This week, Glencore hit its second hurdle with Kamoto after ceasing sales due to the presence of uranium. The suspension occurred in 2015 when Kamoto’s production costs soared in a low commodity price environment, and Glencore addressed the problem by upgrading and modernising the mine’s processing plant. Kamoto projectĭuring the 1980s, Kamoto produced an average 3 million tonnes of ore per year and prior to its restart in 2007 under Katanga’s ownership, the mine had produced a total 59.3Mt, with an average cobalt grade of 0.37% and a copper grade of 4.21%.īut while Kamoto boasts one of the Congo’s biggest reserves of copper and cobalt, it has a track record as an under-performing asset, and Glencore has already been forced to suspend operations once since grabbing a stake in Katanga in 2009. The value of the bluish-grey metal has almost tripled since the EV revolution took off, fuelled primarily by US-based Tesla Motors which built its original model around a lithium-nickel-cobalt-aluminium (Li-NCA) cathode and now plans to launch the Model 3 with a new generation lithium-nickel-manganese-cobalt (Li-NMC) formulation.Īnd cobalt producers worldwide have leapt to the impending demand challenge, with increased production and sales tipping the market into oversupply this year. Cobalt marketĬobalt is currently one of the most in-demand commodities, given an acceleration of the global electric vehicle market where the metal is a crucial component in the production of lithium-ion batteries. The news rocked the global cobalt market and pushed the commodity’s price from under US$45,000 per tonne to US$52,000/t within days. To-date, Katanga revealed the presence of uranium had prevented 1,472 tonnes of cobalt from being exported.
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