🇷🇴🏭 ⛏ Romania has the potential to make billions of its graphite reserves but it isn't doing it

Graphene is a form (allotrope) of carbon consisting of a single layer of atoms arranged in a honeycomb nanostructure. In other words, it is a very thin transparent material made up of a single layer of carbon atoms which can be seen with the naked eye.

Multiple layers of graphene stacked together form graphite, a variant of the sedimentary rock that is more commonly known as "coal". Because graphite is hard to ignite, it saw uses in pencil-making, steelmaking and lubrication.

With the advent of computers and batteries, scientists began researching graphite's potential uses in battery-making. Graphite has been used for decades to make batteries for laptops, smartphones and other similar products. With the rise of electric vehicles (EVs) so did the demand for graphite and graphene.

Because graphene is a lot smaller than graphite (graphene is formed from a single layer of carbon atoms meanwhile a graphite rock can have hundreds or thousands of layers), graphene has become a valuable and useful nanomaterial due to its exceptionally high tensile strength, electrical conductivity, transparency, and being the thinnest two-dimensional material in the world known so far.

Graphene can be used as an alternative to lithium when making batteries for EVs and other electronic devices. It also has been used successfully in the making of solar panels and integrated circuits.

As China has a near monopoly on the renewables and lithium-ion battery market, Romania with its graphite reserves (a graphite rock can be broken into thousands of graphene) has the potential to steal a good chunk of the EV market from China and earn untold amounts of money.

In March 2024, the EU adopted the Critical Raw Materials Act, an effort to reduce the EU's dependence on raw materials needed for the transition to clean energy from potentially hostile sources like China. Graphite was mentioned among the rare materials needed to accomplish this transition and it can be mined in Romania.

The graphite reserves in Romania won't be able to cover the EU's demand for green energy and some worries have begun to appear regarding the faltering EV market in the EU as, over the last two months, automakers have begun selling existing plants and stopping construction of new ones due to a decline in the EV demand, money is to be made.

Romania still has a lot of miners with a lot of experience as coal has been mined in the country for hundreds of years. Most of them were forcefully sent to retirement early by the government due to EU mandated mine closures but they can be brought back into the market by at least passing down their knowledge to a new generation of miners.

The graphite reserves are owned by Salrom, the National Society of Salt. Salrom operates a dozen salt mines across Romania and can find the manpower and experts to mine the graphite reserves of Romania, process the graphite into graphene and sell it to buyers in Europe and abroad. The only thing Salrom needs is money from the government or the EU since they are interested in the renewable energy transition.

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