Renault and Stellantis Volkswagen also signed lithium supply agreements with Australian lithium manufacturer Vulcan.

According to foreign media reports, Australian lithium supplier Vulcan Energy Resources recently launched an environmentally friendly lithium hydroxide for electric vehicle batteries. Vulcan said in a statement on December 8th that it had reached a binding five-year lithium supply agreement with Volkswagen to deliver lithium hydroxide to Volkswagen from 2026, but the company did not provide further details of the contract. The two companies are also negotiating other possible strategic cooperation.

Volkswagen plans to build six large battery plants in Europe by 2030 as part of its ambition to overtake Tesla as the world's largest seller of electric cars. The lithium supply agreement will help meet Volkswagen's future battery production needs in Europe.

Francis Wedin, Managing Director of Vulcan Energy, said, "through this agreement, Vulcan will be the main driver of Volkswagen's leading global goal of producing carbon-neutral electric vehicles, including all raw materials in the battery supply chain. We look forward to working closely with the Volkswagen Group and establishing a sustainable local lithium supply for the German and European automotive industries. "

Vulcan is currently developing a project to extract lithium hydroxide from geothermal salt water rich in lithium in the upper Rhine without the use of fossil fuels or evaporation ponds. The company's zero-carbon lithium project aims to build sustainable regional lithium resources through Europe's largest lithium mine.

Vulcan said that the most common way to extract lithium is from open-pit mines and salt water evaporation ponds, while the lithium extraction (DLE) process used by the company uses less land, groundwater and energy resources.

In November, Vulcan signed a preliminary lithium supply agreement with carmaker Stellantis, shortly after Vulcan reached a similar supply deal with Renault due to a surge in consumer demand for electric vehicles. In addition, Vulcan has signed supply agreements with Belgian material technology companies Umicore and South Korea's LG Chemical.

Geothermal lithium in the upper Rhine on the French-German border has also attracted the attention of EnBW, an energy company. Companies developing geothermal lithium also include Eramet Mining Group, which is conducting a pilot project to extract lithium from geothermal brine at a geothermal power plant in eastern France.