Chile-Regulatory & Investment Landscape for Lithium
Chile holds approximately 40% of global lithium reserves, primarily concentrated in the Salar de Atacama, making it one of the most strategically important lithium deposits globally. Lithium in the Atacama, as in many other places, exists not in hard rock but dissolved in ancient underground brines, accessed historically through large-scale pumping and slow evaporation in open ponds, a process that consumes vast volumes of water in one of the driest ecosystems on earth. The interaction between brine extraction and freshwater aquifer systems remains deeply
contested, particularly among indigenous communities whose ancestral territories sit directly above these deposits.
April 17, 2026