As the future starts to suggest, our roads could be full of electric cars within a few years, and this means that Lithium becomes a sought after material for the newer modeled greener vehicle of the future. Amongst those companies who are scrambling for Lithium it includes Japan's largest automotive and electronic giants.
Major brands such as Panasonic and Toyota are likely to add a lithium extraction operation and/or mining facilities to their new business portfolio of services in the future as the technology that is currently used to power our iPods and laptops is upgraded for vehicles such as the Mitsubishi Miev and Chevrolet Volt including many other electric cars that are firmly set on manufacturers' design boards.
Only recently, the lithium ion battery has emerged as what could be a critical ‘stop gap' for green technology during the period that will be required for the motor industry to wean itself off the conventional internal combustion engine. Although major advancements have already been made within the production of more viable fuel cell vehicles, there are still infrastructure issues with them (not least the complete lack of hydrogen fuelling stations around the country!) so it could still be another 20 years before these types of vehicles may enter the consumer market.
A short term alternative to this is the car that can be plugged in and charged up overnight so it has become a major focus for car manufacturers as an immediate alternative.
The Japanese car industry has started to suffer a sudden ‘crisis of confidence' regarding their current pipeline of raw materials. Japan, as a country relies almost entirely on its imports to feed its manufacturing factories so to overcome these issues some Japanese companies are already now discussing the construction of "upstream supply" through the form of mining investments.
Panasonic is now in a position where it looks to stand as the world's main and largest producer of lithium batteries when it completes its purchase of the company Sanyo. A Panasonic spokesman claimed that whilst the brand had no definite plans to purchase an interest in the lithium production facility it was certainly being considered as an option.
Apart from Japans immediate pursuit of lithium, most of their major trading companies have started a land grab for a few other types of mines including; platinum, bauxite and nickel.
After already being stung by the soaring prices earlier in 2008, most motor companies have started to look at the securing of their own company's supplies of raw materials for steel production. Toyota Trading for example has just bought part of a coal mine and openly admitted that other mine investments which included lithium, were all looking to be a good possibility in the future.