La labor boliviana es complementada con investigaciones que realizan en Japón las empresas Mitsubishi y Sumitomo, que manifestaron su interés en participar en el proyecto para explotar el litio del Salar.
‘Esta parte (de investigación) es la más importante, más que la infraestructura, porque es la validación del proceso tecnológico que luego vamos a aplicar en la planta piloto y tiene un avance del 50 por ciento’, sostuvo Beltrán.
El Estado boliviano construye en Uyuni una pequeña planta piloto para producir carbonato de litio en pequeñas cantidades, con el propósito de adquirir experiencia en la industria para luego ingresar a una fase de industrialización del metal.
Beltrán explicó que el avance de la construcción de ese proyecto es del 45 por ciento, por lo que el Gobierno confía en que la planta comenzará a funcionar el próximo año.
Además de las dos compañías japonesas, industrias como la francesa Bolloré y la surcoreana LG manifestaron su interés por el litio boliviano.
No obstante, el Ejecutivo decidió emprender ‘en solitario’ la primera fase del proyecto, pues las propuestas de las firmas interesadas planteaban solo la explotación del litio y no su industrialización, señaló el funcionario.
El Gobierno espera asociarse con alguna empresa para llegar a la producción de baterías para los vehículos eléctricos.
El litio boliviano se halla en el Salar de Uyuni, que tiene una superficie de 10.000 kilómetros cuadrados, una profundidad de hasta 220 metros y está ubicado en la región andina de Potosí.
Evo le dirá a Sarkosy que Bolloré no se quedará con el litio
El gobierno reveló que la empresa francesa Bolloré, interesada en el litio del salar de Uyuni, pretende concretar en septiembre un acuerdo con el Estado boliviano para la explotación de este recurso. Coincidente con este hecho llega al país, ese mismo mes, el presidente de Francia, Nicolás Sarkosy, quien se benefició el 2007, según el diario Le Monde Diplomatique, con unas lujosas vacaciones regaladas por Vincent Bolloré, dueño de la compañía que quiere adjudicarse la explotación del litio boliviano.
El ministro de Minería y Metalurgia, Carlos Echazú, confirmó la visita del mandatario francés a Bolivia para septiembre próximo, aunque no precisó la agenda de Sarkosy; sin embargo, extraoficialmente se sabe que una de las razones de su visita será persuadir a su homólogo Evo Morales y a su gobierno de conceder a Bolloré la explotación del codiciado litio.
La autoridad indicó que la intención de la empresa francesa, que junto a la Mitsubishi y Sumitomo, ambas japonesas, son las únicas que presentar propuestas concretas y tuvieron reuniones con los representantes del gobierno boliviano, quiere cerrar en septiembre un acuerdo para adjudicarse la explotación del litio.
“Ellos (Bolloré) quieren hacer un acuerdo para septiembre, el cual tiene que tener las bases de nuestra política, si no es así lo hallo difícil”, aseveró el Ministro de Minería a tiempo de indicar que la propuesta del Estado boliviano no variará, es decir, que se hará cargo solo de todo el proceso hasta la fase de producción del carbonato de litio, de ahí se abrirá a la posibilidad de cristalizar una sociedad con las transnacionales pero sólo para la industrialización, en ningún caso la extracción de la materia prima únicamente.
Echazú señaló que hay una falta de calidad y especifidad en el planteamiento de industrialización del litio de parte de las tres empresas proponentes, que de no superar esas observaciones el Estado boliviano se verá obligado a seguir solo en las demás fases, vale decir, la producción de hidróxido y cloruro, para lo cual se buscará créditos.
“Lo importante es que el ofrecimiento de la industrialización del litio se haga de una manera muy clara, las propuestas que hemos recibido no son tales, se hace mucha incidencia en la exploración y la valoración de todo el depósito y en la primera etapa la planta piloto y; después, mucho más allá la planta industrial de carbonato. Las otras fases están bastante perdidas en el escenario general y eso no nos gusta porque nosotros hemos delineado ya una política”, enfatizó.
¿A quien beneficiará el litio boliviano?
El valor de sus reservas es mil veces mayor al de la empresa Bolloré de Francia.
El presidente Evo Morales que, a instancias de su colega francés Nicolás Sarkozy, se reunió el mes de febrero con el empresario galo Vincent Bolloré, mantiene en suspenso su decisión de conceder a éste los derechos de explotación del litio potosino -valorados en 4000 millones de millones de dólares- para la fabricación de baterías recargables de litio utilizadas en notebooks, automóviles híbridos y teléfonos celulares.
A Bolloré se le atribuye un patrimonio de 4 mil 800 millones de dólares. Está considerado como poseedor de la 16ava fortuna de Francia, según la clasificación del semanario especializado Challenge. La revista Forbes, afamada por sus estimaciones de fortunas mundiales, le acredita sólo 1.200 millones y lo ubica en el puesto 843 del ranking mundial de millonarios.
Bolloré -en alianza con la italiana Pininfarina- ha desarrollado una batería de litio, gracias a la cual un automóvil puede desplazarse hasta a 125 kilómetros por hora, con una sola recarga. De lo que se trata ahora es de apropiarse de las 5.500 millones de toneladas de litio metálico boliviano para enfrentar tranquilos la producción en gran escala de vehículos eléctricos.
¿Cuánto vale esa cantidad de reservas certificadas de litio? Según estimaciones de un experto en el sector, "esa reserva, al precio actual, como litio metálico, vale 4.000.000.000.000 de dólares, es decir cuatro millones de millones de dólares, o cuatro billones de dólares en castellano, cuatro trillones de dólares en inglés", y añade que, "si en lugar de vender litio metálico vendiésemos baterías de litio, con el valor agregado obviamente la ganancia se multiplica". Otro experto (Zuleta) ha estimado el valor actual de esas reservs en más de 500 mil millones de dólares.
En resumen, el valor de una parte de las reservas de litio metálico boliviano vale al menos mil veces más que la fortuna acumulada por la familia Bolloré desde el siglo antepasado. Los analistas y expertos en el tema han analizado la situación, calidad y cantidad de otros reservorios en el mundo y coinciden que la producción masiva de vehículos eléctricos necesariamente debe estar ligada a la explotación de las reservas bolivianas. Estas son, en consecuencia, estratégicas para el mundo entero y no sólo para los bolivianos. Ratificando su valor, precisamente el artículo 369-II de la nueva CPE califica de estratégicos "los recursos naturales no metálicos existentes en los salares, salmueras, evaporíticos, azufres y otros" .
El instinto del presidente Evo Morales le ha llevado a declarar que la explotación del litio se hará sin socios. Ha avanzado en la instalación de una planta piloto cuyo funcionamiento se prevé para fines de este año. Pero son pasos pequeños. ¿Como avanzar hacia el objetivo final, que es el de obtener litio metálico, fabricar baterías y, finalmente, participar en la fabricación de los vehículos mismos, como adelantaron las autoridades bolivianas?
La respuesta pasa por utilizar los mismos mecanismos de financiamiento que emplean Mitsubishi, General Motors, Bolloré y otras empresas que están en carrera, pero dando aplicación práctica al artículo 357 también de la nueva CPE, que reserva el derecho exclusivo del Estado boliviano de "anotar y registrar" el valor de estas reservas.
Para ello, es indispensable organizar una empresa corporativa estatal, cuyo principal activo será parte de las reservas de litio metálico. Este valor deberá "anotarse y registrarse" en sus Estados Financieros. Acto seguido, esta empresa deberá habilitarse (precisamente inscribiendo sus balances contables en las Bolsas de Valores) para cotizar títulos de deuda en el mercado de dinero nacional e internacional y así obtener el financiamiento necesario destinado no sólo a desarrollar sus propios proyectos industriales, sino, también, con semejante respaldo en activos, incluso comprarse empresas que ya han desarrollado la tecnología o asociarse con ellas en condiciones ventajosas.
Los 4.800 millones de dólares, que suman la presunta fortuna de Bolloré (bancos, medios de comunicación, yates, aviones y hasta vehículos propulsados eléctricamente), son una migaja al lado de un activo de cuatro millones de millones de dólares de la que podría llamarse Corporación Litio Bolivia S.A., con sede en Uyuni y una sucursal en la Villa Montmorency, en París, refugio secreto de 1,5 kilómetros cuadrados que cobija a no más de 30 millonarios franceses, donde Vincent Bolloré aún reside.
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The Politics of Lithium Reserves
Much of the next generation of automobile will be (at least initially) based on battery chemistry that currently is similar to that which powers laptops, mobile phones, and other consumer electronics – lithium ion (Li-ion). This raises the question, where does all that lithium come from?
At the moment, China provides a lot of the batteries that go into consumer electronics, and Tibet is known to have a large source of lithium. Additionally, estimates are that Bolivia has the largest reserves of lithium in the world with 36% of the global pie. Currently, the U.S. holds about 3% of world reserves.
The good news is that most experts have come to the conclusion that there is not an impending lithium shortage as many suspected there would be. There have been arguments put forth showing that lithium will actually run short within the decade. However, many have refuted this saying that even with the development of electric vehicles, lithium will be around for much longer than a decade.
The bad news is that the politics of lithium are quickly likely to become a hot issue for battery builders.
Regardless of whether they believe lithium is running out sooner or later, most experts have come to agree that lithium’s greatest abundance is in Bolivia, Chile, and Tibet. Bolivia’s president, Evo Morales, is already trying to avoid foreign investment, and talks consistently about the importance of Bolivia having state control over its natural resources. Automakers approaching Bolivia have not received a warm welcome either. The challenges China faces in Tibet (politically speaking) are already well publicized.
As the growth of lithium usage in both auto and larger stationary batteries grows, the U.S., South Korea, Japan, and China are all going to be facing some complicated politics with lithium that may have a surprisingly familiar ring to it. Estimates show that 75% of lithium is likely to come from South America. Despite a history of tensions between Chile (about 20% of world reserves) and Bolivia, the politics between them have been growing more friendly since 2005. A future governing body for South American lithium trying to set world pricing (similar to OPEC) would not be too much of a stretch of the imagination.
Once the consumer market has accepted plug-in hybrids and electric vehicles, the challenge facing battery and automakers, it seems, may be to see how quickly they can move to a new chemistry less reliant on lithium.
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The Li of Bolivia’s land
Bolivia’s vast lithium riches could bring the country out of poverty – but success depends on working with foreign firms.
Bolivia idles at a crossroads. The country has an unprecedented opportunity to use its newfound lithium deposits to bring itself out of poverty and in part save the planet from climate change. The trouble is, Bolivia can’t fully do so without the help of foreign firms.
Lithium is a mineral that currently serves as the battery for BlackBerrys and other electronics. The big hope for lithium is in the automobile industry – it is so light that electric cars running on lithium batteries can store more energy, emit less pollution, and drive longer distances.
General Motors’ Volt, the new car GM hopes can rescue it from near bankruptcy, will deploy a lithium-ion battery with a petrol engine. Future models of Toyota’s hybrid Prius intend to use lithium batteries as well.
This is great news for Bolivia. According to the United States Geological Survey, 5.4 million tons of lithium could potentially be extracted in Bolivia’s Salar de Uyuni region.
Bolivia may lack the technological capacity to exploit this resource to its full long-term potential in an environmentally sound manner. Yet because the World Bank and US-based Bechtel corporation so horridly botched water privatisation in Bolivia, and the IMF recommended that Bolivia lift taxes from corporations and tax the poor, engaging with foreigners of any kind can be seen as complete blasphemy.
Indeed on 14 June the head of Bolivia’s mining agency told the Latin American Herald Tribune that the government may want to mine and manage lithium without foreign help. This is a marked change from the famous UN speech where President Morales said he would partner with foreign firms but that "we want partners, not bosses".
A bold negotiating stance would be for Bolivia to leverage foreign technological capabilities for mining lithium and for moving up the value chain.
What if Bolivia demanded that foreign firms not only formed joint ventures for mining lithium, but foreign firms would also be required to form ventures: to bring battery makers and assembly plants and an automobile manufacturing plant or two; to establish research and development centres in Bolivia; to help build Bolivian infrastructure for exporting lithium, batteries, and cars; and to help train Bolivians to be engineers? What’s more, such a deal would also require fair wages, labour rights, and environmental protection.
Now that’s a partnership.
Similar deals were commonplace in East Asia during the second half of the 20th century. Nations such as Taiwan leveraged their assets to attract foreign firms and learn from them. In exchange for allowing foreign firms to come to these countries, foreign companies were required to form joint ventures with domestic firms, to locate research and development facilities that employed local engineers, source inputs from domestic firms, pay taxes, train the workforce, and more.
Though tensions with Brazil over energy have been acute, Bolivia need look no further than the state-owned Petrobras as a Latin American success story in terms of leveraging foreign technology for local benefit. Petrobras serves as the lead co-ordinator of a web of foreign firms that helped Brazil acquire ultra-deep water drilling for oil. Brazil complements such efforts with policies to enable domestic producers and upstream technologies. Now Brazil is not only poised to be one of the world’s biggest oil exporters but it has collaterally developed a biofuel industry and a flex-fuel engine that can take oil or biofuels – all through carefully targeted government policy.
Mexico, on the other hand, provides an example of how to drive a great opportunity into the ground. It sat on huge oil deposits but hijacked its state-owned oil company Pemex for close to 100% of its profits to supply the government with close to 40% of its revenue. Unlike Brazil, Mexico doesn’t allow the company to deploy Petrobras-like policies that learn from foreign firms. Now, Mexico has only nine years of proven oil reserves left and at this point if they wanted to be pro-active they would be shot down by Nafta.
Given that the country has so much lithium, and that the world is looking for every opportunity to develop in a climate friendly manner, Bolivia has more leverage than most nations before it. Japan, with its hybrid and electric car technology, might make an interesting partner.
If Bolivia chooses an East Asian or Brazilian path and partners with foreign firms it can accelerate sustainable economic development. Slamming the breaks on carefully thought out foreign partnerships may jam Bolivia’s development prospects and steer the planet away from a cooler road.
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There is enough lithium to go round
At least until the end of the century according to new research. The lithium scare most of the news seems to delight in might not be all that accurate, as suspected.
The gist is that the heated debate as to whether or not there was enough lithium to feed the auto industry and static storage has been, not so cleverly manipulated by vested interested. More research points to show there is enough. However, the next step is to start mass mining and manufacturing batteries with it quickly.
The EV lithium Supply Debate. The question of lithium supply has been used by some as a scare tactic which seems to all have started from a paper by William Tahil of Meridian International Research, MIR according to Plug In America’s newsletter. This paper was refuted by San Diego geologist Keith Evans, who argues against it.
Plug In America Research. Plug in America conducted an independent data analysis, along with a review of information presented by Evans and Tahil and found that there is enough Lithium for the next 75 years, even with a worse case scenario use. The worse case scenario included no recycling, which has greatly improved with lithium batteries over the last few years. If this data is accurate, it should leave enough time to create an next generation to the lithium chemistry. The only problem was the ability to mine it fast enough by 2020. If roughly 52% of the known deposits are in South America, 48% are elsewhere, North America being 24%. This last information nips in the bud the other point that would have us exchange the dependency from certain oil producing countries to those of South America that are not too Western country friendly.
At this stage, it does not seem there is a lithium crisis as has been reported by the news media. Contrary to gas engine, electric vehicles’, EV motors can operate independently of battery chemistry. An EV can use lead-acid batteries or any other chemistry, as long as it gives off electricity. The only thing we need to work on is mass mining lithium in an environmentally friendly way.
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Lithium-ion Batteries for the Hybrids?
The recent Hitachi´s announcement that beginning next year and by 2015 it will increase its Li-ion battery production by 70 fold for hybrids is quite significant for the Li-ion battery market. Until now, most analysts thought that there was no real potential for use of Li-ion batteries in Hybrid Electric Vehicles (HEVs). They erroneously believed that Nickel-Metal Hydride (NiMH) batteries were the best choice for today´s HEVs, whereas Li-ion batteries were reserved for tomorrow´s Plug-in Hybrid Electric Vehicles (PHEV), Range Extended Electric Vehicles (REEVs) and Battery Electric Vehicles (BEVs).
This argument, of course, never made sense. It rested on the unreasonable two-fold assumption that Li-ion batteries are not ready for prime-time and that plug-ins (and, for that matter, REEVs and BEVs) are a scam. For one thing, Hitachi´s notice tears apart the first half of the above contention. For another, Toyota´s latest decision to begin mass-producing PHEVs by 2012 and Nissan´s conviction that ”now´s time to go electric” completely demolish the second half of it. Indeed one should not be surprised since PHEVs can be really thought of as an extension of HEVs. So if Li-ion batteries are to be used quite soon in plug-ins and both range-extended and battery EVs, then why not utilize them now for conventional hybrids as well? The new General Motors appears to have understood this. It just asked Hitachi to produce Li-ion batteries for its 100,000 hybrids that plans to sell from next year.
Taken together, this only means that both NiMH and Lead Acid (LA) battery makers have many reasons to worry nowadays. And some of them, perhaps aided by their government, appear to have started to take some actions. In China, for example, they may be behind their government´s decision to impose restrictions to lithium-ion battery vehicles. At first sight, these constraints may seem somewhat astonishing, considering that China holds one of the most advanced lithium-ion battery car makers of the world, namely Build your Dreams (BYD). However, they may be indeed part of a rather rational approach to help a number of other car producers that for the last five years or so have been heavily investing in NiMH and LA battery technologies for their different cheap plug-ins and electric vehicles, already running on Chinese roads and/or getting ready for export to other countries.
While I doubt anything like it could happen in Japan or in the U.S., one should be aware that all these recent events will begin to change dramatically the battery car market as a whole. In this connection, Hitachi´s approach is likely to be followed by other battery makers in Japan and elsewhere. But this may be a short-lived approach. We will not have to wait too long until the major car makers of the world realize that mass-producing REEVs and BEVs (rather than HEVs and PHEVs) is the correct way forward. The new GM and Nissan seem to be quite clear about it, while Toyota also appears to be moving (albeit cautiously) in the right direction.
