On 11 October 2019 the Western Australian government announced
that it will introduce a new royalty regime for lithium producers
in the form of a 5% feedstock royalty rate for lithium hydroxide
and lithium carbonate where those are the first products sold and
the feedstock is spodumene concentrate.
The announcement comes after a recent review into lithium
royalties as part of the government's Future Battery Industry
Strategy and aims to encourage downstream processing of lithium
concentrate in WA.
The current regime
The WA royalty regime is contained in the Mining Regulations
1981 (WA) (Mining Regulations), under which
royalty rates are calculated either by a specific rate per tonne of
production or ad valorem (a percentage of the 'royalty
value' of the relevant mineral). Currently an ad valorem rate
of 5% applies to lithium concentrate.
