Critical Minerals: The New Battleground for Economic Supremacy

As the energy transition continues, exploiting critical mineral reserves and securing their supply chains is crucial.

For this graph, Visual Capitalist collaborated with Appian Capital Advisory to provide visual context to the leading countries for mineral reserves, production and processing that are vital to energy transition.

The analysis uses data from the USGS and the IEA for four minerals: lithium, cobalt, natural graphite, and rare earths.

Which countries hold the most critical mineral reserves?

South America dominates lithium reserves, with nearly half of all known reserves located in Chile (34%) and Argentina (13%). Australia, with 22% of global lithium reserves, it is in third place.

The Democratic Republic of Congo is home to the largest share of cobalt reserves, at 57%. Australia, at 16%it also possesses a considerable supply of metal.

Natural reserves of graphite are relatively spread geographically. China (28%) and Brazil (26%) hold comparable amounts. Mozambique (9%) complete the first three lists.

Rare earth minerals are mainly located in Asia, with China (38%) and Vietnam (19%) holding the largest reserves. Brazil has 18% of known world reserves.

Production and processing of critical minerals

Overwhelmingly, China it is the main hub for processing critical minerals in general. The country is responsible for processing 65% of lithium mined worldwide, 74% of cobalt, 100% of natural graphite and 90% of rare earths.

Similarly, mine production is also quite concentrated. This poses a potential risk to supply chain stability. For each mineral, more than half of the production takes place in a single country.

For lithium, the largest producing country is Australia (51%) and for cobalt it is the Democratic Republic of the Congo (73%). Meanwhile, China produces the largest share of both natural graphite (72%) and rare earths (70%).

Securing the future supply of critical minerals

Expanding the global supply chain for minerals that are vital to the clean energy transition will require investment in new mining projects, particularly in countries with large reserves but low rates of production and processing.

By Zerohedge.com

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