Mining Magazine > Panorama > South Korea to extract lithium from seawater

As demand climbs for the rare metal, a South Korean government-funded research institute has announced it plans to extract lithium from seawater. Japan and South Korea are leading countries in the development of techniques for lithium recovery.

"We will finish building a research facility and offshore plant in the first half of this year and could start extracting lithium from next year," said Choi Byung-gwan, spokesman at the Korea Institute of Geoscience and Mineral Resources (KIGAM).

Asia's fourth-largest economy aims to double its combined self-sufficiency rate for new strategic materials such as rare earth and lithium to 10% in 2011 from 5.5% in 2010.

KIGAM and steelmaker POSCO signed a deal to establish an offshore plant and production line to extract 30t of lithium annually by 2014 and mass produce by as early as 2015.

Lithium is a key raw material in the manufacture of batteries for laptops and other electronic devices such as mobile phones, though concentrations in seawater are quite dilute at around 0.1-0.2 ppm.

In 2008, South Korea imported around 11,000t of lithium batteries and other related products worth about £370 million to meet local demand, according to the ministry.