Chinese Prime Minister Li focuses on clean energy during his visit to Australia
Prime Minister Li Qiang visited a Chinese-controlled lithium refinery in Perth on Tuesday, a sign of his country’s huge appetite for Australia’s “critical minerals” needed for clean energy technologies.
Li concluded his four-day visit to Australia with a tour of resource-rich Western Australia’s low-carbon energy industry.
His first stop was Tianqi Lithium Energy Australia, a 51 percent Chinese-owned venture consisting of a hard rock lithium ore mine and a lithium refinery.
Along with at least a dozen other officials, China’s second most powerful man wore a white helmet during a rainy visit to the facility south of Perth.
The Chinese premier will also tour a private research facility for clean energy-produced ‘green hydrogen’ – touted as the fuel of the future for powering heavy goods such as trucks and blast furnaces.
Australia mines 52 percent of the world’s lithium. The vast majority of it is exported as ore to China for eventual refining and use in batteries, particularly in China’s world-dominant electric car industry.
But despite being a major Australian customer, China’s involvement in the country’s crucial mineral industry is sensitive due to its dominance of global supply chains.
Australia only recently started refining lithium instead of exporting the ore.
And the government has announced a strategic plan to develop new supply chains with friendly countries for crucial minerals such as lithium, nickel and so-called rare earths.
Earlier this year, the government instructed five China-linked shareholders to sell a combined 10 percent stake in Northern Minerals, a producer of the rare earth metal dysprosium.
Such foreign ownership was contrary to Australia’s “national interests”, Treasurer Jim Chalmers said.
About 99 percent of the world’s dysprosium – used in high-quality magnets – is currently produced in China.
China has invested in crucial minerals in Latin America, Africa and Australia over the past 10 to 20 years, said Marina Zhang, associate professor at the Australia-China Relations Institute at the University of Technology Sydney.
Developing supply chains independent of China is “fine and dandy”, but it is unlikely to be achieved even in the short to medium term, she said.
“We are facing a very time-consuming issue fighting climate change – so that issue should be at the center of the discourse,” Zhang said.
“But unfortunately, Western allies assume that China’s dominance in the supply chains of crucial minerals poses a threat to national security,” she said.
However, China’s story was that it was investing and contributing to sustainability and environmental protection, the analyst said.
