India Discovered 14,100 Tonnes of Lithium Deposit

Lithium deposit, a rare metal reserve critical for building batteries for electric vehicles, has been discovered in Mandya, 100 km from Bengaluru. According to the data from researchers at the Atomic Minerals Directorate, a unit of India's Atomic Energy Commission, the deposit in the study area contains about 14,100 tonnes of lithium metal.

Regarding this lithium deposit, Indian media are excited to say that the country could take a crucial step in the field of energy and electric power. If the country starts mining this deposit, then India will become one of the leaders in the lithium ore industry. At present, the country has been able to establish a large-scale lithium-ion battery production chain, and its share has also increased year by year in the international market.

Actually, India has been always trying to promote the development of clean energy and holding the ambition to become a global lithium battery manufacturing center, while, Indian lithium resources are very scarce in the past. The chairman of the Indian Power Corporation said that Indian electric cars, mobile phone, and other technology industries are highly dependent on Chinese imported lithium batteries.

According to the US media, around 3/4 of the battery capacity is in China globally. Chinese companies own unparalleled control over raw material processing facilities. Indian companies have been trying to shifting more capacity of lithium materials to domestic, and with little effect. Although the material is important in this industry, processing technology is even more important.

Russian geological experts said that the lithium deposit find in India is small compared to many major producers. If one compares with 8.6 million tonnes in Chile, 2.8 million tonnes in Australia, 1.7 million tonnes in Argentina or 60,000 tonnes in Portugal, 14,100 tonnes is not that large. Some Russians have said that India will be able to build its own large-scale production of lithium-ion batteries, but the country needs to master the extraction technology.

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