The surge in commodity prices has been impressive since mid-2020, predictably resulting in calls that a new “supercycle” is underway. We have questioned that narrative, given the apparent supply-demand imbalances plaguing the globe and boosting prices in the process.
But one theme we do agree with is the long-term secular tailwinds behind a number of commodities required in the transition to a green economy in order to address climate change.
https://www.miningnewsnorth.com/
As another signal foreshadowing the growing demand for graphite, the Pentagon has added this lithium-ion battery ingredient to its newest National Defense Stockpile Acquisitions List.
Published by the U.S. Defense Logistics Agency on Oct. 4, this list calls for DLA’s strategic materials department to acquire up to 900 metric tons of graphite to store in government stockpiles over the coming year.
Carbon in the form of flake graphite may have a lustre ranging from dull to metallic. In gradations of black to grey, the flat plates with hexagonal edges seem more drab than eye-catching.
The non-metallic element has vast applications and potential, from the common pencil lead to industrial and aerospace purposes, and beyond. Located in the Precambrian Grenville Province, eastern Ontario seemed to be a prime area for a graphite mine. About 70 kilometres from Kingston, the Portland Graphite Mine drew the interest of resource companies since the mid-1900s. Then the attention quietly vanished.
Matt Fernley is Head of Research, Volta Fund; MD of Battery Materials Review.
I wanted to talk about the Nature article on battery raw materials that’s been doing the rounds this week. The article, Electric Cars: The Battery Challenge (Nature, 19 August 2021), is an otherwise excellent discussion of a lot of the issues with sourcing materials for electric cars. Unfortunately there’s a big “but”. And that “but” is in its treatment of primary battery raw materials.
While the author, Davide Castelvecchi, has clearly spoken to a lot of experts on batteries, recycling and other elements of the supply chain, maybe he hasn’t known exactly which questions to ask, because we get a discussion almost entirely on ternary batteries with little to no mention of LFPs (and their ability to lower demand for Nickel, Cobalt and Manganese) and we also get only three paragraphs on the impact of extractive industries on the battery industry.
All the “analysis” on raw materials is effectively based on BNEF’s Long-Term Electric Vehicle Outlook for 2021 and the general conclusion, based on a quote from the BNEF analyst, is that “temporary shortages [of battery raw materials] and dramatic price swings… [will] work themselves out”.
https://www.theglobeandmail.com/
European private equity investor Pallinghurst Group is making a billion-dollar bet that Quebec will recover from its early blunders in battery materials and become a dependable pillar for supply in North America, as the global shift to electric transportation accelerates in the years ahead.
London-based Pallinghurst has invested more than US$500-million to date in two key battery-mining and material-processing projects in the province, with plans for more.
The company scooped up mining company Nemaska Lithium Inc. out of bankruptcy protection in a partnership with the Quebec government’s investment arm and built up a 15-per-cent position in another supplier, Nouveau Monde Graphite.
BloombergNEF has upped its predictions for annual demand for lithium-ion batteries by more than a third from its previous forecast on the back of expectations for rapid growth in the passenger vehicle segment.
BNEF predicts annual demand for lithium-ion batteries will pass 2.7 terawatt-hours per year by 2030 – a 35% increase from the analytics company’s forecast made last year. Passenger vehicles will represent 72% of the overall market as sales race to 14 million by 2025 from just over 3 million last year.
BNEF expects China to extend its lead in the battery supply chain — particularly processing and refining. The country accounts for almost half of new lithium hydroxide projects coming online this year and has 55% of the world’s nickel sulfate market and 80% of the global market for cobalt sulfate, according to the report.
Ryan Castilloux is managing director of Adamas Intelligence, which provides research on strategic materials and minerals.
A US$174-billion U.S. plan to spur domestic production and sales of U.S.-made electric vehicles while bolstering domestic supply chains, from raw materials to parts, dovetails with allies Canada and Australia’s ambitions to become leading suppliers of raw materials to parts.
The plan is part of the massive US$2-trillion spending plan unveiled by U.S. President Joe Biden in March, that aims at creating millions of “good jobs,” rebuilding the nation’s infrastructure, and positioning the U.S. to “out-compete China.”
From a raw materials perspective, there are four main facets of interest for the Canadian auto sector in the U.S.’s grand ambition to win the EV market.
The growing adoption of electric vehicles (EVs) is driving the increasing demand for lithium, nickel and cobalt – critical metals used as cathode materials for lithium-ion batteries in the automotive, energy and electronics industries.
According to Deloitte’s Electric Vehicle Trends, EV sales are forecast to grow from 2.5 million in 2020 to 11.2 million by 2025, and to 31.1 million by 2030. Analysts from Roskill, a commodity research firm and a leader in critical materials supply chains, provide an outlook on battery metals’ markets over the next decade.
Lithium
Global demand for lithium carbonate — one of two primary forms of lithium used in EVs — is expected to exceed one million tonnes of lithium carbonate equivalent (LCE) in 2026, according to David Merriman, an expert on EV and battery materials at Roskill.
In mid-January Graphite One’s (TSX: GPH; US-OTC: GPHOF) Graphite Creek project in Alaska was designated as a High-Priority Infrastructure Project (HPIP) by the U.S. government’s Federal Permitting Improvement Steering Committee (FPISC). The approval comes after the project was originally nominated for HPIP designation by Alaskan governor Mike Dunleavy in October, 2019.
In his 2019 nomination letter to the FPISC, Governor Dunleavy wrote that designating Graphite Creek as a High-Priority Infrastructure Project “will send a strong signal that the U.S. intends to end the days of our 100% import-dependency for this increasingly critical mineral.”
The Vancouver-based company says that Graphite Creek, which is located in Alaska’s Seward Peninsula, about 55 km north of the city of Nome, is the highest grade and largest known large flake graphite deposit in the U.S. The site is adjacent to the Imuruk Basin, which opens into the Bering Strait that separates Alaska from Siberian Russia.
https://www.northernontariobusiness.com/
ZEN Graphene Solutions, a technology company with a Northern Ontario mine property, has come up with a mineral-based solution that kills the COVID-19 virus when applied to personal protective equipment (PPE).
The Thunder Bay and Guelph-based company developed a graphene-based virucidal ink coating that can be applied as an agent to N-95 masks or fabrics that, third-party lab testing shows, is 99 per cent effective in rendering the COVID-19 virus inactive, thus giving health-care workers that an extra layer of protection.
ZEN Graphene has a high-grade graphite deposit, west of Hearst, that was first discovered in 2011. The anti-viral ink formulation they’ve come up with is from a processed graphene product pulled from bulk sample material extracted at its Albany deposit near Constance Lake First Nation.
LAUNCESTON, Australia, May 21 (Reuters) – Which commodities and countries are best placed to emerge as winners in the post-coronavirus world, especially if the anticipated boost to investment in renewables energies actually happens?
One of the themes emerging for a post-coronavirus world is that investment should flow into renewable energies, both as economic stimulus and as a way of limiting the impact of climate change.
To this end, the World Bank released a report on May 11 stating that global production of minerals such as lithium, cobalt and graphite would have to increase by as much as 500% by 2050.
TORONTO – Small miners hoping to take advantage of demand for battery metals are struggling to convert electric vehicle aficionados into investors, compounding the sector’s funding constraints even as analysts predict a long-term shortage of the raw materials used to make EVs.
The predicament has made it harder for already-strapped miners to raise money and could stall construction of new mines in the event the burgeoning EV industry faces a supply crunch for battery-grade lithium, graphite and other minerals.
“You need a mine for almost everything that we touch, and people still don’t get that,” said Eric Desaulniers, chief executive of Nouveau Monde Graphite Inc (NOU.V), which is developing a graphite mine in Quebec. “They want the electric car to save the planet but no mining.”
(Reuters) – The United States faces stiff challenges as it moves to create its own electric vehicle supply chain, industry analysts say, with the extent of the country’s metal reserves largely unknown and only a few facilities to process minerals and produce batteries.
Legislation making its way through the U.S. Congress aims to help offset those gaps, but China remains the global EV sector leader, a dominance seen by some as difficult to supplant. Even some U.S. mines are caught in China’s orbit, with domestic production of so-called rare earth minerals reliant on Chinese processing and now caught up in the U.S.-China trade conflict.
“China has a huge head start,” said Gavin Montgomery, a battery and mining analyst at the Wood Mackenzie consultancy. “They’ve just been at this a lot longer than the rest of the world.”
Booming demand for electric vehicles and insufficient investment in mines could result in a global shortage of minerals needed to manufacture rechargeable batteries in a few years’ time, a Tesla Inc. representative told U.S. officials and mining executives in a meeting in Washington.
Prices for some of the minerals, which include graphite, cobalt, lithium and nickel, could increase as a result of the high demand and the limited supply, Tesla global supply manager of battery metals Sarah Maryssael said in a closed-door presentation Thursday confirmed by the company.
Investment is important to ensure there is sufficient supply for the industry to grow, she said. Funding for projects to mine these minerals in certain countries has been challenging in the past, Maryssael said at the presentation.
The European Commission is eyeing opportunities within the EU’s minerals and mining sector, and has put forward, in its Strategic Action Plan (SAP) on batteries, a comprehensive set of targeted measures to make Europe a global leader in sustainable battery production and use.
The SAP focuses on including raw materials research and innovation, financing and investment, standardization, regulation, and trade and skills development to secure a sustainable supply of battery raw materials.
In his opinion piece in the EU Observer, Raw Materials: ‘holy grail’ of 21st century industrial policy, Maros Sefcovic, Vice President of the European Commission in charge of the Energy Union, said that Europe has world-leading technologies as well as high environmental and social standards, and that the EU aims to ensure that mining is no longer the polluting industry of the past.
