Lithium in the NEWS Mar 4, 2022| By Kitco News
Lithium is a metal that is used in almost all electronics today, with a surge in demand over the last two years pushing up the price more than ten times during that time.
The metal’s production is concentrated in only a few countries, with 80% of the global production and refining coming from China. This presents a unique national and economic security challenge.
In fact, U.S. National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan has declared that lithium is “essential” to U.S. economic security and “critical” to national security.
Speaking to Michelle Makori, editor-in-chief of Kitco News at the BMO Global Metals & Mining Conference, Jonathan Evans, CEO of Lithium Americas said that lithium is ubiquitous.
“Your phones, computers, power tools. It’s ubiquitous in everything we do,” he said.
Lithium Americas (NYSE: LAC) is a lithium exploration company with lithium projects in Argentina and the United States.
According to the company, the Caucharí-Olaroz project in Argentina is advancing towards production and will become the largest new brine operation in over 20 years. The company’s U.S. deposit in Nevada is the largest-known lithium deposit in the U.S. It has received Record of Decision from the Bureau of Land Management and is advancing towards construction.
The spot price of lithium was trading at 48,677 yuan/tonne in March 2020. Two years later, today, it is trading at 493,500 yuan/tonne.
A large part of this price growth has been driven by the electric vehicle industry in recent years.
“To follow the investment that’s been committed already by major automotive companies like Ford or General Motors and the battery companies that supply them…the supply chain in the U.S. today for batteries is about 40,000 tons per year, which is going to go to excess of 400,000 tons per year by 2030,” Evans said. “The entire world supply, today, needs to be replicated just for use in North America in less than 10 years.”
This price growth is only going to continue, Evans said, especially given that global demand for lithium is expected to grow 4,000% by 2040 according to the International Energy Agency.