The Advent of the Lithium Era in Bolivia

 

EV WORLD

1998-2018

 

·         QUICK GUIDE

·         REVIEWS

·         RESOURCES

·         ARCHIVES

·          

Lithium Economics

The Advent of the Lithium Era in Bolivia

Apr 05, 2008

Juan Carlos Zuleta Calderón *

Last Tuesday, Evo Morales, President of Bolivia, announced the construction of a small pilot plant to produce lithium carbonate at the delta of Rio Grande in Uyuni, where it is believed are laying the richest brines of lithium of the world, thereby inaugurating the lithium era in Bolivia. As is well known, with its 5,4 million tons of lithium (metal equivalent), Bolivia holds around 50% of world reserves of the lightest and most electro-negative metal of the planet.

The small pilot plant will cost 5.7 million US dollars. As President Morales indicated, this is only the first phase of a larger project aimed also at industrializing all the non-metal resources (e.g. boron, potassium, magnesium, and sodium) of the Uyuni Salt Lake in the Department of Potosi, which has been estimated to cost 150 million US dollars, an amount that at present the Bolivian State is willing to invest since its return is granted and this will ensure that Potosi becomes once again the center of the country´s economy.

This announcement leaves aside, at least for the time being, any other supposition that the political situation of the country could jeopardize the provision of lithium to the world in times of an escalating demand for the resource resulting to a great extent from an apparently irreversible transition of the global automobile industry to electric propulsion.

* Economist, jczuleta @gmail.com

Times Article Viewed: 3938

Note.- This is a republication of a blog originally published on EVWorld.com on April 05, 2008.