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The Salton Sea is already a man made disaster deep into ecological collapse. Even if they do it terribly, I doubt they'll make anything worse. It's also a reg
by desine 5y ago
The Salton Sea is already a man made disaster deep into ecological collapse. Even if they do it terribly, I doubt they'll make anything worse. It's also a region with no economic future, so hopefully this brings some jobs. This will be interesting to watch, I'm hopeful.
- samstave 5y agoHoldMyCarbonCredits while we make the Salton Sea a SuperFund-Site! [0] --- Anyone know how recoverable Lithium is from Lithium batts? Does the Lithium degrade/denature/deconstruct over time in all lithium batteries? How bad for the environment is all the Lithium we are throwing out with all these used up batteries? [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Superfund_sites https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Superfund_sites
- parsecs 5y agoThere is only a tiny bit of lithium in lithium batteries, afaik.
- nitrogen 5y agoLithium is everywhere, especially in salt lakes. A long time ago I met someone whose family ran a mineral extraction company, of which there are many around Salt Lake City. They take the lake water and evaporate it. The main non-water ingredient in the concentrated brine was lithium. (Though the guy was drinking the stuff as a supplement, which probably affected his personality a bit)
- antisthenes 5y agoThat tidbit about drinking it is the most interesting part of this whole thread! Are they the same lithium salts that are prescribed as medication for certain psychological disorders?
- _Nat_ 5y agoYup! Dunno if modern medications may also include other active-ingredients to compliment lithium, but lithium itself is pretty much the same thing as sodium or potassium in terms of its simplicity as a chemical species. Since lithium has a +1 charge as a cation (positively charged ion) in salt, it needs to be balanced with an anion (negatively charged ion), so the exact salt can vary in solid-form. But once it dissolves in water, such as in the body, then it's not really bound to the anion anymore and so the exact anion it was originally ingested with isn't particularly important. Apparently some people used to drink [mineral water with lithium](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lithia_water https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lithia_water). Reference: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lithium_(medication) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lithium_(medication)
- sdenton4 5y agolithium recovery: https://trace.tennessee.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=3421&context=utk_chanhonoproj https://trace.tennessee.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=3421... Seems possible; not sure of economic value at this particular point in history. There's a bunch of recent headlines about trivial extraction of lithium from seawater, so might get less economically feasible if those techs pan out. OTOH, even if it's not obviously worth it, you could try burying it all in one place and then 'mine' it once the economics swing towards recovery.
- ashtonkem 5y agoElements tend to not degrade quickly outside of nuclear reactors as a general rule.
- Tagbert 5y agoThe first thing recovered from salvaged batteries will be the cobalt and similar materials in the electrodes. Those are much less plentiful than lithium.
- okareaman 5y agoI had go take a road trip to see for myself. Nearby Slab City is a nightmare, but Salton Sea wasn't too bad for a salt lake in the desert. There are picnic tables and campsites. There's a palm tree farm on the north end. In a little town on the water's edge, I found the sign for the the old Bombay Beach Club: https://imgur.com/a/eifJkzB https://imgur.com/a/eifJkzB
- sidewndr46 5y agoIsn't Slab City just a place that people go because they can squat there and no one cares?
- monetus 5y agoIt is romanticized among other things.
- colordrops 5y agoThere are definitely addicts out there but I went with my family and met some nice people a few years ago. The art installation was interesting and the hippies running the library gave my kid a book. I wouldn't want to live out there for sure though.
- suzzer99 5y agoThere are a lot of artists, and they even have a "club" made up of old abandoned couches where they have occasional outdoor concerts. It's pretty wild.
- lizknope 5y agoI drove around Slab City so that I could see Salvation Mountain. It was... interesting. Bombay Beach was scary and depressing. The smell was fine when I was there but there are frequent massive fish die offs. Something has to be done about it though. If it dries up (irrigation runoff feeds the lake but irrigation is getting more efficient causing less runoff) then the dry lake bed will blow over Palm Springs and other towns in the area. It's full of toxic dust now. Migrating birds also use it as a stopover point because we have gotten rid of so many natural wetlands.
- lanstin 5y agoAwesome documentary on it: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plagues_%26_Pleasures_on_the_Salton_Sea https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plagues_%26_Pleasures_on_the_S... John Waters narrating. I took my family there in a trip we also saw Las Vegas, the Mt Palomar telescope, LA tar pits, and Palm Springs. It is too disgusting to be educational. At least when we went it stank to high heaven and we ended up with rotting fish flesh all over our pants. The dumb dog liked it. Everyone else uses it as a cautionary tale about letting me chose destinations for vacation. Getting 10x existing Lithium production would be great use of it. There are some extremely good date palm farms north of it. It you like figs and dates, check them out.
- rantwasp 5y agoexcept the dog. truly our best friend. pretended to like even that awful place. :)
- lanstin 5y agoShe is a very sweet dog tho not very good signal for will humans like something.
- jdhn 5y agoMy curiosity is getting the better of me, why would you choose the Salton Sea as a vacation destination?
- lanstin 5y agoIt is the second largest lake in California. I was new to California and just looking for interesting things. My quick googling was clearly insufficient. Tho it was interesting in some sense. Also it’s kind of in the area of the other places that were ok. Tar pits are awesome. Mt Palomar very cool. Las Vegas unique and notable if not actually my cup of tea.
- jws 5y agoJust west of it is Ocotillo Wells. You can rent a quad bike and tour around it for an afternoon. There is a fossil reef (oyster shells), an odd rock formation called the pumpkin patch, some mud with mysterious subterranean gas that bubbles out, and general desert scenery. A little further west is Anza Borrega. More desert, but there is a nice hike through the desert to a palm tree oasis which just sort of pops up out of nowhere. Outside the town are inexplicable (unless you read about it) huge steel sculptures.
- jakear 5y agoHuh. I’ve been to Salton Sea a couple times and always really enjoy it. Nice place to kayak, the mist over the sea with the surrounding mountains makes it very picturesque the right time of day, and there aren’t motorboats flying by every second blasting music like you get with most lakes open to boating in SoCal. I’ve only been in winter, which I’m sure helps. I certainly wouldn’t want to go in >100 degree heat.
- devoutsalsa 5y agoI've been there once. It's a super weird place. I stopped by Salton City on the west side of the lake (https://goo.gl/maps/ksWdbiRFfpnUBE6X8 https://goo.gl/maps/ksWdbiRFfpnUBE6X8). The town has 50% nice-ish, occupied homes & 50% derelict buildings that looked like dilapidated crack houses. The shore was super stinky, covered with dead fish (tilapia I assume) & the smell you'd expect to go with it.
- jhayward 5y agoThe Salton sea is just the latest iteration of the cycle of freshwater lakes[1] that form, then dry up in that location in the Colorado River delta. The fact that a canal cut formed the latest one does not distinguish it much from the several version over the last few thousand years of natural formations. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lake_Cahuilla https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lake_Cahuilla
- hutzlibu 5y ago"Even if they do it terribly, I doubt they'll make anything worse." You can always make things worse. So I hope this will not be an excuse to be even more careless with the exploitation, even though more lithium is beneficial, too.
- tbonesteaks 5y agoThis quick video on the Salton Sea is very informative: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wCYcSbCR6z4 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wCYcSbCR6z4
- skittleson 5y agoTotally agree. It's so bad out there. What's the worst they can do?!
- NeoVeles 5y agoNormally I would be against a proposal like this. However looking at the history and state of the Salton sea - we cannot make it any worse. This looks like a win-win situation.
- b20000 5y agothis is bad news as it is close to palm springs, and anything like this should be kept out of the LA area.