Cobalt: Relationships
Every element and industry that Cobalt is linked to, and how. Each pair has its own card explaining the relationships between the two.
- Aerospace and defence: Cobalt is a small but essential ingredient of jet engine superalloys: aerospace used about 11.5 kt in 2025, a fraction of battery demand, yet about three quarters of mined cobalt comes from Congo, whose export quotas now set availability and price. (researched)
- Vehicles, ships, rail, aircraft: Electric vehicle batteries are now the largest use of cobalt, about 43% of demand in 2024, but makers have cut cobalt per kWh through LFP and high-nickel cathodes, so cobalt demand depends on chemistry mix as much as on EV sales, while Congo's export quotas set supply. (researched)
- Copper: About three quarters of cobalt is mined as a by-product of copper, mostly in DR Congo, so cobalt supply follows copper investment; Congo's 2025 export ban and quotas showed that cobalt can be held back while copper keeps flowing. (researched)
- Nickel: About a fifth of by-product cobalt comes from nickel ores, and Indonesia's high-pressure acid leach (HPAL) plants have made it the second largest cobalt producer, selling nickel and cobalt together in mixed hydroxide for batteries; both metals also share the NMC battery market and the threat from LFP, which uses neither. (researched)
- Battery cathode materials: Cobalt is a raw material for battery cathode materials.
- Computers and electronics: Computers and electronics depends on cobalt.
- Electric and hybrid vehicles: Electric and hybrid vehicles needs cobalt.
- Medical devices: Medical devices depends on cobalt.
- Metal products: Metal products depends on cobalt.
- Nickel-rich lithium-ion batteries: Nickel-rich lithium-ion batteries needs cobalt.
- Refining catalysts: Cobalt is a raw material for refining catalysts.
- Semiconductors: Semiconductors depends on cobalt.
- Waste and recycling: Waste and recycling depends on cobalt.