Critics of electric cars would such as you to believe that all the mining for all the minerals wanted in EVs is carried out by environmentally destructive means. This may not be a wholly correct representation of the actual mining and extraction process that will get the lithium essential in your Li-Ion battery. And the processes are getting cleaner on a regular basis.

Lithium is needed to make batteries for electric automobiles. Right now, most lithium comes from Australia-51,000 tons of it in 2019. Second-highest producer of lithium is Chile with 16,000 tons. The checklist drops off precipitously from there. But the world goes to need much more very soon, particularly carmakers comparable to GM, which, along with many if not a lot of the world’s carmakers has pledged to go all-EV very soon, GM by 2035.

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So GM has just signed an revolutionary agreement with a company referred to as Controlled Thermal Sources to extract Lithium from superheated waters beneath the Salton Sea in the desert of Southern California.

The Salton Sea is an historic water pocket that has been formed and dried up each naturally and by man-made mistake a number of occasions over millennia. It was a part of the Sea of Cortez between Baja California and Mainland Mexico tens of millions of years in the past. However as sea ranges fell, the Salton Sea dried up and that might have been that, as far as we're involved. But then somebody eager to irrigate crops in the fertile Imperial Valley tried to divert the waters of the mighty Colorado River just somewhat bit after which-slosh-the Salton Sea stuffed up again. That was greater than one hundred years in the past. Since then, the accidental ocean has been fed toxic runoff from the various acres of farmland simply south of it. What was once a promising resort with “bass, catfish, and stripers!” turned right into a smelly chemical sludge puddle. However it was a sludge puddle with lithium.

So….

GM simply announced that it turned the primary investor in a challenge run by Controlled Thermal Resources. CTR will pump sizzling, salty water from deep beneath the Salton Sea and extract the lithium from it, along with clear thermo vitality at the same time. Cleaner water goes again into the Salton Sea and the ground beneath it. lithium battery manufacturer ’s a win-win. You would possibly even add another win in there when you consider the California Vitality Commission’s estimate that the Salton Sea area could produce 600,000 tons of lithium per yr, which is superb since your entire world’s trade produced a mere 85,000 tons of lithium in all of 2019.

“CTR’s lithium resource on the Salton Sea in California is one of the biggest known lithium brine assets in North America,” CTR stated in a launch. “The integration of direct lithium extraction with renewable geothermal vitality gives the very best sustainability credentials available at present. CTR’s closed-loop, direct lithium extraction course of utilizes renewable energy and steam-considerably lowering the time to supply battery-grade lithium products and eliminating the need for overseas processing. CTR’s operations can have a minimal bodily footprint and a near-zero carbon footprint. The brine, after lithium extraction, is returned to the geothermal reservoir deep throughout the earth.”

“World-vast development in electric vehicle adoption has highlighted the important need to develop a strong and safe battery supply chain within the United States,” stated Rod Colwell, CTR’s Chief Executive Officer.. “CTR is totally dedicated to growing its vital lithium useful resource in response to this, and we sit up for collaborating with GM as we proceed to accelerate these efforts.”

“Lithium is vital to battery manufacturing right this moment and can only turn into extra vital as shopper adoption of EVs will increase, and we accelerate in the direction of our all-electric future,” stated Doug Parks, GM executive vice president of world Product Development, Purchasing and Provide Chain. “By securing and localizing the lithium supply chain within the U.S., we’re serving to ensure our skill to make highly effective, inexpensive, excessive mileage EVs while also serving to to mitigate environmental impression and bring extra low-value lithium to the market as an entire.”

CTR should begin lithium deliveries to GM by 2024. If the Salton Sea pans out as well because it should, the world might provide 40 p.c of the world’s lithium-all of it American-made.

The GM deal sounds promising, proper? Tell us what you think in the comments.