Sediment samples collected from the Gulf of Khambhat, near Alang in Gujarat, have revealed the presence of vanadium, a critical raw material essential for various industrial applications. Notably, vanadium has been somewhat of a rarity within India’s natural resource landscape. Considering the country’s long efforts to boost EV production, this revelation comes as a boon for the industry as vanadium is used as a crucial raw material in making batteries.
Some months back, the Geological Survey of India (GSI) made an equally momentous discovery, unearthing 5.9 million tonnes of lithium reserves in the region of Jammu and Kashmir. This finding resulted in widespread excitement among key stakeholders in the automotive industry and government officials. They hailed it as a game-changing breakthrough, extolling the potential of these reserves to fuel India’s target of achieving net-zero carbon emissions and promoting domestic electric mobility.
The prospective new source of vanadium was discovered by the Geological Survey of India (GSI), reported the Times of India. B Gopakumar, a researcher from the Marine and Coastal Survey Division (MCSD) of GSI, Mangalore, in an article published in the magazine ‘Nature,’ referred to this finding as the first occurrence of Vanadium in the offshore sediments of India, the report stated.
Vanadium is a rare element that is seldom found in its pure form, leading to an expensive production process. It is found in 55 different minerals. However, in the Gulf of Khambhat, it has been identified within the mineral titanomagnetite, a substance created through the rapid cooling of molten lava.
GSI researchers suggested that the vanadiferous titanomagnetite deposits in the Gulf of Khambhat may have been transported from the Deccan basalts region, primarily through the Narmada and Tapi rivers. They gathered a total of 69 sediment samples from this Gulf.
Vanadium holds significant importance as a crucial raw material in strategic domains like defense and aerospace. For example, alloys combining vanadium with titanium and aluminum are employed in the manufacturing of components for jet engines and high-speed aircraft frames.
In addition to these applications, it is also utilised to manufacture essential electronic components and store energy. It is used to create alloys that are temperature, wear-resistant, and corrosion-free.
Moreover, it finds application in the production of vanadium redox flow batteries as well, which show great potential for large-scale energy storage solutions. Small amounts of vanadium have been previously discovered in regions such as Arunachal Pradesh, Karnataka, Odisha, and Maharashtra.
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