(Bloomberg) — Bolivia is cutting the ribbon on its first industrial-scale lithium plant, the dawn of what it hopes will be an export boom of the battery metal that could bring it back from the brink of economic crisis. It’s going to be a long road though.
In a ceremony Friday on the world’s largest salt flat, President Luis Arce will open the $100 million lithium carbonate facility, designed to churn out 15,000 metric tons a year to fuel electric vehicles in the global shift away from fossil fuels.
For the land-locked Andean nation, tapping into vast lithium deposits held in brine under the remote Uyuni salt flat offers a way to stave of a looming economic crisis as it burns through foreign currency reserves amid dwindling hydrocarbon exports.
But while Bolivia has much more resources of lithium than neighboring Chile, they are not yet deemed economically viable.
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