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Tibet

HOT ROCKS

MATERIAL WORLD A blog series on China’s lust for lithium from Tibet, blog 1 of 3 A concise version of this blog was published by Turquoise Roof. If you have read that report, do read on for further insights into China’s long term strategy for global dominance of all new industries, and in-depth analysis of […]

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Tibet

SPIN CYCLE LITHIUM

A blog series on China’s lust for lithium from Tibet, blog 2 of 3 BOOMING LITHIUM: FEAR OF MISSING OUT Mining has always been prone to booms and busts, since the interval between demand and supply is  several years of careful investigation  to find and confirm a mineral deposit, draw up a sound business case, […]

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Tibet

PROBING TIBETAN SECRETS

A blog series on China’s lust for lithium from Tibet, blog 3 of 3 SAVING OUR PLANET, THROUGH MORE MINING THAN EVER Lithium extraction by any means, at whatever financial and environmental cost, makes sense only if decarbonising a world addicted to fossil fuels is the sole goal, and nothing else matters. Getting lithium out […]

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Tibet

TIBATTERY

HOW TIBET HELPS CHINA WIN THE NEXT INDUSTRIAL REVOLUTION   Many fates have loomed for Tibet in the seven decades this vast plateau has been forced into Chinese modernity. Initially, in the proclamations of revolutionary communism, Tibet was to become a new heaven on earth, to be accomplished by first destroying all that is old. […]

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Tibet

KHAM ELECTRIFIED

Blog 1 of 3 on a big new hydro dam in Tibet RED GENE PRINCELINGS MAKING  TIBET CHINA’S In May 2023 the first big new hydro dam in several years in Tibet was announced. It will not be on the Yarlung Tsangpo but the Za Chu, the uppermost Mekong. The announcement came not as official […]

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Tibet

SOLARIZING TIBET

Blog 2 of 3 on a big new hydro dam in Tibet Migrating China’s massive energy extraction infrastructure industry far upstream into Tibet has long been signalled by party-state planners. Potential dam locations have been mapped by engineers for decades, and listed as potential dams in official plan decrees. Yet most of the big dams […]

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Tibet

EXPRESSWAY TURNS TIBET EASTWARD

Blog 3 of 3 on a big new hydro dam in Tibet EAST-WEST NORTH-SOUTH THE PARTY IS LEADING EVERYTHING. The intersectionality of Kham Markham is core. The magic of fungibility happens in Markham. Water turns into electricity, horses into tea, rivers into regional spheres of influence, movement is everything. China’s trajectory, from humiliation to hegemony, […]

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Tibet

BUILDING THE HAN CHINESE DREAM

EUROPE’S ENGINE European car makers have no idea what’s coming. The affordable Chinese electric cars about to flood the European market will upend a business model that sustained Europe for a century. Euro auto is on course with European mammoths and rhinos, for extinction. It’s not just the tech revolution, the switch from internal combustion […]

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Tibet

STAB-PROOF VESTS IN THE PURE LAND

NYINGTRI ESCALATES RISK MANAGEMENT CONTROL OF RURAL TIBETANS Why would the rural police, responsible for enforcing agriculture regulations in lower Tibet Nyingtri district, be advertising for riot control gear suppliers to pitch to them?  The officials of the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Affairs (MARA) aren’t tackling a dangerous gang of cattle rustlers, or drug […]

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Tibet

FRONTLINE TIBET

CHINA’S EXTRACTIVISM IDEOLOGY   Blog 1 of 3 on the rapidly accelerating boom in China’s demand for critical minerals   In a decarbonising world transitioning to “green” energy, Tibet is now emerging as China’s frontline source of two key critical minerals: copper and lithium. Both have been exploited by Chinese miners for decades, but in […]