A Chinese mining company has opened a giant lithium processing plant in Zimbabwe
By FARAI MUTSAKA
Associated Press
HARARE, Zimbabwe (AP) — A Chinese mining company on Wednesday commissioned a $300 million lithium processing plant in Zimbabwe. Zimbabwe has one of the world’s largest reserves of the metal, which has seen a surge in demand globally due to its use in batteries in electric cars. Zimbabwe President Emmerson Mnangagwa and officials from Prospect Lithium Zimbabwe, an arm of the Chinese firm Zhejiang Huayou Cobalt, said the plant has a capacity to process 4,5 million metric tons of hard rock lithium into concentrate per year. The concentrate will be further processed into battery-grade lithium outside Zimbabwe.