Lithium Scarcity Pushes Carmakers Into the Mining Business [View all]

https://www.nytimes.com/2023/07/02/business/lithium-mining-automakers-electric-vehicles.html
https://archive.ph/DkNPe

Lithium Scarcity Pushes Carmakers Into the Mining Business
Ford, General Motors and others are striking deals with mining companies to avoid raw material shortages that could thwart their electric vehicle ambitions.
By Clifford Krauss and Jack Ewing
July 2, 2023

Eager to avoid falling further behind Tesla and Chinese car companies, many Western auto executives are bypassing traditional suppliers and committing billions of dollars on deals with lithium mining companies.

They are showing up in hard hats and steel-toed boots to scope out mines in places like Chile, Argentina, Quebec and Nevada to secure supplies of a metal that could make or break their companies as they move from gasoline to battery power.

Without lithium, U.S. and European carmakers won’t be able to build batteries for the electric pickup trucks, sport utility vehicles and sedans they need to remain competitive. And assembly lines they are ramping up in places like Michigan, Tennessee and Saxony, Germany, will grind to a halt.

Established mining companies don’t have enough lithium to supply the industry as electric vehicle sales soar. General Motors plans for all its car sales to be electric by 2035. In the first quarter of 2023, sales of battery-powered cars, pickups and sport utility vehicles in the United States rose 45 percent from a year earlier, according to Kelley Blue Book.

So car companies are scrambling to lock up exclusive access to smaller mines before others swoop in. But the strategy exposes them to the risky, boom-and-bust business of mining, sometimes in politically unstable countries with weak environmental protections. If they bet incorrectly, automakers could end up paying far more for lithium than it might sell for in a few years.

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Ford Motor has agreed to buy lithium from SQM, a Chilean supplier. (Marcos Zegers for The New York Times)


General Motors has invested in the Thacker Pass lithium project in Nevada. (Rick Bowmer/Associated Press)