China Stakes Its Claim in Latin American Energy:

Given the current growth in demand for Li-ion batteries, almost all the raw materials used in battery manufacturing extracted by Chinese companies overseas are sent home for domestic consumption. Finished products, like Chinese electric vehicles, have been shipped to Latin America to demonstrate their performance and green footprint. This is a key part of the country’s efforts to promote their products overseas and develop new markets. Chinese electric buses have been sent to Argentina, Chile, Colombia and Peru. The Chinese electric bus manufacturing company BYD purchased a former Ford car assembly plant in Brazil. 15 Setting up a future manufacturing plant in Brazil makes sense, given the size of the Brazilian market and the government’s growing support for electric vehicles. It also could serve as a base for penetrating other regional markets. BYD already has three other plants operating in Brazil. Chinese companies recently have invested billions of dollars in Latin American lithium mining ventures, principally in Argentina, Brazil, Chile and Bolivia. Ganfeng Lithium, China’s largest lithium compounds producer and a supplier to Tesla, set up a joint venture to mine lithium in the Mexican state of Sonora in 2019. 16 Late last year, Ganfeng exercised an option to increase its share of the Bacanora Lithium project from 22.5% to 50%.

Electric buses from China’s No. 1 electric automobile manufacturer BYD are making test runs in Bogota in an effort to help the capital city of Colombia alleviate air pollution. Photo: New China TV

And in early December 2020, Ganfeng announced it would build a lithium-ion battery recycling plant in Mexico. The plan is to recycle batteries from Tesla cars in the U.S., as well as batteries from Chinese-made electric buses used in South America. 17

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