The only U.S. cobalt mine sits fallow in the northern Idaho woods, a mothballed hunk of steel and dirt that is too expensive for its owner to operate because Chinese rivals have flooded global markets with cheap supplies of the bluish metal used in electric vehicle batteries and electronics…Jervois Global , which dug the mine into the side of a nearly 8,000-foot (2,400-meter) mountain, watched helplessly last year as cobalt prices plunged after China's CMOC Group opened the Kisanfu mine in the Democratic Republic of Congo, pushing global production of the metal to an all-time high…"We were straightforward with our staff and told them: 'This is all about the price of cobalt,'" site manager Matthew Lengerich told Reuters during a visit to the facility. Jervois says cobalt prices need to reach at least $20 per pound for the site to open. But prices sat near $12.17 in July…A similar quandary faces BHP , Albemarle and other Western mining companies trying to compete with metals produced by Chinese-linked companies, some of which use coal-generated electricity, child labor or other practices not meeting the standards set by many governments and manufacturers…Western miners say their competitors have inherent cost advantages that enable rapid production expansions even as prices for cobalt, lithium and nickel have plunged more than a third in the past 18 months. Operational costs for many of these Western companies have, as a result, been exceeding what market prices will cover…That has fueled growing calls from some policymakers and miners, including Jervois and Albemarle, for a two-tier pricing system with a premium for sustainably produced metals, according to interviews with more than three dozen traders, investors, executives, purchasing agents, and pricing agencies…The plan is to charge more for a metal that is produced sustainably, whether that is through direct transactions or via multiple prices for a metal listed through futures exchanges, depending on production methods. For example, there would be one price for standard nickel and another for green nickel. "Western miners simply can't compete with China, and China has shown the willingness to drive market prices way, way down," said Morgan Bazilian, director of the Payne Institute for Public Policy at the Colorado School of Mines…Industry leaders have pushed for two pricing structures for several years, but the call for change started gaining more attention from investors, policymakers and customers last fall as Western governments grew more concerned about Chinese competition…Customers for now do not face a penalty if they do not source sustainable metals, but they increasingly face a reputational risk…Since January, world leaders have taken a range of steps to offset China's market control…President Joe Biden imposed tariffs in May on critical minerals produced in China, saying "(metals) prices are unfairly low because Chinese companies don't need to worry about a profit."…Jim Chalmers, Australia's treasurer, in February said governments should consider support for "a differentiated international trading market for resources produced to higher ESG standards."…Chrystia Freeland, Canada's deputy prime minister, in April said Ottawa would fight the dumping of critical minerals by China, Indonesia and others…Multiple U.S. senators from both parties have said they are considering legislation to offer price insurance for metals, similar to a government insurance program for crops, according to Senate aides. Such a move would guarantee miners a price for their metals, regardless of market conditions…General Motors , the largest U.S. automaker, believes critical minerals should be produced sustainably but does not want to pay a premium out of concern that it will be unable to compete with Chinese rivals, according to a source directly involved in the company's minerals procurement…"You will not be able to guarantee by any stretch of the imagination a non-China supply of certain metals unless you're willing to pay some degree of a premium for that product," said Benchmark's Daniel Fletcher-Manuel.

 India will apply for licences to explore for deep-sea minerals in the Pacific Ocean as it competes to secure supplies of minerals critical for energy transition technologies, a top government scientist told Reuters…The UN-backed International Seabed Authority (ISA) has issued 31 deep-sea exploration licences, including two for India in the Indian Ocean, but is yet to allow mining because the 36-member body is still working on regulations…India's critical minerals plans in the Pacific have not been previously reported…China, Russia, and some Pacific Island nations have already secured exploration licences for the Pacific Ocean…India plans to focus on the Clarion-Clipperton Zone, a vast plain between Hawaii and Mexico known to hold large volumes of polymetallic nodules containing minerals used in electric vehicles and solar panels including manganese, nickel, copper, and cobalt. First discovered by British sailors in 1873, the potato-shaped nodules take millions of years to form…Opponents of deep-sea mining say that not enough is known about its impact on marine ecosystems…Some 27 countries have called for a moratorium or suspension of all ocean mining-related activities, but some Pacific nations including Nauru and Cook Islands favour deep-sea mining…India also expects to receive two more exploration permits from the ISA this year for the Indian Ocean, focused on the Carlsberg Ridge and Afanasy-Nikitin Seamount regions, known for polymetallic sulphide deposits and ferromanganese crusts, Ravichandran said…Polymetallic sulphide deposits contain metals such as copper, gold, silver and zinc. Ferromanganese crusts are known for cobalt, nickel, manganese, platinum and rare earth elements among other resources.

Japan on Saturday extended its designation of its continental shelf to the eastern part of islands some 1,000 kilometers south of Tokyo, enabling the resource-poor country to start research on extracting maritime natural resources such as rare metals from the region…A revised Cabinet order took effect designating a significant portion of the Ogasawara Plateau sea area as part of its continental shelf, an area of around 120,000 square kilometers. Its move to enlarge the shelf has triggered opposition from China…The government said it has confirmed the existence of a cobalt-rich crust, including rare metals, in the region. Cobalt is a metal that is used for electric vehicle batteries…To have its continental shelf recognized beyond its exclusive economic zone, Japan needed the approval of an institution established under the U.N. Convention on the Law of the Sea on the continuity of the seabed topography and agreement from relevant countries, which in this case was solely the United States…Following consultations with Washington, Japan set the area for expansion in December 2023…China has criticized Japan's move. 

The cobalt market is expected to be pressured by oversupply and changing battery chemistry preferences into the third quarter of 2024, with market participants not anticipating a price recovery before September following a temporary boost from China's stockpiling initiatives in the second quarter…Global cobalt raw material output has been forecast to reach 238,000 metal tons in 2024, rising from 220,000-230,000 metal tons in 2023, China's state-owned research agency Antaike has said…Platts assessed battery-grade 20.5% Co cobalt sulfate at Yuan 28,500/mt DDP China on July 18, hovering near an all-time low of Yuan 28,000/mt on July 8 since the launch of the cobalt sulfate assessment on May 4, 2018. The price has fallen Yuan 2,000/mt, or 6.6% since the start of the year…Demand for NMC batteries in China fell 6.9% month on month to 20.5 GWh in June, according to the China Automotive Battery Innovation Alliance. Meanwhile, Chinese production of mobile phones, which predominantly use lithium-cobalt-oxide batteries containing about 55% cobalt, reached 620 million units from January to May, rising 10.6% year on year, data from China's Ministry of Industry and Information Technology showed…Commodity Insights has estimated global cobalt chemical demand from electronic batteries growing 9.3% year on year to 50,966 mt in 2024…The cobalt metal price in Europe, the second biggest market for EV sales after China, fell to $13.65/lb IW Rotterdam on June 28, the lowest since July 2020 because of oversupply and poor end-user demand for chemical-grade metal.

General Motors and Ford may post lower profit when they report quarterly results this week, as the industry's high-stakes bet on EVs fails to pay off, while a cyberattack on a crucial computer network used by dealerships disrupted sales…A slowdown in growth of EV sales is also making it harder for automakers such as GM and Ford to boost volumes to levels where they can drive down costs and hit profitability sooner…"It can't be expected that established vehicle manufacturers, who need to make similar investments that a start-up would in vehicle design and manufacturing facilities, could turn a profit immediately," said Sam Fiorani, vice president at research firm AutoForecast Solutions…Legacy American carmakers are also seeing their EV ambitions being throttled by cutthroat competition from Chinese EV makers and Tesla, which have triggered a price war globally…GM last week declined to reiterate its previously announced forecast that it would have one million units of EV production capacity in North America by the end of 2025…Ford had also outlined plans to use a Canadian plant it had earmarked for a future electric vehicle to instead build larger, gasoline-powered versions of its flagship F-Series pickup truck.