Nemaska Lithium Inc NMKEF

europe seeking independence in lithium supply

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Global Lithium Sources—Industrial Use and Future
in the Electric Vehicle Industry: A Review -2018
The European Union has a burgeoning demand for lithium and is the second largest consumer of lithium resources.
Currently, only 1–2% of worldwide lithium is produced in the European Union
(Portugal). There are several lithium mineralisations scattered across Europe, the majority of which
are currently undergoing mining feasibility studies. The increasing cost of lithium is driving a
new global mining boom and should see many of Europe’s mineralisation’s becoming economic (same for quebec)

China has invested in lithium projects all around the world and has
the power to distort the market. China has already limited its export quotas of rare earth elements
(REEs); a similar limit on the export of lithium to the EU could give rise to a real supply security issue.
Within the EU, demand for lithium is growing increasingly quickly [3]. The United Nations (UN)
Environment Programme launched an international resource panel in 2007, with an aim to gather and
share information on global metal resources, the availability of critical raw materials (CRMs), and the
concept of a circular economy [4]. The European Commission (EC) uses a CRM approach to describe
materials which are essential to the EU’s economy. The EC defines a CRM as a material which forms
a strong industrial base, producing a broad range of goods and applications used in everyday life
and modern technologies [4]. CRMs are crucial to the EU’s economy. The EC has created a list of
CRMs which includes 27 materials (Table S1, Supplementary Material [4]). The EC revises its CRM
list every three years and the list was last updated in 2017 [4]. Lithium is not currently considered a
CRM, rather a near critical material. Factors contributing to lithium not being classified as a CRM
include its relative global abundance (although it rarely appears in large deposits) and the current
availability of suitable substitutes available for some lithium technologies, for example, other battery
technologies using manganese and nickel [1]. Nickel and manganese are globally abundant and not
classified as CRMs [3]. Lithium is likely to be classified as a CRM in 2020 when the EC revises its
CRM list, because of current and expected future demand. Lithium has a high economic importance
and is essential to the growth of green technologies in the EU. The EU has the potential to become
self-reliant for lithium supplies by developing its own domestic lithium resources reducing reliance
on other suppliers (Table S2, Supplementary Material [5–16]). In the EU, hard rock mineralisations of
lithium offer the best potential to provide the EU with lithium in the future. New mining investment
in the EU will strengthen the competitiveness of its lithium industry.