Exclusive: Exploration for vanadium, crucial for EV battery, to start soon in Gujarat

Vanadium is a hard, silvery-grey, malleable transition metal.

Preliminary exploration of vanadium, a crucial raw material for electric vehicle (EV) battery discovered in the Gujarat coast, is likely to be approved soon  by the executive committee of the National Mineral Exploration Trust (NMET) as the proposal has been cleared by the technical committee, according to  minutes of the NMET's meeting seen by Moneycontrol.

Vanadium is a hard, silvery-grey, malleable transition metal. Batteries powered by the metal is becoming popular for energy storage applications.

NMET's technical cost committee has recommended the proposal of  preliminary exploration of vanadium and titanium in the beach and dune sands of Dandi-Onjal-Surwada block in Navsara and Valsad district of Gujarat, for EC approval.

The cost of exploration work is pegged at Rs 86.28 lakh, according to the minutes document.  The exploration will be done by notified private exploration agency  (NPEA) Geo Marine Solutions and Gujarat's commissioner of geology & mining.

The mining of the metal may advance India's efforts to ensure raw materials security as it forays into EV supply chain amid decarbonization goals. Last year, Vanadium was discovered in sediment samples collected from the Gulf of Khambhat, bordering the state of Gujarat.

"The EC approval is expected in two weeks, post which we would start the exploratory work," said Praveen Kumar, director of Geo Marine. NMET did not immediately respond to request for a comment.

"One of the main source of vanadium is -byproduct of iron titanium slag. We are interested in a low grade titanium ore in which vanadium would be byproduct. In high grade titanium ore (high grade ilmenite)vanadium quantity will be much lesser," Kumar added.

The metal is among the 30 minerals identified as 'critical' by the Indian government last year. Authorities are also in advanced talks with  Australia to secure lithium, cobalt, and vanadium.

In the energy storage track, lithium powered battery is  the market leader but vanadium battery seems to be becoming the new darling due to its low-risk and high durability properties.

In case of vanadium batteries, capacity expansion is simple, and compared with lithium iron phosphate batteries, no additional safety risks will be added in the case of large capacity.

Also, vanadium batteries do not undergo physical changes during use. Even if the battery has been used for a long period and its performance has deteriorated, the battery can be recovered by repairing the activity of the electrolyte, according to reports.  However, low energy density is the major disadvantage as compared to lithium batteries.