POSCO Hits the Jackpot
As lithium prices have more than doubled recently, the value of "Hombre Muerto," a lithium salt lake acquired by POSCO in 2018, has soared to around 35 trillion won, POSCO said on March 3.
The spot price of lithium carbonate in China more than doubled from US$5,000 per ton in July 2020 to US$11,000 per ton in February, POSCO said.
In August 2018, POSCO signed a contract to acquire the Argentine lithium salt lake, which covers 17,500 ha, for US$280 million from Australia's Galaxy Resources.
POSCO confirmed in late 2020 that the lake’s lithium reserves were 13.5 million tons, six times more than 2.2 million tons estimated at the time of the acquisition. The verification of lithium reserves was conducted by Montgomery & Associates of the United States, the industry's top global brine and lithium consulting firm, in accordance with standard international regulations. The amount is enough to produce batteries for about 370 million electric vehicles.
By 2030, POSCO plans to establish its own supply system for lithium, nickel and graphite, which are raw materials for secondary batteries. POSCO Chemical plans to establish a production system with an annual capacity of 400,000 tons of cathode materials and 260,000 tons of anode materials. Through this, POSCO Group is planning to complete a material value chain for electric vehicle batteries.