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Lithium

Tantalum miner threatens expansion at Australia’s biggest lithium mine – by Melanie Burton (Reuters U.S. – June 25, 2018)

https://www.reuters.com/

MELBOURNE – (Reuters) – A partner in one of the world’s largest lithium mines said on Monday trial dates have been set to determine whether expansion at the Western Australian mine, in which China’s Tianqi Lithium holds a stake, would unfairly impact its minerals rights.

Private-equity backed Global Advanced Metals (GAM) owns the rights to tantalum and other minerals produced at Greenbushes, the world’s largest hard rock lithium mine, and has requested the courts to halt mine expansion plans to ensure that its rights are secure.

Talison Lithium, a joint venture between units of lithium giants Tianqi Lithium, and U.S.-based Albemarle Corp, owns only the lithium rights at Greenbushes. Tianqi and Albemarle hold 51 percent and 49 percent of Talison each.

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Lithium and cobalt: A tale of two commodities – by Marcelo Azevedo, Nicolò Campagnol, Toralf Hagenbruch, Ken Hoffman, Ajay Lala, and Oliver Ramsbottom (McKinsey.com – June 2018)

https://www.mckinsey.com/

What does the rise of electric vehicles mean for two critical raw materials that go into their batteries—and for the players in this ecosystem?

The electric-vehicle (EV) revolution is ushering in a golden age for battery raw materials, best reflected by a dramatic increase in price for two key battery commodities, lithium and cobalt, over the past 24 months. In addition, the growing need for energy storage, e-bikes, electrification of tools, and other battery-intense applications is increasing the interest in these commodities (Exhibit 1).

However, recent concerns regarding the future of the raw-material supply availability for batteries and the impact of rising commodity prices on battery production costs have highlighted risks that might create divergent futures for these two commodities.

The strategic response needed will likely differ across industry players such as automotive OEMs, battery manufacturers, mining and refining companies, and financial investors. For all players, there is a growing imperative to understand the complexities and dynamics of this rapidly changing market and to ensure that their strategies are robust in the face of uncertainty.

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Australia takes over Chile as world’s No.1 lithium producer – by Cecilia Jamasmie (Mining.com – June 12, 2018)

http://www.mining.com/

Australia has taken over Chile as the world’s largest lithium producing nation boosted mainly by record output at two major mines, data from United States Geological Survey (USGS) shows.

Down Under produced 18,700 tonnes of lithium in 2017, according to the USGS, thanks mainly to Western Australia-based mines — Galaxy Resources’ Mt Cattlin and Mt Marion, owned by Neometals and China’s Jiangxi Ganfeng Lithium.

Chile, which holds the largest known lithium reserves in the world (about 52%), only produced 14,100 tonnes of the white metal last year, which meant its market share dropped to 32.8% from 37.6% in 2016. Australia, instead, went from having 36.8% of the global market to 43.5% in the same period.

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U.S. electric car sector, wary of China, seeks more domestic lithium – by Nicole Mordant (Reuters U.S. – June 12, 2018)

https://www.reuters.com/

(Reuters) – Miners are pushing to sharply boost lithium output in the United States, as automakers in the world’s third biggest electric vehicle market are eager to cut their dependence on China for the critical battery ingredient and find more local sources.

In North Carolina, Nevada and half a dozen other states, miners are working to revive the U.S. lithium industry, once the world’s largest until it fell off in the 1990s.

Global demand for the lightweight material is expected to quadruple by 2025. Miners are betting U.S. expansion will pay off with orders from battery and vehicle manufacturers who are wary of relying too much on China, which is home to the majority of the world’s lithium processing facilities and sucks up most output of top producer Australia.

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Rio Tinto moves into cleaner resources to chase electric vehicles – by Kaori Takahashi (June 9, 2018)

https://asia.nikkei.com/

Global miner shifts focus to lithium after exit from coal

TOKYO — Anglo-Australian miner Rio Tinto is realigning its business structure in the wake of the global resources boom, after completing its exit from the coal industry earlier this year, with an eye on electric vehicle-related battery materials.

Rio Tinto CEO Jean-Sebastian Jacques, in a wide-ranging interview with Nikkei in Tokyo this week, laid out the company’s focus on new minerals, particularly lithium, technology partnerships in Asia, and divestment in coal.

Rio Tinto is shifting tack to respond to China’s demands, but its own operational needs and relationships with Asian customers are changing. On Thursday, Rio Tinto finalized a joint venture with China Minmetals to explore for minerals in the country.

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COLUMN-The battle for control of the lithium mother-lode – by Andy Home (Reuters U.S. – June 8, 2018)

https://www.reuters.com/

LONDON, June 8 (Reuters) – What’s happened to lithium? What was last year’s “next big thing” has been pushed out of the investor limelight by cobalt, another key metallic input to the electric vehicle (EV) revolution and one with an even more troubled supply profile.

Lithium prices have also been taking a breather after their meteoric rise over the 2015-2017 period. The lithium supply chain is currently absorbing a wave of new production, much of it coming from hard-rock miners in Australia.

Some analysts are now forecasting a surplus of lithium over the next two years. Fears of future shortfall, meanwhile, have been damped by the prospect of much higher production in Chile, which sits on the world’s lithium mother-lode in the form of the brine lakes in the Atacama Desert.

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Lithium booms shows no sign of slowing as new refinery announced for WA – by Jarrod Lucas and Jon Daly (Australian Broadcasting Corporation – June 6, 2018)

http://www.abc.net.au/

A Western Australian lithium miner is tipping the current boom for battery technologies will last at least a decade, as plans were revealed on Wednesday for a new lithium refinery in the Goldfields.

China’s appetite for lithium continues to drive the boom, with lithium most commonly used in new generation batteries for electric vehicles and home power storage. Lithium miner Neometals has revealed plans to build a downstream processing plant in Kalgoorlie-Boulder at a cost of about $200 million, creating more than 100 jobs.

The decision marks potentially the biggest economic shake-up for the regional mining hub since the construction of the Kalgoorlie Nickel Smelter in the 1970s and the start of the Super Pit gold mine in the late 1980s.

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Battery taskforce powers up to supercharge WA lithium potential – by Stuart McKinnon (The West Australian – May 24, 2018)

https://thewest.com.au/

A taskforce to investigate how WA can cash in on a “once-in-a-generation” lithium and battery minerals boom will make recommendations to the State Government within six months.

Announcing the taskforce in Maylands in front of two Tesla demonstration Model X electric cars yesterday, Mines Minister Bill Johnston said the downstream processing of lithium and other battery minerals in WA could create thousands of highly skilled, high-paying jobs.

He said the taskforce, consisting of senior government representatives, would engage with companies operating in the sector and take advice from an industry reference group.

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A Legacy of Mining Busts Haunts Chile’s Lithium Dreams – by Laura Millan Lombrana (Bloomberg News – May 25, 2018)

https://www.bloomberg.com/

Dozens of towns abandoned after a collapse in nitrate prices offer a cautionary tale for the next hot commodity.

Chile knows what it is to be expendable. Ghost towns that pepper the nation’s north are a painful reminder of a time when it was replaced almost overnight as the world’s top fertilizer producer. These days, the decaying buildings and rusty plants serve as a harbinger for miners embarking on a major expansion of lithium.

Lithium prices have tripled in three years, triggering a race to find a replacement for the soft, white mineral that is used to make batteries for a range of products from electric cars to mobile phones.
As researchers at institutions from the U.S. Department of Energy to Stanford University work behind the scenes to come up with a chemical alternative, local mining executives say Chile’s boom-to-bust past often weighs on the back of their minds.

While miner Soc. Quimica & Minera de Chile SA, or SQM, believes the lithium business “will go on for a while,” Chief Executive Officer Patricio de Solminihac acknowledges they always need to keep an eye out for the next big development. The nature of disruptive technologies means “they come out of nowhere and develop incredibly fast,” he said.

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A Lithium Valley in Western Australia could power the world – by Cameron Jewell (Fifth Estate.com – May 24, 2018)

https://www.thefifthestate.com.au/

There’s more than 100,000 jobs and $50 billion in economic activity up for grabs if a “Lithium Valley” is set up in Western Australia, according to Curtin University’s Professor Peter Newman, one of the authors behind a new report calling for the state to become a battery manufacture and technology leader.

According to Newman, Western Australia is a one-stop shop for all the materials needed to power the new economy, and says a “Lithium Valley” should be set up in Kwinana, Perth, leveraging off the recent announcement of a lithium hydroxide refinery being built, and Tesla’s recent meeting with the state government.

The report – Lithium Valley: Establishing the case for energy metals and battery manufacturing in Western Australia – says WA is home to the world’s most accessible abundance of energy metals, including lithium, cobalt, vanadium, tin, tantalum, nickel, manganese, magnesium and rare earths – essential components in batteries and other renewable tech.

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China Looks to Control Global Lithium Supply – by Fan Yu (Epoch Times – May 20, 2018)

https://www.theepochtimes.com/

China is slowly amassing control over the global supply of lithium, an important mineral in the production supply chain of new technologies.

On May 17, China-based Tianqi Lithium paid more than $4 billion to purchase a sizable stake in Chile’s Sociedad Química y Minera (SQM), one of the world’s biggest producers of lithium. Tianqi bought the stake in SQM from Canadian fertilizer company Nutrien.

Lithium is a critical mineral for production of high-capacity batteries, those powering the world’s smartphones, electric cars, and renewable energy grids. Expected global production of electric cars is expected to dramatically increase demand for lithium. Whoever controls the production of lithium has great influence over the price and supply chain for these emerging technologies.

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The Lithium Cartel Should Be Stopped – by David Fickling (Bloomberg News – May 18, 2018)

https://www.bloomberg.com/

Why are we so relaxed about an emerging oligopoly in the key battery element?

The world doesn’t like its essential commodities being controlled by a small group of producers. When Arab members of Opec resolved to cut their oil exports in response to U.S. involvement in the 1973 Arab-Israeli war, the situation was rightly deemed a global crisis.

Less than a year after BHP Billiton Ltd. announced plans to merge its iron ore operations with those of Rio Tinto Group in 2009, the proposal was dropped amid expectations that regulators in Europe and Asia would oppose the deal on antitrust grounds.

So why is there so little noise about the emerging oligopoly in one of the hottest elements on the periodic table, lithium?

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Electric vehicle rush fuels optimism at LME Asia Week – by Melanie Burton and Tom Daly (Reuters U.S.- May 18, 2018)

https://www.reuters.com/

HONG KONG (Reuters) – Rising demand for battery materials cobalt and lithium infused some optimism into an otherwise cautious London Metal Exchange (LME) Asia Week, amid a backdrop of slowing growth in China and escalating trade tensions between it and the United States.

In the event’s first ever session on battery materials in Hong Kong, Chinese cobalt producers such as Jinchuan Group International Resources and Wanbao Mining said they were ramping up production to sate an anticipated demand boom from electric vehicles (EVs).

That is a market that the LME hopes to tap with the launch of cash-settled cobalt and lithium contracts, slated for late this year or early next year.

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‘They actually sold it at a premium’: Nutrien sells stake in Chilean lithium producer for $4.1 billion – by Gabriel Freidman (Financial Post – May 18, 2018)

http://business.financialpost.com/

In a sign of how hot the lithium market is, Canadian fertilizer producer Nutrien Ltd. sold a 24 per cent stake in Sociedad Quimica y Minera de Chile S.A. for US$4.07 billion, at a healthy premium.

The purchaser, China’s Tianqi Lithium Corp., agreed to pay US$65 per share for the Chilean producer, which represented a premium on the US$58 trading price, which surprised some analysts, as antitrust regulators in China and India had required Nutrien — the company formed by the merger of Potash Corp. of Saskatchewan and Agrium Inc. — to sell its stake in SQM as a condition of the deal.

“The price seemed good,” said John Chu, an analyst with Laurentian Bank Securities. “Because Nutrien had given advanced notice that they had to sell it, and because it was such a large block of shares, it was thought that they would have to sell it a discount, and they actually sold it at a premium.”

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Battery makers pushing for ten 10-year lithium contracts: Albemarle – by Peter Ker (Australian Financial Review – May 14, 2018)

http://www.afr.com/

A push to offer long warranties for batteries used in electric cars is one factor forcing lithium miners to change the way they sell their product, according to one of Australia’s biggest producers.

US company Albemarle, which owns 49 per cent of the lithium-rich Greenbushes spodumene mine in Western Australia, said battery manufacturers are increasingly demanding 10-year contracts in a bid to secure supply. The comments came as the New York listed company indicated first production on its $400 million lithium hydroxide plant in WA may come a year later than previously expected.

Addressing investors, Albemarle’s lithium president John Mitchell said a desire to offer 10-year warranties on lithium-ion batteries was driving some manufacturers to seek guaranteed sources of raw materials for similar periods.

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