Graphite is Now Critical

By development of Technology and Industry, some products even didn’t cross people’s mind 20 years ago, especially like mobile phones, has turned a need and sine qua non of our lives today. This of course brought with it an increased consumption of technological and industrial products, and with increased consumption of these products, raw material used in the production of them especially sourced from mining, gradually started to gain importance. Some specific of these raw materials has no substitution, and weren’t distributed evenly on the earth, and these creates a monopoly in the production of these raw materials for some countries, and this leads to a critical stage for certain type of raw materials.

Technology and industry manufacturing countries and Country groups has recognized this situation and was forced to adopt measures, and develop strategies for accessing and securing the supply of these raw materials. European Union is one of the most important of them, particularly due to geographical proximity to Turkey, and Turkey’s intensive economic relations with it. The EU in 2008 started to act and establish an initiative called “Raw Materials Initiative”, and prepared , started to developed strategies and alternate sources for 14 raw material that they thought important and critical.

A similar study has been carried out by BGS-British Geological Surveys, by evaluating over 50 raw materials, by identifying critical risk index for them, and ranks them based on importance. More similar studies in other countries such as India and China have been carried out.

In both studies made by EU and BGS, two important raw materials, especially for our country, are noticeable immediately;

- Antimony (in the first rank and has a higher risk index than rare earths)

- Graphite

These two raw materials are being produced and have potential to be produced more in Turkey.

Graphite is now become the hottest topic all around the world. Graphite is allotropes and pure form of carbon; some of other allotropes of carbon are diamond and coal. There are three types of graphite, they are amorphous, flake and vein. In Turkey only amorphous graphite deposits so far were found. Graphite has some unique properties as it is excellent heat and electricity conductor but heat and corrosion resistant. With these unique properties it hasn’t a substitution for certain industry applications.

Main industries of graphite applications are; steel making, refractory, automotive parts (brake pads etc), lubricants and batteries. Besides these traditional applications of graphite, by development of Electrical Vehicle, graphite started to gain more importance, as it is used 10 to 20 times more than lithium in lithium ion batteries. Also some new technologies like carbon fiber also increase the need for graphite.

It was expected that trends of electrical vehicles, by its own, will bring significant increase in graphite consumption, by doubling consumption.

When we investigate graphite (natural) production and market we see that, China is dominant in the market and supply by producing 70-80% of world annual 1.2 million tonnes production. Because of China’s

monopoly situation, and China’s imposing export taxes that aiming to limit the graphite export as they need more raw material for their own developing industries and that is why graphite is becoming critical for the rest of the world.

Turkey is not a major player, and could not be the alternative of China totally for graphite. When we have a look at the production in Turkey ; till 1991 you can see below table an increasing production but after collapse of Soviet Union, Production is dramatically drop in Turkey, as Petroleum Coke discovered as a substitute of graphite for steel industry.

YearProduction (tonnes)

Consumption (tonnes)

1985 - 4.100,001986 3.586,00 4.000,001987 8.900,00 3.400,001988 12.911,00 13.000,001989 11.000,00 12.000,001990 18.712,00 18.712,00 1991 26.763,00 26.763,001994 5.000,00 25.000*1995 5.000,00 25.000*1996 5.000,00 25.000*1997 5.000,00 25.000*1998 5.000,00 25.000*1999 5.000,00 25.000*

Source: Turkey State Planning Institute, 8th Quinquennially Development Plan, 2001

And later period is worse than above list;

Year Production (tonnes)

2003 0,002004 28,002005 0,002006 0,002007 0,002008 3.236,002009 2.400,00

Source: Migem = Turkish Republic Ministry of Energy and Natural Resources - General Directorate of Mining Affairs

But actually Turkey’s potential is not fit with its production figures. We could easily say that Turkey has very limited exploration works on graphite, and majority of the graphite potentials were determined before 1980s by MTA (MTA = General Directorate of Minerals Research and Exploration). And later periods there is almost no works carried out by MTA for determining new potentials of graphite. Till the year 2000 total drilling that MTA carried out for Mining exploration works for all types of mines was only 30,000 mt., and graphite is not a priority for exploration works. Even with these limited works, (it was said that only 40% of Turkey mining potential was discovered) MTA determined below reserves;

Place/CityReserve Quantity (Tonnes)

Average C%

Yozgat < 100 000 45

Kastamonu Unknown 60

Aydin 150 000 10İzmir - Tire -Karamersin 150 000 8İzmir - Tire – Çeşme 200 000 6İzmir - Tire – Başköy 150 000 10

Istanbul 150 000 30

Mersin 500 000 35

Adiyaman Unknown 45

Mugla 500 000 10Kutahya-Oysu 130 000 20

Even there are some unknown potentials that we had discovered and by its own, has more than half a million tones reserve potential.

As a conclusion we could say that Turkey may not be an Alternative of China for whole of the world but particularly for Europe it could be an alternative supplier by developing its undiscovered potentials.

Sait UYSALsaituysal@gmail.comgşo www.saituysal.com.tr