Lithium prices soar, Tesla will build the first lithium refinery in North America
Thank you, Mr. Air, a netizen of CTOnews.com, for your clue delivery! CTOnews.com Sept. 10, Tesla recently submitted documents to Texas, the company said it will build a battery-grade lithium hydroxide refining facility. Tesla declared that it would be "the first of its kind in North America", and Tesla applied for tax relief from the office of the Texas Auditor General.
Tesla also said that if completed, the facility will process ore raw materials into materials that can be used for battery production, and the produced lithium hydroxide will be transported by truck and railway to Tesla's battery manufacturing bases to support the production of its large electric vehicle battery plant.
In addition, Tesla said the facility will use innovative processes, which will consume fewer dangerous chemicals than traditional processes and produce reusable by-products.
Construction of the project will begin as early as the fourth quarter of 2022, and commercial production will not be possible until the fourth quarter of 2024, according to people familiar with the matter.
On July 14 this year, Musk tweeted that lithium batteries are the new oil to affirm the value of lithium in the modern economy. In addition, during the Tesla earnings conference call in July, he also urged entrepreneurs to enter the lithium refining business, saying that the competition for lithium should not be lost, which is the same business as printing money. Earlier, Musk wrote on Twitter in April: "the price of lithium has reached crazy levels! unless we improve costs, Tesla may actually have to directly enter the field of lithium mining and refining on a large scale. Lithium itself is not in shortage, because it is almost everywhere on earth, but the speed of extraction / extraction is very slow."
It is worth noting that recently, Tesla supplier, the well-known US lithium mining company Piedmont Lithium issued a warning that the United States "does not have enough" lithium to achieve the goal of electric vehicles.
CTOnews.com learned that China is currently the leader in lithium refining, with more than half of the world's production capacity.
