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China is upping the critical minerals stakes by curbing exports of graphite, a key raw material in electric vehicle batteries.When China announced restrictions on exports of gallium and germanium in July, former Vice Commerce Minister Wei Jianguo was quoted in the China Daily as saying it was “just the start” if the West continued to target China’s high-technology sector.
Those are all used to make the battery cathode. It won’t work, however, without an anode, which is invariably made of graphite.Indeed, graphite is the largest EV battery component by weight, typically accounting for between 50 and 100 kg. The West’s dependency on Chinese supply has seen graphite recently join the likes of cobalt and rare earths on the U.S. Department of Energy’s list of super-critical raw materials.The Department of Defense awarded $37m in July to Graphite One to accelerate a feasibility study on its Graphite Creek project in Alaska, thought to be one of the largest 10 identified deposits in the country.
Previous restrictions on lower-grade graphite exports destined for the steel and lubricants sectors have been rescinded.If gallium and germanium are anything to go by, expect a flurry of export activity in the run-up to the Dec. 1 deadline and then a collapse in activity. This was a tactic successfully used when China cut off exports of rare earths in 2010. A joint complaint by the U.S., the European Union and Japan was upheld in 2014 and China was forced to back down.
The Biden administration has so far been equally dismissive. When the WTO last year upheld China’s complaint about the Section 232 tariffs, Assistant Trade Representative Adam Hodge rejected the finding as “flawed” and said “these WTO panel reports only reinforce the need to fundamentally reform the WTO dispute settlement system.”
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