11 ms·

'We don’t have enough' lithium globally to meet EV targets, mining CEO says

118 points by clouddrover 4y ago

superchroma 4y ago
"one miner warned that when it comes to the transportation sector, domestic resources for lithium may not be sufficient enough to meet some of the most ambitious targets." "The Biden administration, for instance, aims to cut sales of ICE vehicles to 50% of all new purchases by 2030, to which the source says “Yes, we’ll [eventually] have enough, but not by that time,”" This article is all over the place. It immediately undermines the title for a few paragraphs and ends with the buried real story, where it seems like the real complaint is that US lithium project permitting takes too long and that Australia is faster. Journalism can go take a long walk off a short pier.
brink 4y ago
So what you're saying is.. That politicians are out of touch with reality?
nortonham 4y ago
maybe less EV's, and more improved public transportation?
- ekianjo 4y ago
  > more improved public transportation? always this ignorant in every thread like that. most people dont live in huge city centers where public transportation is abundant.
  - dayjaby 4y ago
    Nothing ignorant here, especially considering the fact that it's the cities which are brimful of cars.
    - preommr 4y ago
      It is a tiring comment given that they're not mutually exclusive and that the forms of public transport that are mutually exclusive like railways are horribly expensive to the point that they're almost not viable. Bay area rail costs are like 2-3 billion per mile. The areas where these kinds of public transport solutions are most effective are also where it's the most expensive and most likely to face extreme friction.
      - nortonham 4y ago
        they may not be mutually exclusive. Doesn't change the fact that US public transportation and needs to be updated, and more new public transport built. We have the world's biggest "defense" budget by some margin, but we can't improve our infrastructure?
  - torginus 4y ago
    56% of the world population lives in cities. While not a perfect measure, it's a decent ballpark for the amount of folks who could feasibly use public transport.
    - ekianjo 4y ago
      And even the biggest cities with the best public transportation systems have a low coverage in terms of area. This is why this is such an ignorant comment.
  - nortonham 4y ago
    doesn't mean our public transportation in cities and between cities here in the US can't be improved. In fact, it should be if we are to reduce our dependency on cars, which we have to do if for the environment and our own well being.
- toiletfuneral 4y ago
- Pxtl 4y ago
  This. The EV revolution isn't here to save the world, it's here to save the automobile industry. LRTs with overhead catenaries are electric vehicles without batteries. Let's build more of those.
  - deleted 4y ago
    [deleted]
  - dontlaugh 4y ago
    Trolley buses with small batteries are great too. They mostly use the grid, but are able to go a few km without in case of disruption.
    - Pxtl 4y ago
      One neat tech is the "capabus" which is a bus with a supercapacitor that has a range of only a few miles but charges wirelessly near-instantly. So instead of catenaries you put chargers around the route at major stops.
- matheusmoreira 4y ago
  No thanks. I'd rather have my own vehicle. Much more convenient.
  - kelnos 4y ago
    That's fine, I guess, but I think plenty of people would get rid of their car if public transit was more ubiquitous, reliable, and convenient. Even people (like myself) who would choose to still have a car in that scenario, we might use the car less often, which would reduce wear and tear on it (thus increasing the length of its useful life). That would also serve to reduce demand for new vehicles.
    - matheusmoreira 4y ago
      Sure. Good public transportation is always desirable. I just don't want it to be an argument against electric cars which would be a huge improvement.
      - sanxiyn 4y ago
        Since money is fungible, argument for good public transportation is argument against electric car subsidy and vice versa, whether you like it or not. Like, we could scrap electric car subsidy and use money on public transportation instead. And I argue we should: at the moment, electric car subsidy is stupid, people are in line to buy electric cars, there is no need for subsidy.
  - bigDinosaur 4y ago
    I'd rather have a private jet, too, but I don't think my personal desires are the only salient factor here.
    - matheusmoreira 4y ago
      If desires aren't a factor, they should be. I'm willing to spend money on a car that I can charge at home like a smartphone. It would reduce my fuel costs to zero because I have a lot of solar panels. I'll even install more solar panels if necessary. The so called free market needs to make it happen. If there's a lithium shortage, then mine more.
- switchbak 4y ago
  I'd settle for subsidized ebikes and safer bike lanes. Not for everyone obviously, but in my world that would get a lot more people out of their cars. Good public transit would be great too though.
  - TaylorAlexander 4y ago
    I'm about to move to a bikable area and I am planning to do an ebike conversion. I am suuuper excited to finally have an electric vehicle, and the actual energy usage is super low! A 0.9 kWh pack will take you 60 miles and costs ten cents to fill up. People talk about electric cars versus trains but subsidized ebikes are something we can do now and would make a huge difference! Just the idea that I can ebike to the BART station, hop on the train and end up all over the bay, ebike where I need to go and get back all for a few dollars is exciting.
    - supertrope 4y ago
      E-Bikes still depend on municipal bike infrastructure which cannot be individually purchased. Re-allocation of on-street parking to protected bike lanes, traffic calming, legalization of denser housing has to happen at the public policy level.
      - TaylorAlexander 4y ago
        Yes absolutely! I am really pleased to find that the Bay Area governments have done a lot of work there, and I found that they have active plans to continue this build out. But I guess what I am saying is they are much more energy efficient than electric cars, and the infrastructure requirements are way simpler than trains. By the way I just found the mode on Google Maps that highlights bike friendly roads and it is cool to explore. https://www.google.com/maps/@37.8149208,-122.2338056,13.13z/data=!5m2!1e4!1e3 https://www.google.com/maps/@37.8149208,-122.2338056,13.13z/... You can read more about the long term plans to better support bike paths in the Bay Area on the Plan Bay Area 2050. https://www.planbayarea.org/ https://www.planbayarea.org/ For example they are going to expand the bike path on the Bay Bridge that currently goes from Oakland to Treasure Island so that it connects all the way to San Francisco: https://mtc.ca.gov/planning/transportation/bicycle-pedestrian-micromobility/bay-skyway https://mtc.ca.gov/planning/transportation/bicycle-pedestria... I just thought all that was neat. Anyway you are totally right. I just think this stuff is simpler than trains to implement so it is important to consider, though I fully support trains too! A good plan should include both. Also I am not saying we should leave this up to individuals. But for example we have seen huge subsidies for electric cars while subsidies for ebikes have been lacking, with some movement finally towards that direction. I'm in favor of government plans that emphasize the green value of ebikes in addition to trains and electric cars.
- mesarvagya 4y ago
  This should be the way. Make really connected public transportation and discourage private vehicle ownership. This is the only way to beat global car emissions and climate change.
  - TotoHorner 4y ago
    - sofixa 4y ago
      My grandparents live in a small village (maybe a few hundred inhabitants, but most of them are old people so don't know how many are still alive) with a regular train connection to the nearby "big city" (27k inhabitants). And that's in the poorest country in the EU. Park and ride is a popular way to bridge very low density with public transit.
      - asdff 4y ago
        Many rural american towns used to be like this too. Then the passenger rail stations were raised and streetcar tracks torn out in most places after WW2 if not sooner.
      - nec4b 4y ago
        What about people in the neighboring village without a train connection?
    - asdff 4y ago
      Do rural people need to take a v8 for each and every trip they take in life from their home?
- dzhiurgis 4y ago
  And power storage for solar panels..? France has buses that quick charge at every second stop with batteries size of Tesla (70 kwh IIRC).
justahuman74 4y ago
"Mining CEO advises that more mining is needed."
noipv4 4y ago
How about research into Sodium ion batteries? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sodium-ion_battery https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sodium-ion_battery
- kelnos 4y ago
  I doubt they'd be a suitable replacement for Li-Ion, since their energy density is so much lower. They could be a great replacement for lead-acid batteries (batteries present in ICE cars), and probably some other applications, like when you want a rechargeable battery, but you don't care quite so much about the space required or weight. Unfortunately, when it comes to a phone, laptop, or EV, you really do care a lot about the space and weight.
  - raverbashing 4y ago
    > like when you want a rechargeable battery, but you don't care quite so much about the space required or weight. Like all those batteries that Tesla and other companies installed for grid stabilization and load shifting? Yeah, that's where it's going to be used.
  - throwawaymaths 4y ago
    If we go the way we need to, most battery applications (by total battery storage, not by unit produced) won't need space or weight constraints. Of course a car or phone phone will need to be lithium but there's no reason a Tesla powerwall (currently lithium) couldn't be 0.5x bigger; or certainly grid level electricity storage (currently CA has one second? I think and there is a plan to expand to three days of grid level). Probably even some semis or buses would be ok with a bigger battery
    - AstralStorm 4y ago
      Not to mention all of these issues (hot operating temperature, insulation weight) are easier to improve than ultimate capacity.
  - darkwater 4y ago
alex_young 4y ago
Lithium is nearly twice as abundant as lead in the earth’s crust. I don’t hear anyone saying we’re running out of lead.
- thoughtstheseus 4y ago
  We are not running out. The article states current electrification goals are not feasible based on existing raw material production (mining). Bear in mind the overwhelming majority of global industrial infrastructure needs to be replaced. Recycling is also not clear cut for many of the metals and minerals needed. It’s a big gap to meet and few want to mine.
- 8note 4y ago
  Are we currently trying to cover the world in a thin layer of lead like we are for lithium?
  - conception 4y ago
    There’s a second amendment nut joke in there somewhere.
  - CGamesPlay 4y ago
    Probably a better way to say this is “we are currently trying to cover the world in a slightly thicker layer of lithium than we are lead”. Lead’s everywhere! Including in (non-EV) car batteries and until recently some forms of petrol, which are pretty much everywhere.
    - idiocrat 4y ago
      Lithium is a psychotropics. I wonder what would be the unintended consequences of exposing the environment with higher concentration of lithium. (the thicker layer)
      - henearkr 4y ago
        Actually, maybe good consequences. Lithium presence in drinking water (from natural sources) has been linked to lower crimes rate, suicides rate, and is acting as a mood stabilizer.
actually_a_dog 4y ago
It gets worse. There isn't enough of a lot of different metals to build the renewable energy capacity to replace fossil fuels: https://www.counterpunch.org/2022/08/23/is-there-enough-metal-to-replace-oil/ https://www.counterpunch.org/2022/08/23/is-there-enough-meta...
- thoughtstheseus 4y ago
  In hindsight we should’ve replaced the fossil fuel industrial base back when oil was $10 a barrel.
- stephen_g 4y ago
  None of the researchers I read on renewable tech took that study seriously. From what I recall, I believe it makes some incredible assumptions that are very sketchy. Like assuming the need for massive amounts of grid storage (like four weeks or more), and assuming it’s all a single battery chemistry (that contains cobalt even though most stationary storage has already moved to other chemistries). In the real world, the actual grid storage requirements won’t be anything like that, there are other battery chemistries that might take over some of the market from lithium-based ones (like sodium or sulphur based), lots of storage will be pumped hydro, some will be flow batteries (not just vanadium but zinc-bromide), plenty of copper conductors can be switched to aluminium, energy efficiency measures (like heat pumps) will reduce the amount of energy needed compared to gas heating, etc. etc.
  - switchbak 4y ago
    I find it hard to take seriously an article that suggests we'll still be using the same battery chemistry some 28 years from now. The number of compounding innovations likely to take place between now and then is certainly a lot based on historical precedent, and I think it's bonkers to not factor that in. If scarcity is really that much of an issue, even a less efficient chemistry could supplant lithium. But a more likely outcome is we'll use something novel that we can't foresee from this moment in time. And the future science journalists will write about how we don't have enough of that either.
graycat 4y ago
A click-bait headline? From about 1917 in Arabia in the classic movie Lawrence of Arabia, a newsman talking to the prince: "You want your story told, and I desperately want a story to tell." Gee, there may not be enough plastic for everyone to have their own Hula Hoop.
babalulu 4y ago
Cool Worlds did a great piece on this a few weeks ago. It's worth watching if you have an interest in this subject. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AHgAcbpsujI https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AHgAcbpsujI
Melatonic 4y ago
Guess we are going to have to increase mining of it and find a bunch more sources of it then. Which is literally what humans have done for every raw material out there !
defrost 4y ago
TBH this reads more like a Piedmont Lithium (USofA) problem than it does a Global Resources (world) problem. Over half of the worlds known lithium reserves (ie roughly measured) are undeveloped in places like Bolivia (with 21 million tonnes out of the known 89 million tonnes) and other not-USofA locations. I stress known as that is distinct from "all" as it is restricted to those deposits that have been sufficiently exploration drilled to form an estimate. > Projects get permitted [in Australia] in under a year,” Phillips explained. “Here, it's two, four, six, seven, eight years, which is a problem, especially in a business that's booming so fast.” is, in my opinion, the crux of this article and interview. Phillips wants to mine more and faster within the US. People with an interest might like to get a demo | account with: Metals & Mining | S&P Global Market Intelligence https://www.spglobal.com/marketintelligence/en/campaigns/metals-mining https://www.spglobal.com/marketintelligence/en/campaigns/met...
- fourstar 4y ago
  - froh 4y ago
    yeah. like these ugly windmills, also a horrible sight. /s on a serious note we need to be careful in shaping the world, and a license to mine has to be bound to a plan and a budget for recultivation, for restoration of a habitable and nice landscape.
    - btilly 4y ago
      My favorite restored mine is https://www.butchartgardens.com/ https://www.butchartgardens.com/. I sometimes wonder how many tourists visiting it realize that it started as a strip mine.
      - ehnto 4y ago
        50 full time gardeners, 26 green houses, 55 acres of garden. That's quite the operation, incredible work!
azeemh 4y ago
hydrogen fcev is the way.
- theshrike79 4y ago
  Hydrogen production still needs its own Elon Musk. It's not even slightly viable unless you get the sweet Toyota $15k credit for hydrogen. In my country there are exactly 0 hydrogen refuelling stations, I'd need to grab my passport to go refuel =) There are 4 L3 quick chargers 5 minutes away. 4 more 10 minutes away. And I can charge where I park.
  - senectus1 4y ago
    watch this space.. they're coming.
    - theshrike79 4y ago
      I've been watching this space for ... 20 years? All that time Hydrogen cars have been right around the corner. Nowadays it mostly seems to be people who, for some reason, hate battery electric vehicles and are pointing at the "coming soon" hydrogen vehicles as a reason why they still use an ICE. Even though a hydrogen powered vehicle IS an EV except that ~80% of the battery is replaced with hydrogen tanks and a fuel cell... (Yes, Toyota has a prototype car that can run on straight-up hydrogen for like 10 miles at a time)
  - defrost 4y ago
    Twiggy Forrest [1] https://www.businessnewsaustralia.com/articles/forrest-pens-multi-billion-dollar-green-hydrogen-deal-to-transition-european-energy-away-from-russia.html https://www.businessnewsaustralia.com/articles/forrest-pens-... [2] https://www.crikey.com.au/2022/09/05/twiggy-green-hydrogen-rick-and-morty/ https://www.crikey.com.au/2022/09/05/twiggy-green-hydrogen-r...
- ncmncm 4y ago
  Market forces will take care of this, if needed. If battery price goes up, hydrogen vehicles are favored. What hydrogen vehicles need now is cheaper catalysts for their fuel cells. Hydrogen-powered vehicles are much, much lighter than battery-driven, so consume less energy in operation. Balanced against that, electrolysing hydrogen has some losses, and braking doesn't regenerate hydrogen you used.
surfsvammel 4y ago
Well that’s because he comes from mining. We have plenty of lithium in the oceans waiting to get harvested. We also have the technology to harvest lithium from the oceans.
- sieabahlpark 4y ago
- defrost 4y ago
  From a mineral resources PoV vacumming up ocean floor nodules and metals extraction from seawater also count as "mining" .. just not in the dwarves underground with pick axes sense. The issue, for now, with lithium from seawater is the cost of the extraction techniques at scale - the economic feasibility isn't there for now. > Although multiple groups of researchers have devised ways to harvest lithium from the ocean, none of the methods are currently practical. “It’s technically possible to extract lithium from seawater,” although: > Still, the biggest challenge in devising a practical system for extracting lithium from the ocean is the metal’s ultralow concentration in seawater. There are many sources of salt-enriched water with high lithium concentrations, including salty lakes, brine used in geothermal power plants, and brackish water generated from oil and gas production. Some researchers have started to look at those sources as a more practical starting point than ocean water. “If the lithium concentration starts out 10–100 times higher, then electrochemical systems could be economically feasible,” Cui says. [0] https://cen.acs.org/materials/inorganic-chemistry/Can-seawater-give-us-lithium-to-meet-our-battery-needs/99/i36 https://cen.acs.org/materials/inorganic-chemistry/Can-seawat...
manmal 4y ago
> During Tesla’s last earning call, the CEO encouraged entrepreneurs to get into the lithium processing business – referring to it as “a license to print money”: >> So it is basically like minting money right now. There’s like software margins in lithium processing right now. So I would really like to encourage, once again, entrepreneurs to enter the lithium refining business. You can’t lose. It’s a license to print money. https://electrek.co/2022/09/09/tesla-license-to-print-money-lithium-refining-factory-texas/ https://electrek.co/2022/09/09/tesla-license-to-print-money-...
rXoX 4y ago
rXoX 4y ago
TedShiller 4y ago
Anyone who has seen the environmental effects of lithium mining first hand will never want to drive an EV again. Sad, but true.
- peterashford 4y ago
  I think global warming is a bigger issue
  - TedShiller 4y ago
    lithium mining is extremely energy intensive and creates a lot of carbon emission
tmaly 4y ago
I am hopeful that alternative materials can be developed https://news.mit.edu/2022/aluminum-sulfur-battery-0824 https://news.mit.edu/2022/aluminum-sulfur-battery-0824

118 points by clouddrover 4y ago

"one miner warned that when it comes to the transportation sector, domestic resources for lithium may not be sufficient enough to meet some of the most ambitious targets." "The Biden administration, for instance, aims to cut sales of ICE vehicles to 50% of all new purchases by 2030, to which the source says “Yes, we’ll [eventually] have enough, but not by that time,”" This article is all over the place. It immediately undermines the title for a few paragraphs and ends with the buried real story, where it seems like the real complaint is that US lithium project permitting takes too long and that Australia is faster. Journalism can go take a long walk off a short pier.

brink 4y ago

So what you're saying is.. That politicians are out of touch with reality?

nortonham 4y ago

maybe less EV's, and more improved public transportation?

ekianjo 4y ago
> more improved public transportation? always this ignorant in every thread like that. most people dont live in huge city centers where public transportation is abundant.
- dayjaby 4y ago
  Nothing ignorant here, especially considering the fact that it's the cities which are brimful of cars.
  - preommr 4y ago
    It is a tiring comment given that they're not mutually exclusive and that the forms of public transport that are mutually exclusive like railways are horribly expensive to the point that they're almost not viable. Bay area rail costs are like 2-3 billion per mile. The areas where these kinds of public transport solutions are most effective are also where it's the most expensive and most likely to face extreme friction.
    - nortonham 4y ago
      they may not be mutually exclusive. Doesn't change the fact that US public transportation and needs to be updated, and more new public transport built. We have the world's biggest "defense" budget by some margin, but we can't improve our infrastructure?
- torginus 4y ago
  56% of the world population lives in cities. While not a perfect measure, it's a decent ballpark for the amount of folks who could feasibly use public transport.
  - ekianjo 4y ago
    And even the biggest cities with the best public transportation systems have a low coverage in terms of area. This is why this is such an ignorant comment.
- nortonham 4y ago
  doesn't mean our public transportation in cities and between cities here in the US can't be improved. In fact, it should be if we are to reduce our dependency on cars, which we have to do if for the environment and our own well being.
toiletfuneral 4y ago
Pxtl 4y ago
This. The EV revolution isn't here to save the world, it's here to save the automobile industry. LRTs with overhead catenaries are electric vehicles without batteries. Let's build more of those.
- deleted 4y ago
  [deleted]
- dontlaugh 4y ago
  Trolley buses with small batteries are great too. They mostly use the grid, but are able to go a few km without in case of disruption.
  - Pxtl 4y ago
    One neat tech is the "capabus" which is a bus with a supercapacitor that has a range of only a few miles but charges wirelessly near-instantly. So instead of catenaries you put chargers around the route at major stops.
matheusmoreira 4y ago
No thanks. I'd rather have my own vehicle. Much more convenient.
- kelnos 4y ago
  That's fine, I guess, but I think plenty of people would get rid of their car if public transit was more ubiquitous, reliable, and convenient. Even people (like myself) who would choose to still have a car in that scenario, we might use the car less often, which would reduce wear and tear on it (thus increasing the length of its useful life). That would also serve to reduce demand for new vehicles.
  - matheusmoreira 4y ago
    Sure. Good public transportation is always desirable. I just don't want it to be an argument against electric cars which would be a huge improvement.
    - sanxiyn 4y ago
      Since money is fungible, argument for good public transportation is argument against electric car subsidy and vice versa, whether you like it or not. Like, we could scrap electric car subsidy and use money on public transportation instead. And I argue we should: at the moment, electric car subsidy is stupid, people are in line to buy electric cars, there is no need for subsidy.
- bigDinosaur 4y ago
  I'd rather have a private jet, too, but I don't think my personal desires are the only salient factor here.
  - matheusmoreira 4y ago
    If desires aren't a factor, they should be. I'm willing to spend money on a car that I can charge at home like a smartphone. It would reduce my fuel costs to zero because I have a lot of solar panels. I'll even install more solar panels if necessary. The so called free market needs to make it happen. If there's a lithium shortage, then mine more.
switchbak 4y ago
I'd settle for subsidized ebikes and safer bike lanes. Not for everyone obviously, but in my world that would get a lot more people out of their cars. Good public transit would be great too though.
- TaylorAlexander 4y ago
  I'm about to move to a bikable area and I am planning to do an ebike conversion. I am suuuper excited to finally have an electric vehicle, and the actual energy usage is super low! A 0.9 kWh pack will take you 60 miles and costs ten cents to fill up. People talk about electric cars versus trains but subsidized ebikes are something we can do now and would make a huge difference! Just the idea that I can ebike to the BART station, hop on the train and end up all over the bay, ebike where I need to go and get back all for a few dollars is exciting.
  - supertrope 4y ago
    E-Bikes still depend on municipal bike infrastructure which cannot be individually purchased. Re-allocation of on-street parking to protected bike lanes, traffic calming, legalization of denser housing has to happen at the public policy level.
    - TaylorAlexander 4y ago
      Yes absolutely! I am really pleased to find that the Bay Area governments have done a lot of work there, and I found that they have active plans to continue this build out. But I guess what I am saying is they are much more energy efficient than electric cars, and the infrastructure requirements are way simpler than trains. By the way I just found the mode on Google Maps that highlights bike friendly roads and it is cool to explore. https://www.google.com/maps/@37.8149208,-122.2338056,13.13z/data=!5m2!1e4!1e3 https://www.google.com/maps/@37.8149208,-122.2338056,13.13z/... You can read more about the long term plans to better support bike paths in the Bay Area on the Plan Bay Area 2050. https://www.planbayarea.org/ https://www.planbayarea.org/ For example they are going to expand the bike path on the Bay Bridge that currently goes from Oakland to Treasure Island so that it connects all the way to San Francisco: https://mtc.ca.gov/planning/transportation/bicycle-pedestrian-micromobility/bay-skyway https://mtc.ca.gov/planning/transportation/bicycle-pedestria... I just thought all that was neat. Anyway you are totally right. I just think this stuff is simpler than trains to implement so it is important to consider, though I fully support trains too! A good plan should include both. Also I am not saying we should leave this up to individuals. But for example we have seen huge subsidies for electric cars while subsidies for ebikes have been lacking, with some movement finally towards that direction. I'm in favor of government plans that emphasize the green value of ebikes in addition to trains and electric cars.
mesarvagya 4y ago
This should be the way. Make really connected public transportation and discourage private vehicle ownership. This is the only way to beat global car emissions and climate change.
- TotoHorner 4y ago
  - sofixa 4y ago
    My grandparents live in a small village (maybe a few hundred inhabitants, but most of them are old people so don't know how many are still alive) with a regular train connection to the nearby "big city" (27k inhabitants). And that's in the poorest country in the EU. Park and ride is a popular way to bridge very low density with public transit.
    - asdff 4y ago
      Many rural american towns used to be like this too. Then the passenger rail stations were raised and streetcar tracks torn out in most places after WW2 if not sooner.
    - nec4b 4y ago
      What about people in the neighboring village without a train connection?
  - asdff 4y ago
    Do rural people need to take a v8 for each and every trip they take in life from their home?
dzhiurgis 4y ago
And power storage for solar panels..? France has buses that quick charge at every second stop with batteries size of Tesla (70 kwh IIRC).

justahuman74 4y ago

"Mining CEO advises that more mining is needed."

noipv4 4y ago

How about research into Sodium ion batteries? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sodium-ion_battery https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sodium-ion_battery

kelnos 4y ago
I doubt they'd be a suitable replacement for Li-Ion, since their energy density is so much lower. They could be a great replacement for lead-acid batteries (batteries present in ICE cars), and probably some other applications, like when you want a rechargeable battery, but you don't care quite so much about the space required or weight. Unfortunately, when it comes to a phone, laptop, or EV, you really do care a lot about the space and weight.
- raverbashing 4y ago
  > like when you want a rechargeable battery, but you don't care quite so much about the space required or weight. Like all those batteries that Tesla and other companies installed for grid stabilization and load shifting? Yeah, that's where it's going to be used.
- throwawaymaths 4y ago
  If we go the way we need to, most battery applications (by total battery storage, not by unit produced) won't need space or weight constraints. Of course a car or phone phone will need to be lithium but there's no reason a Tesla powerwall (currently lithium) couldn't be 0.5x bigger; or certainly grid level electricity storage (currently CA has one second? I think and there is a plan to expand to three days of grid level). Probably even some semis or buses would be ok with a bigger battery
  - AstralStorm 4y ago
    Not to mention all of these issues (hot operating temperature, insulation weight) are easier to improve than ultimate capacity.
- darkwater 4y ago

alex_young 4y ago

Lithium is nearly twice as abundant as lead in the earth’s crust. I don’t hear anyone saying we’re running out of lead.

thoughtstheseus 4y ago
We are not running out. The article states current electrification goals are not feasible based on existing raw material production (mining). Bear in mind the overwhelming majority of global industrial infrastructure needs to be replaced. Recycling is also not clear cut for many of the metals and minerals needed. It’s a big gap to meet and few want to mine.
8note 4y ago
Are we currently trying to cover the world in a thin layer of lead like we are for lithium?
- conception 4y ago
  There’s a second amendment nut joke in there somewhere.
- CGamesPlay 4y ago
  Probably a better way to say this is “we are currently trying to cover the world in a slightly thicker layer of lithium than we are lead”. Lead’s everywhere! Including in (non-EV) car batteries and until recently some forms of petrol, which are pretty much everywhere.
  - idiocrat 4y ago
    Lithium is a psychotropics. I wonder what would be the unintended consequences of exposing the environment with higher concentration of lithium. (the thicker layer)
    - henearkr 4y ago
      Actually, maybe good consequences. Lithium presence in drinking water (from natural sources) has been linked to lower crimes rate, suicides rate, and is acting as a mood stabilizer.

actually_a_dog 4y ago

It gets worse. There isn't enough of a lot of different metals to build the renewable energy capacity to replace fossil fuels: https://www.counterpunch.org/2022/08/23/is-there-enough-metal-to-replace-oil/ https://www.counterpunch.org/2022/08/23/is-there-enough-meta...

thoughtstheseus 4y ago
In hindsight we should’ve replaced the fossil fuel industrial base back when oil was $10 a barrel.
stephen_g 4y ago
None of the researchers I read on renewable tech took that study seriously. From what I recall, I believe it makes some incredible assumptions that are very sketchy. Like assuming the need for massive amounts of grid storage (like four weeks or more), and assuming it’s all a single battery chemistry (that contains cobalt even though most stationary storage has already moved to other chemistries). In the real world, the actual grid storage requirements won’t be anything like that, there are other battery chemistries that might take over some of the market from lithium-based ones (like sodium or sulphur based), lots of storage will be pumped hydro, some will be flow batteries (not just vanadium but zinc-bromide), plenty of copper conductors can be switched to aluminium, energy efficiency measures (like heat pumps) will reduce the amount of energy needed compared to gas heating, etc. etc.
- switchbak 4y ago
  I find it hard to take seriously an article that suggests we'll still be using the same battery chemistry some 28 years from now. The number of compounding innovations likely to take place between now and then is certainly a lot based on historical precedent, and I think it's bonkers to not factor that in. If scarcity is really that much of an issue, even a less efficient chemistry could supplant lithium. But a more likely outcome is we'll use something novel that we can't foresee from this moment in time. And the future science journalists will write about how we don't have enough of that either.

graycat 4y ago

A click-bait headline? From about 1917 in Arabia in the classic movie Lawrence of Arabia, a newsman talking to the prince: "You want your story told, and I desperately want a story to tell." Gee, there may not be enough plastic for everyone to have their own Hula Hoop.

babalulu 4y ago

Cool Worlds did a great piece on this a few weeks ago. It's worth watching if you have an interest in this subject. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AHgAcbpsujI https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AHgAcbpsujI

Melatonic 4y ago

Guess we are going to have to increase mining of it and find a bunch more sources of it then. Which is literally what humans have done for every raw material out there !

defrost 4y ago

TBH this reads more like a Piedmont Lithium (USofA) problem than it does a Global Resources (world) problem. Over half of the worlds known lithium reserves (ie roughly measured) are undeveloped in places like Bolivia (with 21 million tonnes out of the known 89 million tonnes) and other not-USofA locations. I stress known as that is distinct from "all" as it is restricted to those deposits that have been sufficiently exploration drilled to form an estimate. > Projects get permitted [in Australia] in under a year,” Phillips explained. “Here, it's two, four, six, seven, eight years, which is a problem, especially in a business that's booming so fast.” is, in my opinion, the crux of this article and interview. Phillips wants to mine more and faster within the US. People with an interest might like to get a demo | account with: Metals & Mining | S&P Global Market Intelligence https://www.spglobal.com/marketintelligence/en/campaigns/metals-mining https://www.spglobal.com/marketintelligence/en/campaigns/met...

fourstar 4y ago
- froh 4y ago
  yeah. like these ugly windmills, also a horrible sight. /s on a serious note we need to be careful in shaping the world, and a license to mine has to be bound to a plan and a budget for recultivation, for restoration of a habitable and nice landscape.
  - btilly 4y ago
    My favorite restored mine is https://www.butchartgardens.com/ https://www.butchartgardens.com/. I sometimes wonder how many tourists visiting it realize that it started as a strip mine.
    - ehnto 4y ago
      50 full time gardeners, 26 green houses, 55 acres of garden. That's quite the operation, incredible work!

azeemh 4y ago

hydrogen fcev is the way.

theshrike79 4y ago
Hydrogen production still needs its own Elon Musk. It's not even slightly viable unless you get the sweet Toyota $15k credit for hydrogen. In my country there are exactly 0 hydrogen refuelling stations, I'd need to grab my passport to go refuel =) There are 4 L3 quick chargers 5 minutes away. 4 more 10 minutes away. And I can charge where I park.
- senectus1 4y ago
  watch this space.. they're coming.
  - theshrike79 4y ago
    I've been watching this space for ... 20 years? All that time Hydrogen cars have been right around the corner. Nowadays it mostly seems to be people who, for some reason, hate battery electric vehicles and are pointing at the "coming soon" hydrogen vehicles as a reason why they still use an ICE. Even though a hydrogen powered vehicle IS an EV except that ~80% of the battery is replaced with hydrogen tanks and a fuel cell... (Yes, Toyota has a prototype car that can run on straight-up hydrogen for like 10 miles at a time)
- defrost 4y ago
  Twiggy Forrest [1] https://www.businessnewsaustralia.com/articles/forrest-pens-multi-billion-dollar-green-hydrogen-deal-to-transition-european-energy-away-from-russia.html https://www.businessnewsaustralia.com/articles/forrest-pens-... [2] https://www.crikey.com.au/2022/09/05/twiggy-green-hydrogen-rick-and-morty/ https://www.crikey.com.au/2022/09/05/twiggy-green-hydrogen-r...
ncmncm 4y ago
Market forces will take care of this, if needed. If battery price goes up, hydrogen vehicles are favored. What hydrogen vehicles need now is cheaper catalysts for their fuel cells. Hydrogen-powered vehicles are much, much lighter than battery-driven, so consume less energy in operation. Balanced against that, electrolysing hydrogen has some losses, and braking doesn't regenerate hydrogen you used.

surfsvammel 4y ago

Well that’s because he comes from mining. We have plenty of lithium in the oceans waiting to get harvested. We also have the technology to harvest lithium from the oceans.

sieabahlpark 4y ago
defrost 4y ago
From a mineral resources PoV vacumming up ocean floor nodules and metals extraction from seawater also count as "mining" .. just not in the dwarves underground with pick axes sense. The issue, for now, with lithium from seawater is the cost of the extraction techniques at scale - the economic feasibility isn't there for now. > Although multiple groups of researchers have devised ways to harvest lithium from the ocean, none of the methods are currently practical. “It’s technically possible to extract lithium from seawater,” although: > Still, the biggest challenge in devising a practical system for extracting lithium from the ocean is the metal’s ultralow concentration in seawater. There are many sources of salt-enriched water with high lithium concentrations, including salty lakes, brine used in geothermal power plants, and brackish water generated from oil and gas production. Some researchers have started to look at those sources as a more practical starting point than ocean water. “If the lithium concentration starts out 10–100 times higher, then electrochemical systems could be economically feasible,” Cui says. [0] https://cen.acs.org/materials/inorganic-chemistry/Can-seawater-give-us-lithium-to-meet-our-battery-needs/99/i36 https://cen.acs.org/materials/inorganic-chemistry/Can-seawat...

manmal 4y ago

> During Tesla’s last earning call, the CEO encouraged entrepreneurs to get into the lithium processing business – referring to it as “a license to print money”: >> So it is basically like minting money right now. There’s like software margins in lithium processing right now. So I would really like to encourage, once again, entrepreneurs to enter the lithium refining business. You can’t lose. It’s a license to print money. https://electrek.co/2022/09/09/tesla-license-to-print-money-lithium-refining-factory-texas/ https://electrek.co/2022/09/09/tesla-license-to-print-money-...

rXoX 4y ago

TedShiller 4y ago

Anyone who has seen the environmental effects of lithium mining first hand will never want to drive an EV again. Sad, but true.

peterashford 4y ago
I think global warming is a bigger issue
- TedShiller 4y ago
  lithium mining is extremely energy intensive and creates a lot of carbon emission

tmaly 4y ago

I am hopeful that alternative materials can be developed https://news.mit.edu/2022/aluminum-sulfur-battery-0824 https://news.mit.edu/2022/aluminum-sulfur-battery-0824