(TibetanReview.net, Oct03’26) – China has greatly increased the amount of lithium deposit present in an already super-large reserve located in the eastern Tibetan city of Barkham (Chinese: Maerkang), in Amdo Ngaba, which is currently part of Sichuan province. The new discovery is expected to help China reduce its dependence on foreign sources for this vital mineral as it pushes to lead the world in the development, use, and export of modern high-tech products.
China has announced the expansion of the resource base for a major lithium deposit in Sichuan province by about 70%, strengthening the country’s potential long-term supply for the metal – an essential component in the production of batteries for electric vehicles (EVs) and energy storage, reported scmp.com Oct 3, citing state news agency Xinhua Oct 1.
The report said that after recent detection efforts, the Jiada Lithium Mine had registered about 1.05 million tonnes of lithium carbonate equivalent in the deposit, bringing its total resources to 2.53 million tonnes. The increase has reinforces the mine’s status as a major hard-rock lithium deposit.
Dazhong Mining, the project’s developer, has said the additional resources comprised 33.52 million tonnes of ore containing about 423,800 tonnes of lithium oxide, with an average grade of 1.26%.
The addition is stated to represents a 70.5% increase from the previously registered 1.48 million tonnes of lithium carbonate equivalent.
The company has estimated that the deposit’s initial mining area, with an approved extraction scale of 2.6 million tonnes of ore a year, could support annual production of about 50,000 tonnes of lithium carbonate at full capacity.
The report noted that lithium’s utility in the manufacturing of EVs, energy storage systems and consumer electronics makes access to the metal a strategic concern for China, as its battery and clean-energy firms grow into world leaders.
In Jan 2025, the China Geological Survey said exploration breakthroughs had increased China’s share of global lithium reserves to 16.5%, placing it second worldwide by the agency’s estimates. Yet the country remains heavily reliant on overseas supplies, counting on overseas sources for about 60% of its lithium resource supply in 2025, the report said, citing China Nonferrous Metals Industry Association.
The report said Jiada lies within a lithium belt that stretches across West Kunlun, Songpan and Kardze (Chinese: Garze) in Ngaba (Aba) county, which measures about 2,800km (1,740 miles) and forms part of what Chinese geologists call the “Asian lithium belt”.
The region is a major concentration of China’s hard-rock lithium resources, the Xinhua report was cited as saying.
China currently imports lithium concentrates from countries such as Australia, Zimbabwe and Brazil, while Chile and Argentina are its main sources of imported lithium carbonate, the report noted.