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Lithium drilling advances at the Salton Sea
- emkoemko 4y agois this similar to e3 metals?
- jelliclesfarm 4y agoNot really. E3 is in a wet region in Canada. California is a desert. This plan might fuck up California. How can they source potable fresh water for lithium extraction from brine without increasing salinity at Salton Sea? Also..we are in the midst of one of our scheduled droughts. I am sure there are real experts looking into this..and there is probably something that is in the plans to deal with this. Maybe someone more knowledgeable can throw some light on this. Lithium extraction needs fresh water throughout the recovery cycle.
- TSiege 4y agoThe salton sea is a man made disaster. I couldn't see how it could be any worse than it is now. Given the dire climate situation we're in, it seems like a no brainer https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8TjGAWxL23c https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8TjGAWxL23c
- idontwantthis 4y agoIf it dries out completely it will be much much worse.
- kurthr 4y agoDo you want to accidentally spill water from the Colorado into it again? https://allthatsinteresting.com/salton-sea-history https://allthatsinteresting.com/salton-sea-history
- bombcar 4y agoWe can always bring back Operation Plowshare and try to connect the Salton Sea to the Gulf of Mexico.
- wsinks 4y agoJust out of curiousity, how would it get much worse? I wonder if it wouldn't make it better since a lot of the water seems to just be so salty it kills everything. Do you mean it'll just be drier and therefore suck more water out of the local ecosystem?
- idontwantthis 4y agoIt is full of toxic materials from agricultural runoff. If it dries out then that will become a gigantic dust cloud that will poison millions of people.
- throwaway1777 4y agoSource?
- wsinks 4y agoThank you! I completely forgot about the agricultural runoff, that would make things worse.
- TSiege 4y agoIt's going to dry out completely either way
- deleted 4y ago[deleted]
- mullingitover 4y ago> How can they source potable fresh water for lithium extraction from brine without increasing salinity at Salton Sea? Also..we are in the midst of one of our scheduled droughts. There's a whole infographic in the article explaining this. > Hot brine is pumped up from deep underground, generating heat which is converted to electricity. Then, lithium is extracted from the brine before the fluid is injected back underground. Pretty brilliant, really. There's already a geothermal energy site right there, so the whole lithium mining business could potentially be powered with zero emissions. If they really do need freshwater, there's a ton of it - the Colorado River Aqueduct goes right by the Salton Sea. In fact, that's how it was created in the first place.
- jelliclesfarm 4y agoRight. What about salinity of the brine?
- elihu 4y agoThe brine is injected back underground, quite a bit cooler and minus some amount of lithium and chloride.
- wlesieutre 4y agoThey take out some of the lithium so the salinity of the brine is lowered a bit?
- CameronNemo 4y agoThe Colorado River doesn't have a lot of water by the time it gets to California, and the metropolises on the coast use a lot of it. If they really need freshwater for this, they will have to fight a lot of people for it.
- kurthr 4y agoI'm sorry I just broke out into laughter... you have to fight the FARMERS for it. The people in those cities (with their green lawns, golf courses, cemetaries, and fountains) just get what's left. Maybe they get 10-20% of the Colorado flows?
- danans 4y ago> How can they source potable fresh water for lithium extraction Why would they use potable (AKA drinking) water for lithium extraction from the brine? Nothing in the described extraction process involves potable water.
- jelliclesfarm 4y agoLithium recovery requires fresh water. Tons of it. Using fresh water for lithium extraction is going to affect ..and take away from our potable water sources needed for the 40 something million CA residents.
- danans 4y agoThis will use little fresh water since the brine (water with dissolved lithium salts) already exists at the Salton Sea. Dry lithium mining like what happens in South America requires fresh water, not this.
- emkoemko 4y agoso is e3 a better method?
- tonymet 4y agoInteresting how similar that looks to an oil derrick
- wmoser 4y agoIt probably is one. There’s nothing particularly special about the hole in the ground. It’s what you are trying to suck out. The oil industry has lots of knowledge about making holes, no point in reinventing the wheel.
- ggm 4y agoThe last 5 to 10 years has had a succession of doom-sayers riding the Paul Ehrlich line to "we will run out" -And as Julian Simons bet [0] showed, it may be true but it's based on a false premise of supply chain logistics, mining and planning. In absolute terms yes, there is a finite amount of lithium in the crust. Transmutation aside, What we see in real life is unequal distribution and then bad modelling on assumptions this represents all available lithium when in reality it mistakes availability for existence. There is a lot more lithium in the world. The problem is finding it, and its price in extraction complexity, density, and other "costs" The ramp up time to replace all ICE with EV will consume a lot of Lithium. I have no doubt there will be rises and falls in costs of Lithium extraction, as a function of the investment cycle and demand. What I do doubt, is that we will "run out" for any reason other than investment in this discovery and extraction. What they're doing in the Salton Sea is sensible, and what will happen in Australia (which also has lithium rich soils) is sensible, and no, we're not entirely captive to some fantasy of "there isn't enough lithium in the world" Aside from anything else, there are other battery chemistries out there. Lithium battery chemistry is only the one we like now. [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Simon%E2%80%93Ehrlich_wager https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Simon%E2%80%93Ehrlich_wager
- AtlasBarfed 4y agoSodium Ion batteries are approaching somewhere in the 120-160 wh/kg in production, per CATL. I believe 200 wh/kg is on the industry "roadmap" in 3-5 years. I believe Sodium Ion is like LFP in its safety with thermal runaway, so it, like LFP, doesn't require as much cooling and equipment overhead so its Cell-to-Module, or even better, Cell-to-Pack is bettery than cobalt/nickel li-ion chemistries. A sodium ion battery that CATL says it is putting in production is sufficient for low-end consumer EV transport: the 100 mile city car, possibly a 200-mile one with good drivetrain design, if the Cell-to-Pack napkin math works out correctly. Concurrent with this, LFP batteries are reaching 200-230 wh/kg this year, which thanks to their bettery thermal protection, means the Cell-to-Pack density should be "good to go" for almost all Tesla car ranges today (my napkin math on Cell-to-Pack shows 400 miles for a model 3 for 230 wh/kg LFP). The extended range Tesla vehicles are overkill for 90% of world drivers, and at least 80% of Americans. The 300 mile range is the perfect range for the "next 10 years". The napkin math then says you can combine sodium ion and LFP to get to 300 mile pack designs, and no cobalt/nickel, reduced lithium from sodium ion, probably a 50/50 split or similar. This is for the next 2-4 years of mainstream car / EV production scaling, which is may be the most important for kickstarting true widespread EV and averting climate change that we have left. Hopefully in 2-4 years we get the following (per roadmaps): - 260+ wh/kg LFP - 180-200 wh/kg sodium ion That will mean all-sodium 300 mile range cars, mixed sodium/LFP for long range, light trucks, possibly long haul shipping + container ships. If we get 400 wk/kg or better solid state battery or Li-S, then all the better. Mix in those as needed, or maybe short haul aviation becomes possible, but the important thing is that for the majority of ground transport, sodium ion and lfp will serve to scale out huge portions of carbon emissions from transportation. wh/kg cited are all cell densities, but there is reference to Cell-to-pack being 90% of cell density for LFP and Sodium Ion approaches, which is where are the napkin math begins.
- dave333 4y agoLithium hydroxide sales could fund restoration of the Salton Sea using the "perimeter lake" concept or one of the other plans for a partial freshwater lake that doesn't require a large diversion of fresh water from the Colorado. Center would be dry playa with some irrigated vegetation or dry salt crust to prevent dust problems, maybe even golf course(s). Southern end of the lake would have brine habitat mostly for birds and geothermal/lithium plants. Total cost is roughly $10B which Lithium extraction would cover easily.
- pram 4y agoNot really the topic but the area around the Salton Sea is one of the wildest things I’ve ever seen. It literally looks like an apocalyptic wasteland. There’s ruined, half buried buildings near the shores. Tons of abandoned structures. Also the air was so acrid it was burning my eyes and nose the entire time. Absolutely surreal. Wouldn’t be out of place in a Fallout game.
- mds 4y agoAnd it is in fact the inspiration for "Sandy Shores" in GTA5.
- noduerme 4y agoThe smell is horrendous. And the shoreline is made of fish bones. The Salton Sea was an ecological disaster when it was accidentally created... the only thing that might make it worse now is if it dries out and the salt blows off.
- panick21_ 4y agoFor lithium hydroxide sales to fund anything they first need to actually manage to profitably produce it. And we are far away from that yet. And its very questionable that it will ever get three. And even if it does, the idea that it is profitable enough to finance all that people are hoping is questionable. Lithium mining is a low margin business.
- xiphias2 4y agoThe top voted question (tied with one about the new battery performance) on the Tesla Q&A is ,,How does Tesla plan to secure raw materials required to scale to extreme size?'' I'm quite interested in the answer as well (which we'll get on APRIL 20, 2022 4:30 PM CDT) https://app.saytechnologies.com/tesla-2022-q1 https://app.saytechnologies.com/tesla-2022-q1
- Animats 4y agoFinally, a use for the Salton Sea. Good.
- lesgobrandon 4y ago
- themitigating 4y agoAll this talk about Lithium feels like it's describing a new destructive force in the environment but won't this replace/reduce oil extraction? The Exxon Valdez, Deepwater Horizon oil spill, and I'm sure many other smaller disasters happened due to oil. I would even add in both gulf wars which costs massive amounts of money, resources, and lives wouldn't have happened if the US didn't have a vested interest in oil. As long as Lithium doesn't cause the same issues isn't that an improvement?
- throwaway1777 4y agoHave you ever seen a lithium mine? It’s pretty damn nasty.
- froh 4y agoPlease add the Ukraine war, Georgia (the country) and even Afghanistan to the list of oil/gas drilling or pipelining related. Ukraine: https://www.trade.gov/energy-resource-guide-ukraine-oil-and-gas https://www.trade.gov/energy-resource-guide-ukraine-oil-and-... Georgia: https://www.atlanticcouncil.org/blogs/new-atlanticist/the-greater-caspian-region-a-new-silk-road-with-or-without-a-new-belt/ https://www.atlanticcouncil.org/blogs/new-atlanticist/the-gr... Afghanistan (more disputed though) https://www.outlookindia.com/website/story/pipeline-politics-oil-gas-and-the-us-interest-in-afghanistan/213804 https://www.outlookindia.com/website/story/pipeline-politics...
- mburee 4y agoDidn't Ukraine regularly steal from Russian pipelines?
- themitigating 4y agoWhat does that have to do with the impact of oil production?
- panick21_ 4y agoThere are a number of issues with that logic. Lithium isn't burnt up and released into the air. You build one battery with a few kg of lithium inside and that will drive you for 100000s of miles and might have use in other applications after that. And even at the very end of life, the pack still has all the metal in it an can be recycled (and that will make sense once the scale is large enough). Unlike Oil, lithium is highly distributed in the earth crust. Pretty much every place on earth has some form of lithium assets. Going to war for lithium would be even more dumb then going to war over oil (and its questionable that Golf wars were about that at all). As for mining. Lithium can be sourced many different ways. Traditional hard rock lithium mines are basically not all that different from nickel or copper mines. Not the cleanest thing in the world but its also not specially different or dangerous. Its also a way larger scale then copper and will never reach that scale. Lithium however can also be sources in a way that is environmentally totally fine. If you have some brine resources and you use DLE, you end up taking a little of the salt out of the water and putting the water back. Nothing in the ecosystem depends on the salt content being just a little higher as far as we know. Lithium can also be based on clay mining, in such a process its very likely to require a lot of tonnage mined, but its also likely that after you extract the lithium you just put the clay back where it came from. Places where this would be done would likely be deserts where nobody lives. A current common way is to use brine and let the sun evaporate most of the water. This is environmentally sub-optimal as it actually can use water. But even here its not clear exactly how this is bad, its more maybe a risk that we don't fully understand. So in summation, there is really nothing like 'Deepwater Horizon'. And even if their was, the result would simply be the ocean being a tiny bit more salty.
- jupp0r 4y agoOT but I'm constantly infuriated by media outlets' incapability to properly use units of energy and power and distinguish between them: "There are eleven commercial geothermal plants at the Salton Sea, producing 400 megawatts of geothermal energy a year." Is this really so hard? Nobody who took physics in high school able to proof read this otherwise excellent article? None of the chemical engineering/geology professors interviewed for the article able to land a hand there?
- froh 4y agoI agree. sidenote: Lend. Lend a hand.
- mattkrause 4y agoI asked about this when I was interviewed about my own research. Journalists generally believe that it is inappropriate, or even unethical, to let "sources" see, let alone edit, an article before publication. Some don't even want the copy leaving the newsroom at all. I think this is derived from more investigative/adversarial types of reporting. If Mayor Quimby accidentally mentions that "a friend" gave him a new car, you don't want him to edit that out of a story about bribery allegations. However, it's a weird fit for writing where seemingly similar words may have very different meanings. More here: https://www.poynter.org/reporting-editing/2020/should-journalists-let-sources-look-over-stories-before-publication/ https://www.poynter.org/reporting-editing/2020/should-journa... I'd note that this seems much more...flexible than the journalists I spoke with.
- rob_c 4y agoIt not like california despite all its "green cred" has one of the worst track records for industrial pollution on and off land mind, what could go wrong...