Ecograf
Green Revolution drives graphite demand to unprecedented heights
Editor11. October 2021
Source: Depositphotos
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The transition to electromobility, preferably fueled by renewable energies, leads to a drastic increase in graphite demand, a new report shows. Because even if the name may not suggest it, graphite is the largest component of any lithium-ion battery.
Last year, the World Bank already wrote that graphite demand is increasing both absolutely and in percentage terms, as the material is used in the most common batteries for electric cars, mains storage and decentralized batteries.
And according to Benchmark Mineral Intelligence experts, a battery megafactory that is able to supply 30 gigawatt hours per year needs around 33,000 tons of graphite as an anode material annually.
If you now extrapolate this to the more than 200 megafactories whose construction has been announced or has already begun, this corresponds to up to 5.4 million Tons of battery graphite per year. For example, the International Energy Agency also predicts that electromobility and sectors with low carbon emissions will be approx. 25 times more graphite will need than today. And this does not even take into account traditional uses such as steel production.
According to the Mineral Commodity Summaries 2021, an annual report by the United States Geological Survey, there are currently no graphite mines in the USA, so US producers have to rely on imports of 41,000 tons. Last year, China delivered around 59% of mine production in graphite, by far followed by Mozambique (11%), Brazil (9%) and Madagascar (4%). 2% of global graphite production came from North America (Canada and Mexico).
But when it comes to battery graphite as anode material used in the lithium-ion batteries of electric vehicles, then China was the only commercial producer in 2020! The interest in breaking China's supremacy is correspondingly high in view of the expected and already started boom in electric mobility.
Numerous companies worldwide are working on this, some of which are strongly supported directly and/or indirectly by the state. These include the Australian EcoGraf (WKN A2PW0M), which not only wants to build a battery graphite production plant in Western Australia - and already has the necessary capital for it - but has also developed a process also called EcoGraf, which also does not use the extremely harmful hydrogen fluoric acid used in China. Extensive information about EcoGraf can be found in the company profile on goldinvest.de.