The global electric vehicle market is on track to sell approximately 40 million units in 2026, representing roughly 45% of all new car sales worldwide. Behind that growth lies a supply chain that few consumers understand but that governments have come to regard as a matter of national security: the mining, processing, and manufacturing of the critical minerals — lithium, cobalt, nickel, manganese, and graphite — that make batteries possible.

China's dominance of this supply chain is the central geopolitical fact of the energy transition. Chinese companies control approximately 70% of global lithium processing capacity, 75% of cobalt refining, 85% of graphite processing, and 95% of manganese refining — even though China itself produces only a fraction of the raw materials. This "processing chokepoint" means that lithium mined in Australia or Chile, cobalt from the Democratic Republic of Congo, and nickel from Indonesia all pass through Chinese refineries before reaching battery manufacturers.

The United States and Europe have responded with massive industrial policy interventions. The Inflation Reduction Act's battery material sourcing requirements — which mandate increasing percentages of minerals from US free-trade partners to qualify for EV tax credits — have triggered an estimated $150 billion in announced investments in North American battery supply chains. Europe's Critical Raw Materials Act aims to achieve 40% domestic processing by 2030. But the lead times for mines and processing facilities are measured in years, and the gap between announced investment and operational production remains substantial. "We are running a marathon against an opponent who started an hour ago," said Simon Moores, CEO of Benchmark Mineral Intelligence.