It is one of the most important raw materials in a world without fossil fuels: lithium. In Germany, the turnaround in mobility depends on him. Anyone who wants to get away from crude oil mines or buys the “white gold”. The calculation is that simple. But it doesn’t work anymore. The existing lithium is not enough.
In order to achieve its climate goals, Germany is relying on the mobility turnaround, among other things. By 2030, around 15 million electric cars are to be whirring through Germany – buses, cars, trains. On the one hand, crude oil, which is required to produce diesel fuel, can be dispensed with, and on the other hand, the greenhouse gas emissions emitted in the transport sector can be reduced. That’s the idea.
But nothing will come of it. The problem: You need lithium to build electric car batteries. And the latest calculations by the Federal Institute for Geosciences and Natural Resources (BGR) show that there is not enough “white gold” to achieve the ambitious goals in German traffic conversion, reports the “Handelsblatt”. Because the whole world is fighting for the raw material.
“Even if all projects currently planned and under construction are implemented on schedule and we assume medium growth in demand, we will not have enough lithium to cover global demand in 2030,” says study author Michael Schmidt to the “Handelsblatt”.
The BGR experts calculate that in the next eight years, global demand for lithium will increase to at least 316,000 or more than 550,000 tons per year, depending on the scenario. In the worst case, this means for the year 2030 that 300,000 tons of lithium per year are missing to build electric cars, for example. If you add the end of combustion engines planned by the EU Parliament by 2035, demand could increase even faster.
But how exactly does the lithium situation look like worldwide? Chile has the largest reserves of the coveted raw material. The South American country has 9 million tons of lithium (2021) and could thus meet large parts of global demand. The second and third largest deposits are in Australia (5.7 million tons) and Argentina (2.7 million tons). China, the USA, Zimbabwe, Brazil and Portugal together have a lithium reserve of around 2.6 million tons.
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But there are also lithium deposits in Germany. Under the Rhine and in the Eastern Ore Mountains lies Germany’s “white gold”. Around 1000 meters under the Black Forest soil, experts suspect the largest lithium treasure in Europe. And in the Eastern Ore Mountains near the Czech border, a deposit with 125,000 tons of lithium is said to have been discovered. Both deposits would be enough for around 420 million electric cars – and bring the plans of the federal government and the German car manufacturers back into balance for the time being.
However, global lithium production is stagnating. Reasons for this are, for example, efforts to nationalize lithium mining, such as in Chile. In 2016, just under 45,000 tons were produced. A year later, the lithium industry experienced a sharp increase and was able to almost double the production volume. In 2018, the previous record was reached: around 95,000 tons. Since then, however, lithium production has been declining again.
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Around 82,000 tons of lithium were mined in 2020. In 2021 Australia, for example, produced 55,000 tons in its lithium mines. This puts the fifth continent ahead of Chile (26,000 tons), China (14,000 tons) and Argentina, Brazil, Zimbabwe and Portugal, which together total around 9,800 tons.
The German mobility transition is therefore on shaky ground. The targeted 15 million electric cars by 2030 seem unrealistic given the raw material situation. Especially since in 2022, according to the Federal Motor Transport Authority, there will only be around 610,000 vehicles in Germany with purely electric drives. In 2012 there were only about 4500 electric cars in Germany.
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In the ten years, around 605,500 electric cars were added. In just eight years, it should now be more than 14 million. 14 million cars that need a lithium-ion battery. And a normal electric car battery with 90 kilowatt hours requires around 14 kilograms of lithium. For 14 million electric cars, around 196,000 tons of lithium would be necessary. That makes 24,500 tons per year.
