South Korea’s top mining company made its case on Saturday to be allowed to tap Bolivia’s vast reserves of lithium, the soft metal used to produce batteries for electric or hybrid cars.
“If the Bolivian government gives us the opportunity to get involved with Uyuni’s lithium mines, we are always ready to do so,” Sun Kong, a top executive at the state-run Korea Resources Corporation (KORES), told La Razon newspaper.
Bolivia’s Salar de Uyuni houses some 140 million tonnes of lithium, attracting interest from French and Japanese companies.
Sun said his company would not only be interested in processing the lithium but also hoped to be involved in extraction, adding that KORES has specialized mining capability.
Earlier this month Bolivian President Evo Morales said his country is looking for “partners” and not “owners” for its natural resources, including its vast lithium reserves.
“We need investments,” and “companies who respect Bolivian regulations ... who don’t come to play politics” or “conspire against the government,” he said.
“We are interested in exploiting the brine and lithium, and we want to start negotiations, not just with Spanish companies,” the leftwing leader said on an official visit to Madrid.
Mining groups from across the world are pressing for permission to get at the lightweight metal, which is considered “gray gold” in Bolivia, one of the poorest in South America.
Meanwhile, Korea Electric Power Corp, supplier of almost all of South Korea’s electricity, said it will spend 2.8 trillion won (US$2.4 billion) on green technology, in an effort to promote environment-friendly energy policies.
The money will be spent on eight areas of technology, including development of carbon capture and storage and low-emission power systems, the company said in an e-mailed statement in Seoul yesterday.
South Korea, Asia’s third-biggest crude oil importer, said in July it plans to invest 107 trillion won over the next five years in improving energy efficiency.
ROLLER-COASTER RIDE: More than five earthquakes ranging from magnitude 4.4 to 5.5 on the Richter scale shook eastern Taiwan in rapid succession yesterday afternoon Back-to-back weather fronts are forecast to hit Taiwan this week, resulting in rain across the nation in the coming days, the Central Weather Administration said yesterday, as it also warned residents in mountainous regions to be wary of landslides and rockfalls. As the first front approached, sporadic rainfall began in central and northern parts of Taiwan yesterday, the agency said, adding that rain is forecast to intensify in those regions today, while brief showers would also affect other parts of the nation. A second weather system is forecast to arrive on Thursday, bringing additional rain to the whole nation until Sunday, it
LANDSLIDES POSSIBLE: The agency advised the public to avoid visiting mountainous regions due to more expected aftershocks and rainfall from a series of weather fronts A series of earthquakes over the past few days were likely aftershocks of the April 3 earthquake in Hualien County, with further aftershocks to be expected for up to a year, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said yesterday. Based on the nation’s experience after the quake on Sept. 21, 1999, more aftershocks are possible over the next six months to a year, the agency said. A total of 103 earthquakes of magnitude 4 on the local magnitude scale or higher hit Hualien County from 5:08pm on Monday to 10:27am yesterday, with 27 of them exceeding magnitude 5. They included two, of magnitude
CONDITIONAL: The PRC imposes secret requirements that the funding it provides cannot be spent in states with diplomatic relations with Taiwan, Emma Reilly said China has been bribing UN officials to obtain “special benefits” and to block funding from countries that have diplomatic ties with Taiwan, a former UN employee told the British House of Commons on Tuesday. At a House of Commons Foreign Affairs Committee hearing into “international relations within the multilateral system,” former Office of the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) employee Emma Reilly said in a written statement that “Beijing paid bribes to the two successive Presidents of the [UN] General Assembly” during the two-year negotiation of the Sustainable Development Goals. Another way China exercises influence within the UN Secretariat is
Taiwan’s first drag queen to compete on the internationally acclaimed RuPaul’s Drag Race, Nymphia Wind (妮妃雅), was on Friday crowned the “Next Drag Superstar.” Dressed in a sparkling banana dress, Nymphia Wind swept onto the stage for the final, and stole the show. “Taiwan this is for you,” she said right after show host RuPaul announced her as the winner. “To those who feel like they don’t belong, just remember to live fearlessly and to live their truth,” she said on stage. One of the frontrunners for the past 15 episodes, the 28-year-old breezed through to the final after weeks of showcasing her unique