• India will pump in about Rs 200 crore to explore and develop five lithium mines in Argentina.

• An agreement was signed between Khanij Bidesh India Ltd (KABIL), state-owned joint venture formed to scout for minerals overseas, and Catamarca Minera Y Energtica Sociedad Del Estado (CAMYEN), a government-owned mining and energy corporation in the Catamarca province of Argentina to this effect.

• KABIL is also preparing to set up a branch office at Catamarca, Argentina.

• With this agreement, KABIL has received exploration and exclusivity rights for five blocks to evaluate, prospect and explore and subsequent to existence, discovery of lithium mineral, exploitation right for commercial production.

• Argentina is part of the ‘lithium triangle’ along with Chile and Bolivia with more than half of the world’s total lithium resources and having the distinction of having second largest lithium resources, third largest lithium reserves and fourth largest production in the world.

What is the purpose of KABIL?

• Khanij Bidesh India Ltd (KABIL), a joint venture company between National Aluminium Company Limited (NALCO), Hindustan Copper Limited (HCL) and Mineral Exploration Corporation Limited (MECL), was formed in 2019.

• The mandate of this company is to identify, acquire, develop, process and make commercial use of strategic minerals in overseas locations for supply in India. 

• The main objective is to ensure mineral security of the country through supply side assurance of these minerals.

• KABIL is focusing on identifying and sourcing battery minerals like Lithium and Cobalt.

Lithium is called “white gold”

• Often called “white gold”, lithium is a critical mineral, with particular importance for electric vehicles (EVs) and energy storage, and global demand is expected to grow more than 40 times by 2040. 

• Lithium is a soft, silvery-white metal that can be found in many places throughout the world, typically in mineral compounds in hard rock, sediments, and certain water sources. 

• It is the single most important critical mineral for the energy transition.

• Lithium has a range of uses in both chemical and technical applications. Lithium in various forms, such as lithium carbonate, lithium hydroxide and lithium chloride, is used in lubricant greases, pharmaceuticals, catalysts, air treatment and, particularly, in batteries.

• Being the lightest known metal, lithium is also used in alloys to increase strength-to-weight ratios, taking advantage of lithium’s tensile strength and lightweight (low-density) characteristics. Aluminium-lithium alloys, for example, are used in the aerospace and motorsport industries.

• It occurs naturally and abundantly in the Earth and is generally found in three sources — pegmatites or hard rock, sedimentary deposits often referred to as clay, and waters with high concentrations of dissolved salts referred to as brines. 

• Salar brines are close to the surface, in contrast, geothermal brines are high-temperature, high-pressure formations deep underground.

• Lithium-ion (Li-ion) batteries have applications in energy storage system - from hearing aid to container sized batteries to power a cluster of villages, electric vehicles, portable electronic sector, grid storage, telecom and telecommunication towers, medical devices, household and office power backup (UPS), powering robots in the processing industry. 

• Lithium-ion batteries can power any electrical application without the need of physical wires.

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