As the transport sector accounts for about one-fifth of global emissions, the dawning of the electric vehicle age will have a meaningful impact in the push to avoid the worst and most immediate impacts of climate change. However, electric battery raw materials such as cobalt, copper and lithium must be mined from the ground and often transported long distances to be processed into higher-grade product, raising concerns about the sector’s wider impact on the environment.
“Mining process currently accounts for roughly half of the carbon footprint of a battery cell,” Tesla chairwoman Robyn Denholm told an Australian mining conference in June. “And the best way to reduce the carbon footprint of minerals is to stop shipping them across 9000 kilometres of ocean before refining them.”
Orocobre and Galaxy Resources, two of Australia’s top lithium miners, last week completed a $4 billion merger and are on track to become the world’s fifth most-valuable producer of the sought-after electric battery raw material.
The combined company – to be named Allkem, subject to shareholder approval – will retain its primary listing on the ASX and have operations spanning brine and hard-rock lithium mining and processing around the world.
