The electric vehicle revolution has a supply chain problem the auto industry’s PR departments prefer you not think about carefully. The batteries that make EVs possible require lithium, cobalt, nickel, and manganese in quantities that dwarf current Western production capacity — and the processing of those materials is overwhelmingly controlled by China.
Lithium is mined in Australia, Chile, and Argentina. But the processing — converting spodumene concentrate into battery-grade lithium hydroxide — is dominated by Chinese refiners. Cobalt comes primarily from the DRC, where Chinese companies have secured the majority of mining rights and process most of the output. High-grade battery nickel processing is again concentrated in Asia, with Chinese firms controlling significant capacity in Indonesia.
The pattern Craig Tindale identifies across critical minerals plays out identically in the battery supply chain. The mine is visible. The midstream processing facility is invisible to most investors and almost entirely foreign-controlled. Western automakers have announced ambitious EV targets, built gleaming gigafactories, and signed celebrity endorsement deals — and the battery cells trace their material inputs through a processing chain running through Beijing.
The domestic battery supply chain investments in Nevada, Georgia, and Ontario are real and necessary. But they are years behind schedule, over budget, and dependent on material inputs that must be imported in processed form while domestic processing capacity is built.
For investors, the EV battery story has two chapters. Chapter one — which we are living through now — is Chinese processing dominance. Chapter two is genuine diversification, arriving in the better part of a decade. Knowing which chapter you’re in matters enormously for how you value companies in this space.
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