China unearths million-tonne lithium deposit, heating up global resource race as Thailand also boasts big find

China says it has discovered a massive deposit of lithium, a key material in the country’s flourishing new-energy sector that has emerged as a pillar of economic growth.

And the revelation comes at a time when China has doubled down on efforts to explore domestic resources as it aims to amp up energy and resource security against the backdrop of an intensified global race for core resources that will help power growth.

The Ministry of Natural Resources said the huge reserve – about 1 million tonnes of the silvery-white alkali metal that is often called “the new oil” or “white gold” – was found in Yajiang county, Sichuan province, the Xinhua Insight news outlet reported on Thursday.

That discovery will increase China’s supply of a resource needed for lithium batteries, which are critical to many mass-market electric vehicles sold around the world.

China already had about 7 per cent of the world’s identified lithium resources, ranking sixth in the world after Bolivia, Argentina, the US, Chile and Australia, according to the US Geological Survey.

But it refines around half of the world’s lithium and relies heavily on the overseas market for the material.

Thailand, which is making strides toward becoming a major EV production base in Asia, also said recently that it had discovered two potential types of lithium sources, one of which has estimated reserves of about 14.8 million tonnes. This is equivalent to 64 per cent of the discovered lithium resources in Bolivia, the world’s largest holder of them, according to Thai media reports last week.

“China has been trying to market itself as the renewable battery centre for the world,” said James Chin, a professor of Asian studies at the University of Tasmania. The new source of lithium,