Bolivia signed deals with Russian and Chinese companies to invest the lithium reserves in the country
With the agreements signed with Russian and Chinese companies for the siting of two pilot plants with EDL, Bolivia is advancing “in a technological and serious manner” to become a lithium producer on a global scale, the Vice Minister of Alternative Energies highlighted this Thursday, Alvaro Arnez.
“With these agreement signatures, what is being done is to advance in a technological and serious manner to later become world-class producers,” he stated, in contact with Bolivian TV.
So far, Yacimientos de Litio Bolivianos (YLB) signed two agreements, one with the Russian company Uranium One group (part of the management circuit of the TENEX Group of Rosatom State Corporation), and another with the Chinese CBC Consortium for the construction of two pilot plants for Direct Lithium Extraction (EDL) with capacities of 14,000 tons, and 2,500 tons of lithium carbonate, in the Uyuni salt flat, Potosí.
According to the Bolivian authority, with the projects being undertaken by the national government, the lithium sector will be one of the pillars that will support national policy in terms of economic reactivation, health, and education.
Currently, Bolivia has around 28 salt flats with a lot of potential and studies are needed on the resources they have and from there point to EDL technology, leverage it at an industrial level and with that have this economic pillar.
“YLB is the Bolivian state company, which defines how, when and where to carry out the projects based on what is an EDL technology and subsequently with this technology to be able to see industrialization milestones such as the battery,” Alvaro Arnez added.
At the request of many foreign companies, President Luis Arce instructed the Ministry of Hydrocarbons and Energy the day before to launch this month the second international call to industrialize lithium, under the Bolivian business model.
“It’s worth saying that in this month of January there will also be a call for other smaller salt flats, so that they can present a technological proposal based on EDL in these smaller salt flats, obviously although there is a lot of strength,” Alvaro Arnez added.
According to YLB, with 23 million tons of lithium quantified and in the international certification process, Bolivia remains in first place on the list of countries in the world that also has this metal.
With this important mineralogical deposit, Bolivia faces the industrialization of lithium through pilot and industrial plants through the state-owned YLB and agreements with foreign companies under a sovereign business model.
