Magnesium Industry Advances on Two Fronts: Coordinated Empowerment of New Development Through Salt Lake Resource Security and Breakthroughs in End-Use Applications [SMM Survey]

As one of the lightest known metallic structural materials, magnesium combines outstanding properties such as lightweight, high strength, and high thermal conductivity, making it a core strategic material underpinning industrial upgrading in areas such as automotive lightweighting and new energy new materials. China’s magnesium industry is advancing on two fronts, simultaneously promoting breakthroughs in end-use application technologies and securing raw material supply, in order to overcome bottlenecks in industrial development and support the high-quality development of the magnesium industry.

Faway Wheel’s magnesium alloy base has delivered remarkable results in the field of lightweight magnesium alloys. It has completed construction of the country’s first digital semi-solid forming production line, and commissioning of the 3600T magnesium alloy injection molding unit has been completed, enabling full coverage of magnesium alloy products from 0.3 kg to 10 kg and reaching a leading level in China. The country’s first semi-solid formed magnesium alloy core seat frame component, jointly developed by the company with the China FAW R&D Institute and several other entities, has entered the bench validation stage at OEMs. This product integrates 19 steel structural parts into four magnesium alloy parts, reducing weight by 26 after substitution. At the same time, a new-type high-strength, high-toughness magnesium alloy has been successfully trial-produced, with tensile strength increased by 16.7, effectively addressing the longstanding weakness of insufficient toughness in traditional magnesium alloys and reinforcing the foundation of the automotive lightweighting industry.

At the national Two Sessions, National People’s Congress deputy Yun Hongwei proposed that China is rich in salt lake resources. Among them, the natural inorganic salt reserves of 33 salt lakes in the Qaidam Basin of Qinghai reach 383.2 billion mt, with magnesium resources alone amounting to 7.27 billion mt, ranking first in the country and making the region the most promising raw material supply base for China’s magnesium industry. At present, Qinghai’s salt lakes have developed a series of magnesium products including magnesium chloride, magnesium hydroxide, and high-purity magnesia, with magnesium hydroxide capacity reaching 150,000 mt and magnesium metal capacity reaching 100,000 mt. However, for a long time, salt lake resource development has focused mainly on potassium and lithium, while the utilization rate of magnesium resources has remained low. Moreover, extracting magnesium from salt lakes is still a global technical challenge, constraining the stability of raw material supply for the magnesium industry. To address this, he recommended that the state increase support in talent, technology, and funding, promote breakthroughs in core technologies for magnesium extraction from salt lakes and their industrialisation, and drive magnesium resources toward higher value-added products. At the same time, ecological red lines must be upheld, and coordinated progress in salt lake resource development and ecological protection should be achieved through measures such as closed-loop production and the application of green electricity.

The two are respectively advancing from the application end and the raw material end to address shortcomings in the development of the magnesium industry, promote the transformation of China’s magnesium industry from resource advantages into industrial advantages, and support the upgrading of the new materials industry and the achievement of the “dual carbon” goals.