The prospect that the European Union will classify lithium as toxic is adding to worries in the electric-vehicle battery industry that policy makers aren’t doing enough to attract investment and the EU will lose out to the U.S., an attractive destination for such companies partly thanks to the Inflation Reduction Act.
Last week, the European Commission was set to give a final ruling on whether lithium, a crucial battery input, should be classified as a toxic substance. The commission’s scientific arm recommended that it do so.
