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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u/[deleted] Sep 10 '23

We are entering into a window of global development that is going to require a massive increase in the annual lithium production via mining. Estimates put our requirements by 2030 at literally 10x what we currently produce.

And we need it with some immediacy. If this pans out, it will add to, not replace, current lithium mining elsewhere.

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u/tinyLEDs Sep 10 '23

If this pans out, it will add to, not replace, current lithium mining elsewhere.

Profitability depends 100% upon extraction cost.

There are places all over the world to find gold. You can find it in Nebraska. England. It is everywhere. It isn't mined in such places ONLY because it is not profitable, and IS mined elsewhere, because it costs less to extract/produce.

Gold mines all over the world (and copper, and tin, and iron, and oil, and ________) have gone in, and out,and back into business as demand fluctuates. And mines where large volumes of ore are easily accessed HAVE driven other mines out of profitability, and closed them.

Gold and oil mining history will bring the easiest examples, if you care to look deeper at this.

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u/[deleted] Sep 10 '23

these things - gold and old - are established commodity markets with largely inelastic demand.

lithium represents a sort of "new" market in that its demand in manufacturing and consumer goods is about to go through a massive ramp in scale. we really are at a moment where we're trying to figure out HOW to meet this emerging demand and that means developing new capacity altogether.

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u/tinyLEDs Sep 10 '23 edited Sep 10 '23

Gold and oil demonstrate the mining industry and how demand/supply changes affect viability based upon mining operation costs (which is determned by, among other things, extraction method)

I realize they are not direct parallels, but they are proof of concept. If the find in the OP, or any other find, were fundamentally a mother lode,) then it will impact the viability of other mines with supply shock.

Lithium may be a new commodity, but it is a commodity nonetheless.

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u/CliftonForce Sep 11 '23

Reasons why we are not going to "run out" of any particular mineral. It will just get exponentially more expensive as we tap sources that were previously ignored, but there will always be something to be had.

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u/[deleted] Sep 10 '23

Uhh.. There are plenty of estimates that show our lithium use will only be slightly higher by 2030 too. There are a LOT of emerging technologies that greatly reduce or eliminate lithium altogether. And the larger the battery needs (think local grid storage), the need for lithium will be completely gone by 2030.

There will be uses for the lithium we mine either way, but a 10x increase just in demand of lithium in 6 years is a bit exaggerated. Actually its a lot exxagerated...

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u/[deleted] Sep 10 '23

I mean, we're part way up the curve from the released study (2020), but it's an academic estimate.

https://www.statista.com/statistics/1220158/global-lithium-demand-volume-by-application/#:~:text=Global%20lithium%20demand%20volume%202020%2D2030%2C%20by%20application&text=In%202020%2C%20the%20total%20demand,approximately%202.5%20million%20metric%20tons.

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u/[deleted] Sep 10 '23

I can't really see anything beyond the graph, but what does the * mean next to the dates provided in the graph?

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u/[deleted] Sep 10 '23

it says in the supplementary information that the asterisk indicates that that data is projected rather than observed.

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u/[deleted] Sep 10 '23

Well we're 40% through that study's window, so there is that as far as an x10 increase from where we are now.

But, yea electric cars and small electronics are going to use a lot of lithium, but batteries are at the stage now where every year there are big breakthroughs and the latest round seem to be all including vast reductions of lithium. And technology can be built around the battery without being tied to it.

I don't disagree we'll be using a lot of lithium for the next 10 years, but you could have done an academic study on myspace growth by 2020, but the study doesn't include disrupters, which quite a few emerged for lithium since that study.

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u/salty_sashimi Sep 10 '23

How certain are you those technologies will work? If they don't, lithium batteries are what we'll need. And will they be economically viable in growing third world countries? Consider that they have difficulty building and maintaining things like large electrical grids and will need more localized energy sources.

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u/Akimotoh Sep 10 '23

Is it a gigantic waste of resources to use the Lithium now with our weaker EV battery technology as a opposed to investing more money into research and development of better batteries with the Lithium deposits in the future?

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u/[deleted] Sep 10 '23

I think the question is what happens when todays batteries fail. Do they end up in a landfill? Or do we have the technology to efficiently reclaim that lithium?

I think that’s the critical thing…not that we’ve “solved” batteries.

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u/Rave-TZ Sep 11 '23

Lithium batteries are 95% recyclable with zero degradation. It’s pretty amazing really. The EU is looking for ways to trace lithium batteries to keep them from being exported because of how valuable it can be to recycle them.

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u/ahfoo Sep 11 '23

Lithium salts used in batteries are water soluble which means that it is relatively easy to recover them so there is no waste involved in refining lithium to high concentrations today. The crux of the issue is that lithium is not a fuel, it is a storage media. You do not consume it by using it now. You are simply building up the supply of concentrated salts which can be used indefinitely.