UK National Wealth Fund commits up to £31m to Cornish Lithium equity round

Mechanism

The National Wealth Fund (NWF) is a UK government-owned financial institution (successor to the UK Infrastructure Bank, capitalised with up to £27.8bn) mandated to catalyse private investment into UK infrastructure and industrial capacity, including domestic critical-minerals supply chains. This transaction is a direct equity stake, not a loan or grant — NWF is taking an ownership position in Cornish Lithium alongside private co-investor TechMet, continuing a relationship that began with NWF's first equity round in the company in August 2023.

The £35m round splits roughly 89% NWF (£31m) / 11% TechMet (£4m). Proceeds are earmarked for two distinct projects: the Trelavour hard-rock lithium project (progressing toward a final construction decision) and the Cross Lanes geothermal-lithium project (advancing to commercial drilling — lithium extracted from geothermal brine, a technology pathway the UK is backing as a lower-footprint alternative to conventional hard-rock or brine mining). The deal carries three conditions precedent: Cornish Lithium shareholder approval (General Meeting held 8 October 2025), UK Takeover Panel sign-off, and National Security and Investment Act 2021 clearance — the latter reflecting that critical-minerals extraction now sits inside a designated NSIA sensitive sector.

A Crowdcube retail crowdfunding tranche was planned to follow institutional close, extending the ownership base to retail investors.

Downstream implications

• Reinforces the UK's bet on domestic lithium production (Cornwall is the

only advanced lithium resource in Great Britain) as a hedge against import dependence for battery-grade lithium chemicals.

• NWF's repeat investment (2023 then 2025) signals a state-anchor-investor

model for pre-revenue critical-minerals juniors that struggle to raise purely private capital at this stage — a pattern likely to recur for other UK critical-minerals hopefuls (e.g., other CRM Strategy Vision 2035 priority projects).

• Geothermal lithium extraction (Cross Lanes) is a technology being watched

globally (also pursued in France, Germany, US Salton Sea) as a potentially lower-cost, lower-ESG-footprint alternative to hard-rock or evaporation-pond lithium.

Open questions

• Whether Trelavour reaches a final investment/construction decision and on

what timeline — NWF capital is explicitly gating that decision, not funding construction itself.

• Scale and pricing of the planned Crowdcube retail tranche, and whether it

materially dilutes NWF/TechMet stakes.

• Whether NSIA clearance surfaces any conditions (e.g., restrictions on

future non-UK/allied ownership) given lithium's critical-minerals designation.