r/science • u/Sort_of_Frightening • Sep 10 '23

Chemistry Lithium discovery in U.S. volcano could be biggest deposit ever found

https://www.chemistryworld.com/news/lithium-discovery-in-us-volcano-could-be-biggest-deposit-ever-found/4018032.article
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13

u/pathetic_optimist Sep 10 '23

At what point will there be enough old batteries to make mining them more profitable than refining ore?

17

u/JustWhatAmI Sep 10 '23

You mean mining the batteries, like recycling them? It's already happening. Black mass from old batteries is being called the new gold

8

u/CocoDaPuf Sep 10 '23 edited Sep 11 '23

The question is, when will we start regulating the processes used in manufacturing these batteries to make it cheaper to recycle and reuse these materials?

The thing that really makes recycling expensive these days is that all too often multiple materials are used together in a fashion that makes them difficult to separate.

If it were simpler to separate the lithium from the copper, the glass, gold, nickel, etc, then those would all be valuable materials to reuse. But as it is now, you generally need to use acids and other chemicals just to separate the more valuable materials out, necessarily leaving the less valuable materials in one big useless slurry to be dumped somewhere.

(Edit) Furthermore, it's an unsustainable model and it simply won't do in the future. If for instance, you wanted to start a moon or Mars colony, you'll have to have a more complete and deliberate system for recycling materials. The products themselves will have to be designed to be recycled, or else these space colonies will become far too reliant on materials shipped from earth, which is logistically and politically problematic to say the least.

2

u/rocky_balbiotite Sep 10 '23

A long time, until there's mass adoption and those cars get to the end of their lifespan. Even if all the Li in batteries was recycled right now it still wouldn't be even close to meet demand.

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u/pathetic_optimist Sep 10 '23

The batteries have a shorter lifespan than the cars hopefully. Unless Apple start making cars.

2

u/whilst Sep 10 '23

No they really don't. There are Chevy Bolts that have made it past 200,000 miles and Teslas past 300,000. On their original batteries.

1

u/pathetic_optimist Sep 11 '23

Really. Amazing.

2

u/whilst Sep 11 '23

Yeah! It's exciting to see.

And part of it is, like, lithium ion batteries lifetime is measured in cycles. And e.g. a phone cycles every day, possibly multiple times a day, so 1000 cycles is 2-3 years. But an EV battery these days has 200-300 miles of range in it --- 1000 cycles is 200k-300k miles.

And that's if you fill it all the way then drive it all the way to empty each time --- lithium batteries prefer to be used a little and charged a little. If most of your driving is shorter trips, you can be even kinder to your battery and fill it to 85% and plug it in long before it's empty, and only fill it fully and drain it on road trips.

Additionally, your phone sits in your pocket all day then is plugged in to charge and heats up. Lithium batteries don't like heat extremes. But the battery in your car has a coolant loop --- when it's charging, it's being actively cooled, extending its life (unless you have a LEAF).

2

u/pathetic_optimist Sep 11 '23

I wonder why every sun facing roof is not yet covered by solar cells. Here in the UK I am saving up for some to power my next vehicle. For air conditioning especially it seems a no-brainer.

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u/[deleted] Sep 10 '23

[deleted]

3

u/VanderHoo Sep 10 '23

...that will take well over 150k miles to even break even on the emissions from producing the batteries...

Source? Last I read, this number was in the 10-15k range.

-5

u/TaiVat Sep 10 '23

Typical insane reddit drivel. Let me guess, you're like 16-20 and your idea of transportation amounts to going to school/uni and walking to a local bar with you friends?..

2

u/strcrssd Sep 11 '23

It's already done, though reuse is preferable to recycling. Used EV batteries can be used for grid stabilization. They're not useful for EVs any more, but lower density is fine for grid storage.

The world needs to figure out recycling though.