According to the Shanghai Securities News, on February 13th, it was learned from the Ministry of Natural Resources that relevant parties will promote a new round of strategic actions for mineral exploration breakthroughs, and build a new mechanism for coordinated linkage between central, local, and enterprise levels that is vertically integrated and highly collaborative. As introduced at the National Energy Administration's press conference, in 2022, lithium-ion battery energy storage technology accounted for 94.2%, still holding an absolute dominant position.
The proportion of newly added compressed air energy storage and flow battery energy storage technologies reached 3.4% and 2.3% respectively, with a significant acceleration in the growth rate of their proportions. In addition, various energy storage technologies such as flywheel, gravity, and sodium-ion have also entered the stage of engineering demonstration.
Everyone is desperately looking for minerals. In terms of news, according to a message from the Qinghai Salt Lake Research Institute of the Chinese Academy of Sciences on February 11th, the Qinghai Salt Lake Research Institute and the People's Government of Mangya City in the Haixi Mongol and Tibetan Autonomous Prefecture held a cooperative discussion and signed a strategic cooperation agreement (hereinafter referred to as the "Agreement"). According to the relevant development plans of Qinghai's salt lake industry or enterprises, by the end of 2025, the lithium extraction capacity of Qinghai's salt lakes could reach 200,000 tons/year to 250,000 tons/year.
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Not enough, far from enough. On average, the production of 1 million electric vehicles requires 60,000 tons of lithium carbonate.
The global lithium salt production capacity was 560,000 tons of LCE (converted to lithium carbonate) in 2021, and the effective capacity was 720,000 tons in 2022. It is expected to be 1.1 million tons of effective capacity and 970,000 tons in 2023. The production speed is not keeping up with demand, far from enough.
Of course, hybrid vehicles use less, but in the long run, pure electric is more of a trend. The global car sales volume in 2022 was 81.05 million vehicles. If all were to be replaced, 4.8 million tons of lithium carbonate would be needed. If not all are replaced, even if half were replaced, it would require 2.4 million tons of lithium carbonate, and note that we haven't even mentioned energy storage yet...
What is energy storage? The demand for lithium carbonate in this area is even greater than in automobiles because the current electricity supply is a bottleneck. Thermal power is afraid of the high cost of coal, and coal is non-renewable.
Hydropower and wind power have natural limitations, only photovoltaic has the most room for growth, and since there is no light at night, energy storage is needed to store electricity. In the future, whoever has electricity will rule, and without it, they will fail. South Africa is currently collapsing due to insufficient electricity and has no solution because coal is expensive and photovoltaic technology is lacking, haha, the world is forcing you to develop new energy, not inviting you to develop, but forcing you.
Tesla's energy storage uses ternary lithium batteries, which are the highest-end batteries. Phosphate iron lithium is still lacking something, so in the future, developed countries will mainly use ternary lithium batteries.
For small, less developed countries, forget about it, just don't use them and consider relocating. For superpowers like China and India, the direction is phosphate iron lithium, because they are located in the tropics and are not afraid of winter affecting range.India faces more troubles; it lacks coal for coal power, lacks hydroelectric potential due to a lack of large rivers, and lacks coal for thermal power, leaving photovoltaic as the only option. This is the predicament India is in, and to make matters worse, they don't have lithium. You can see how troublesome this is.
Lithium is primarily found in highland areas, in Asia it's in Tibet, China, in South America it's in Bolivia, and in the southern part of Australia. In short, the concentration is very high, and conflicts can arise at any time.
The market hasn't risen much and is still adjusting, which gives us an opportunity to think and prepare, to study more and pay more attention.
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