<
https://electrek.co/2023/12/01/a-california-dried-up-lake-has-enough-lithium-to-power-375-million-evs/>
"California’s infamous Salton Sea has been a known hotbed of lithium for years,
but no one had a sense of how much “white gold” was found there. Now a new
study quantifies that, and it’s impressive: The huge underground reserve of
scorching hot brine located underneath the lakebed contains enough lithium to
build batteries for 375 million electric vehicle batteries, making it one of
the largest lithium brine deposits in the world.
A new study from the US Department of Energy released this week is the first to
quantify how much valuable metal is down there, and it’s a lot more than
previously thought. Researchers from the Lawrence Berkey National Laboratory
say the reserve can support the production of 3,400 kilotons of lithium, enough
to build batteries for 375 million electric vehicle batteries, according to the
DOE. The US currently has roughly 2.4 million registered EVs (and that data
hasn’t yet been updated for this year). Some say that the EV market is set
explode by 2030, with predictions that we could face a lithium shortage as soon
as 2025.
The Salton Sea is best known for being the state’s worst ecological disaster,
as droughts, heat waves, and agriculture have caused the water to recede,
forming a dry barren-looking lake bed alongside mass die-offs of fish from the
high salinity of the water. But the Salton Sea has had a green energy
reinvention of sorts, with companies of all sizes trying to assess how to
extract lithium from the geothermal brine deep underneath the lake’s southern
end, and for a decade it’s been a source of geothermal electricity production.
Governor Gavin Newsom has called the lake the “Saudi Arabia of lithium.”
Of the new findings, the DOE says that all of that lithium found there can
“enable the United States to meet or exceed global lithium demand for decades,”
according to a press release. “This is pretty significant, it makes this among
the largest lithium brine deposits in the world,” Michael McKibben, a
geochemistry professor and one of the study authors. “This could make the US
completely self-sufficient in lithium so we’re no longer importing it via
China.”"
Via Kenny Chaffin.
Cheers,
*** Xanni ***
--
mailto:xanni@xanadu.net Andrew Pam
http://xanadu.com.au/ Chief Scientist, Xanadu
https://glasswings.com.au/ Partner, Glass Wings
https://sericyb.com.au/ Manager, Serious Cybernetics
