America’s Hidden Dependency: The Foreign Grip on Carbon Pitch

October 22, 2025

Despite being home to some of the world’s most advanced industries, the United States remains startlingly dependent on foreign supplies of one of its most overlooked yet critical materials: carbon pitch.

Used in everything from batteries and aerospace components to semiconductors and steelmaking, carbon pitch is a vital binding and carbonizing agent — but America produces only a fraction of what it consumes. According to industry data, over 80% of global carbon pitch production occurs in Asia, with China alone controlling roughly two-thirds of the market. Meanwhile, U.S. output accounts for less than 3% of global supply, even as the nation consumes around 35%.

This imbalance has left America’s energy transition and industrial base quietly vulnerable. Carbon pitch is essential in manufacturing graphite anodes for lithium-ion batteries, carbon-carbon composites for aerospace, and refractories that line blast furnaces. Yet, nearly every pound used domestically traces back to a foreign refinery or coke byproduct stream.

“Carbon pitch isn’t just another commodity — it’s a choke point in the carbon supply chain,” said a materials analyst with decades in the graphite sector. “If you can’t secure pitch, you can’t make electrodes, and if you can’t make electrodes, you can’t make steel or batteries.”

The challenge lies in how the material is produced. Carbon pitch is derived from the distillation of carbon, itself a byproduct of metallurgical coke production. As American steelmakers have idled coke ovens over the past two decades, domestic pitch feedstock has evaporated. That’s pushed the U.S. to rely on imports from China, Japan, and South Korea, regions where heavy industry remains integrated with coal-based processes.

Compounding the issue, no large-scale pitch production plants have been built in the U.S. for decades, and refining capacity has shrunk. The result is a fragile supply chain increasingly exposed to geopolitical risks, trade restrictions, and volatile shipping costs.

With the Biden administration pushing for battery independence and low-carbon industrialization, experts warn that pitch production must be reimagined, not just relocated. Emerging companies are now exploring alternative feedstocks — including biocarbon and petroleum residues — to recreate pitch domestically without relying on coke byproducts.

Still, scaling such innovation will take time and capital. For now, America’s foundational industries — from electric vehicles to fighter jets — depend on an opaque global market dominated by foreign suppliers.

“We talk about oil, gas, and rare earths,” said one startup founder working to commercialize U.S.-made pitch. “But pitch is the carbon glue of modern industry. Without it, the energy transition stops.”