared to put those hours in. We have a huge team of support, whether it's in the Perth office or it's out at the mine. They are very, very capable people doing amazing things. As a result, we have a business that I think is rising to the top of the pack. All right. That's it for me. I'd love to open up the floor to questions, I think, Alex. Is that the next step?
Yeah.
Yep. We'll start in the room. Perhaps we'll start here, and then we'll intersperse that with some questions. John, over this side. Oh, yep. Thanks, Chris.
John.
Yeah, that's on.
Given the promise and performance at Pilbara, and given that some of our shareholders aren't getting any younger, what's the schedule for dividends at Pilbara?
Dividend question.
Yeah. Look, my sense is it's obviously the question that's on everyone's lips. Thank you for bringing up the question. I think I can safely say, without putting words in Tony's mouth, he is a fan of mining companies paying dividends as and when appropriate and possible. In which case, should that situation arise for Pilbara Minerals, then of course it will be given deep consideration. We can't make any commitments today other than to say it is a well worthwhile question asking of companies as they you know grow and start to generate operating cash flow. My advice would be, we've taken that on notice.
Can lithium be recycled like lead can in batteries?
Yeah. This is also a really important question and speaks to the sustainability of our industry as a whole. I think mostly it's good news. Lithium-ion batteries are receiving a lot of attention as it relates to recycling, and we see that in just about every market where we have touch points: China, Europe, North America. Actually, there's also companies here on the ASX that are specifically focused on that objective. A lot of money is getting pumped into the area for the purpose of research and lowering the cost of recycling, maximizing the recovery. If there's a catch, the catch is you require volume in batteries before you can materially start the recycling process. Because we're relatively early in the adoption of mass scale lithium-ion batteries, it's gonna take about another 10 years before
By far, the majority—I'm talking a very small minority—are all getting vaccinated. Our expectation is that there will be zero impact, if you like, as a function of the mandate. Look, my personal view is, I think that's been well handled by government and very useful for them to mandate a response for industry, to basically force people to act and not be lazy about the effect of the vaccination, if you know what I mean. Getting on with it, even if they were going to not get it, just getting it done faster. Yeah, broadly speaking, we are very supportive of that initiative. As to our controls, well, again, I think mostly there it's good news.
The industry has been very constructive in, you know, through the period of this in the relationship with government. It's also been the government's objective to make sure that business gets the minimum of disruption. I think it was the Premier who said, you know, "If mining doesn't keep going, who's gonna pay for the schools, the hospitals and the police?" Or something, you know, words to that effect. In part, it's true, you know, it's really important to try and maintain industry. A lot of systems have been established to make sure that we can maintain continuity. Getting more specific about Pilbara Minerals, we've got systems in place that support the effect of, you know, a positive case. In fact, like most mine sites, they've all had some level of exposure and had to isolate people.
We've tested our systems in much the same way as most remote mine sites in Western Australia would have. The last thing is the point of entry control. If there's an outbreak and as community transmission starts to emerge, which inevitably it will here in Western Australia, we can ensure that we don't have a positive case to the extent it's possible reporting to site. Things like, you know, rapid antigen tests and those sorts of things being deployed.
Hi, Ken. Yeah, as you said, rising company, all going incredibly well. In terms of the bigger players, not necessarily in lithium, are they not looking, going, "We might have missed the boat. Shouldn't we talk to these guys?" In terms of consolidation, takeover. Do you see that as a potential for not just for you, but for others?
I think a bit like you. I think the big global miners underestimated the rapid adoption of the battery raw materials sphere. I would suggest that at some point in time in the cycle, who knows when, they will act and look to consolidate, or at the very least, look for their own investment sort of options to start to build out a portfolio. You can start to see bits and pieces of it emerging, Rio working on a couple of what I consider to be rats and mice projects around the world. Nothing too serious, but at least they've started. In the case of BHP, you know, nickel sulfate, that's a very real and valid kind of response, industry response.
In lithium raw materials, I think it goes back to that comment I made earlier in the presentation about an all-pervasive view among the investment community, maybe a little bit like that in the big mining houses. Well, there's lots of lithium around. Why would you wanna play in the industry? But I reckon they've completely missed the trick. The trick is, you want one of the big mines. You want it close to existing infrastructure. You want the spodumene to be readily recoverable, and you need some scale. Well, there's not many of them around. It just so happens that Pilbara owns one of the big ones.
What sort of effect do you think Vulcan has with their German mine? Does it impact on Pilbara at all?
Yeah. The industry response, I think, is gonna be interesting actually, about the novel sources of lithium. There's one example. Another is the so-called clays or soft rocks that are in the Americas. Mexico and sort of Southern North America. Couple of notable examples there. In the end, my opinion is, they all likely get developed. The catch will be, it won't happen as quickly or as cheaply as anyone currently imagines. I would go, stating it plainly, with conventional technology for this phase of the cycle. Because those projects look hard in comparison to further development of Pilgangoora. One more from the floor here, Alex, and then we'll go online. Yep.
Kevin Bowman from the ASA. Thanks for our previous meetings. The question which we have to ask, of course, is, you know, sexual harassment on the front page again this morning. Is that an issue with Pilbara, and how have you guys handled that?
Stating it plainly, we have had our own fair share of challenges. I'm also very proud of the company's response to the issues as they've emerged. I think our responses have been, you know, measured, appropriate and perhaps a better word for it is accommodating. You know, making sure that our people are doing the right thing. It does represent a big challenge for the industry. There's no two ways about it. We need to lift our game. I was quoted coming out of the Diggers & Dealers presentation this year, you know, as saying, "We need to get rid of the dinosaurs in our industry." I still believe that to be the case.
You know, we have to weed out people that are still acting either inappropriately or just outright illegally. You know, it shouldn't be acceptable. Yeah, I'm pleased to say that that's the stance that we take and or the team at site takes in respect of harassment. All right, Alex, how about a couple of those online questions?
Okay. Thanks, Ken. We've got one question. Due to the increase of production, are there any pathways to potential customers within the European and U.S. markets?
Yeah, that's an important part of Pilbara Minerals' future. I mentioned that. Well, actually Tony said the same thing. One of the important subsets of our future relates to a deeper level of vertical integration for value-added product participation. The first of those that's been cemented is the POSCO relationship. Korea is a very important market for Pilbara Minerals because they are the next big mover beyond China in respect of battery volumes, battery technology, and interconnectedness to North American and European markets. That's why. Other than the fact that POSCO is a great partner, that's another reason why Pilbara would look to get our spodumene interconnected through the South Korean supply chain. As one example. The other example that I highlighted was the work that we're doing on the midstream product.
A high lithia content industrial salt, and the logic in that is that product can, too, be delivered directly. You know, really competitively, we think, directly to European markets and, say, North America as well. They're an important part of our future, I think.
Thanks, Alex.
This one should be hopefully fairly easy. When does PLS expect to be cash flow positive?
Oh. Yeah, well, we are.
You are.
No, it wouldn't come as a surprise to anyone. You know, with pricing where it is, of course, we are cash flow positive. Yeah, absolutely. I don't think it's giving any secrets away.
The third question, is the Calix scoping study on track to be released to the market this quarter?
Yes, that's our intention. Yeah. The initial rounds of feasibility work there are well advanced, and it's not too far away.
This one, I think it's probably a difficult one to guess, but where do you guess the price of the shares are heading?
Oh. I'll just pull out my crystal ball. Well, you know, I obviously can't make a prediction about the share price, but I am confident about the pricing dynamic and what's required within the industry to incentivize additional supply. What has to happen in lithium raw materials is pretty exceptional in the natural resources industry. It's an industry that's gotta go from 300,000 tons, say back in 2017, to 3 million tons of demand. That's even assuming relatively modest rates of adoption of EVs and energy storage by 2030. There's not many industries that go through that sort of order of magnitude of growth without there being huge incentives to grow the pool of available supply that supports that growth.
So for all those reasons, I think we can be optimistic. Doesn't mean it's all gonna be in a straight line, and there probably will be a few speed bumps along the road. Generally, an incentive price is required to grow the industry, and I think we can be reasonably confident about that.
Okay. I've got another question about the Calix technology. Does the Calix technology enable sufficient energy use or cost reduction using local solar, wind, and battery combinations?
That's the objective in electrifying the calcination process. In using current technology, you will fire your calcination device with just about anything at your disposal. The majority of them in China would probably be coal-fired. In which case, we can replace that coal with electricity, which in turn is supported by renewable energy supplies. It is a really powerful tool. For all those reasons, you know, we think ultimately the Calix technology is going to be generally the direction that industry heads. Where it's particularly powerful in the Pilbara Minerals story and in the lithium world is the fines flotation concentrate, so smaller particle sizes that were already part of your production outcome, that then are a very healthy match for the application of the Calix technology.
For all those reasons, we'd say there's more work to be done, of course. There is more engineering to be done, but nonetheless, heading in the right direction.
We've got a couple of questions which are similar about Mt Francisco. Do you foresee anything happening at Mt Francisco in the near term? What is the overall strategy with Mt Francisco ?
Well, Mt Francisco , for those of you that may not be familiar, it's another pegmatite outcrop, approximately 40-45 km , what would it be? West-southwest of Pilgangoora. It represents one part of a broader portfolio of Pilbara Minerals tenement base. I have to say, if you're gonna spend money in exploration dollars, the first place to do it is at Pilgangoora, and we don't think we're finished there yet. There's going to be a lot more resource at Pilgangoora and hopefully over time, more pit inventory, as a function of the exploration that we do there. It's with that as a backdrop that we haven't really focused our attention on Mt Francisco . That doesn't mean there's no potential there. It's just not the number one priority.
One question about the original announcements from Altura had mentioned that some gold had been found at Pilgangoora. The question is whether there's any commercial amounts and will we do anything about that?
Yeah. No, it's there is this combined tenement base now, what was acquired with Altura, and in fact even some of Pilbara Minerals pre-existing tenements had or have gold occurrences. We've done bits and pieces with a view to either maintaining the tenure and/or adding value to the tenure. Doesn't mean we're about to become a gold company. I don't wanna give you that impression. Nonetheless, in whatever we do with gold assets, we'd be looking to make sure that shareholders can take advantage of any value added there. There's nothing to be done necessarily today, but there is opportunity there in the future to either do a bit ourselves and/or work with somebody else who's keen to explore that ground.
Okay. Thanks, Ken. The last question is which companies in Australia and overseas are our main competitors?
Right. Well, the interesting position that Pilbara Minerals finds itself in today is that we are a merchant seller of spodumene. We're one of a very rare breed, which is exactly why the price is where it is today. What that means is we're a general seller of spodumene as compared to owning spodumene and chemically converting it ourselves. That's the distinction I'm drawing. Today there's really only two material suppliers. There's ourselves and Orocobre through the acquisition of the former Galaxy operation in Mt Cattlin. We are the two main players. There are other smaller players that come out of other jurisdictions. There's a couple that come out of the South America. One is a by-product from tantalum mining, the other is a startup in spodumene, relatively small scale.
What else? There's a little bit domestically in China, but again, very small in scale and not particularly high in quality. A little bit out of Zimbabwe, of all places. Really when you're talking about material spodumene merchant supply, and especially merchant supply growth in the short term, Pilbara Minerals is it.
Okay. That's it, Ken. No more online questions.
Okay. Thanks, Alex. One last time across the floor. Any other questions? All right.
Thank you. Altura, when it was mentioned, was only spodumene output from the plant. Nothing was ever mentioned about tantalite.
Right.
Is there any prospect of a stream being added on to that processing plant?
Yeah. The way it works at Pilgangoora is that as you go further south and further west, as a function of the geology, there is less tantalum. Because the Altura tenements sit in the southwest corner, they have the lowest grade of tantalum. That's why Altura never really invested in recovering the tantalite. In contrast, Pilbara has high-grade tantalite, so we went through the effort of recovering it. Interestingly, it doesn't mean there's none. There is some. We have processed some of the Altura ore through our facility and recovered the bits and pieces of tantalite from there. But we wouldn't intend to do it in a big way by augmenting the Ngungaju plant. It's just not high enough grade. Yeah. All right. Well, I think we might be done.
As such, we'll close it off there. Thank you very much everyone for participating. Really appreciate it.