The Salton Sea could produce the world's greenest lithium, if new extraction technologies work

[Yo_Mama_Been_Loggin]

About 40 miles north of the California-Mexico border lies the shrinking, landlocked lake known as the Salton Sea. Though the lake was once the epicenter of a thriving resort community, water contamination and decades of drought have contributed to a collapse of its once-vibrant ecosystem and given rise to ghost towns.

But amid this environmental disaster, the California Energy Commission estimates that there's enough lithium here to meet all of the United States' projected future demand and 40% of the world's demand. That's big news for the booming electric-vehicle industry, as lithium is the common denominator across all types of EV batteries.

Traditionally, lithium extraction involves either open-pit mining or evaporation ponds, which work by pumping lithium-containing brine to the surface and waiting for the water to dry up. Both of these methods have huge land footprints, are often very water intensive and can create a lot of contamination and waste.

But at the Salton Sea, three companies are developing chemical processes to extract lithium in a much cleaner way, taking advantage of the Salton Sea's rich geothermal resources. Near the lake, there are already 11 operating geothermal power plants, 10 of which are owned by Berkshire Hathaway's renewable energy division, BHE Renewables.

https://www.msn.com/en-us/money/companies/the-salton-sea-could-produce-the-worlds-greenest-lithium-if-new-extraction-technologies-work/ar-AAWUROW

[bahboo]

1. this area could sure use the economic boost...

[masmdu]

2. Solid-state battery technology will make Lithium Ion batteries obsolete...(nm)

[sl8]

3. Solid state might still need lithium for the anode.

Or they might not; there are alternative anode materials.

[hunter]

4. The Biden administration is supporting this, including a $15 million grant to Berkshire Hathaway.

General Motors is actively seeking domestic suppliers of lithium.

In spite of this the "conservative" press is pessimistic, for no other reason than Biden supports it and electric vehicles offend their perverse "rolling coal" ideology.

Remember when the Republican Party was the Party of Big Business?

Now the only thing they seem interested in is controlling the sex lives of others, especially women and people they do not regard as "straight."

Back to the original story, we need to be designing lithium batteries to be easily recyclable from the start and then we have to go to the trouble of actually recycling them. Otherwise we end up with something similar to the debacle with plastics. Many plastics are "recyclable" but few are actually recycled. If we don't recycle lithium we are further depriving future generations of easy access to this alkali metal.