The Great Salt Lake Is Full of Lithium. A Startup Wants to Harvest It.

[Magnus]

America’s biggest saltwater lake may hold a key to the country’s energy future.

This summer, a California startup plans to start construction on a project to suck up water from the Great Salt Lake to extract one of its many valuable minerals: lithium, a critical ingredient in the rechargeable batteries used in electric vehicles. The water will then be reinjected back into the lake, which Lilac Solutions says addresses concerns about the damaging effects of mineral extraction.

At its peak, Lilac says it will use a series of pipes to suck up 80,000 gallons of water a minute to harvest the mineral. The company plans to eventually produce up to 20,000 tons of battery-grade lithium a year at its site in northern Utah, located among fields of cattle and pickleweed.

The effort is one of dozens of projects across the U.S. racing to build up a domestic supply of lithium and other battery minerals, with adoption of electric vehicles expected to boom as part of the country’s transition to cleaner energy.

The challenge: finding ways to efficiently extract the mineral from rocks and water while minimizing environmental damage.

Resources in the U.S. are very large in scale, but the chemistry is very challenging,” said Lilac founder and Chief Executive Dave Snydacker.

https://www.wsj.com/science/environment/great-salt-lake-lithium-startup-lilac-d84c9f76?mod=hp_lead_pos6

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This is good news because the United States has significant lithium reserves - the U.S. is home to one of the largest lithium deposits in the world. Nevada, North Carolina, and California have an estimated 4% of the world's lithium reserves.

 

[1srelluc]

It's not the smell of salt you smell, it's the smell of .gov subsidized grift in the air.

 

[Seymour Flops]

That will have to wait until after the Biden Administration. He has battery production strictly set aside for his Chinese bosses.

 

[Polishprince]

The idea of helping out a Republican state like Utah- I can't see Sleepy Joe doing it.

My suspicion is that environmentalist whackos will find a reason why we don't want to disturb the delicate ecosystem of the Great Salt Lake.

 

[Moonglow]

It's not the smell of salt you smell, it's the smell of .gov subsidized grift in the air.

My cordless drill uses lithium batteries.

 

[jotathought]

America’s biggest saltwater lake may hold a key to the country’s energy future.

This summer, a California startup plans to start construction on a project to suck up water from the Great Salt Lake to extract one of its many valuable minerals: lithium, a critical ingredient in the rechargeable batteries used in electric vehicles. The water will then be reinjected back into the lake, which Lilac Solutions says addresses concerns about the damaging effects of mineral extraction.

At its peak, Lilac says it will use a series of pipes to suck up 80,000 gallons of water a minute to harvest the mineral. The company plans to eventually produce up to 20,000 tons of battery-grade lithium a year at its site in northern Utah, located among fields of cattle and pickleweed.

The effort is one of dozens of projects across the U.S. racing to build up a domestic supply of lithium and other battery minerals, with adoption of electric vehicles expected to boom as part of the country’s transition to cleaner energy.

The challenge: finding ways to efficiently extract the mineral from rocks and water while minimizing environmental damage.

Resources in the U.S. are very large in scale, but the chemistry is very challenging,” said Lilac founder and Chief Executive Dave Snydacker.

https://www.wsj.com/science/environment/great-salt-lake-lithium-startup-lilac-d84c9f76?mod=hp_lead_pos6

---

This is good news because the United States has significant lithium reserves - the U.S. is home to one of the largest lithium deposits in the world. Nevada, North Carolina, and California have an estimated 4% of the world's lithium reserves.

Does this indicate you support "mining" finite resources from the Earth, with most likely ecosystem impacts?

 

[justoffal]

It's not the smell of salt you smell, it's the smell of .gov subsidized grift in the air.

Yup

 

[elektra]

My cordless drill uses lithium batteries.

And now there is a shortage, and the price of cordless drills has skyrocketed, because of all the electric cars and grid batteries.

Pray, you dont need another in a year or two.

 

[petro]

And now there is a shortage, and the price of cordless drills has skyrocketed, because of all the electric cars and grid batteries.

Pray, you dont need another in a year or two.

The damn batteries cost more than the tool already.

 

[elektra]

The damn batteries cost more than the tool already.

The Democrat's will destroy the Great Salt Lake, the entire world must be destroyed, so that the democrats can adjust the Earth's thermostat down a degree, 100 years from now?

 

[surada]

My cordless drill uses lithium batteries.

There's also lots of lithium in the Dead Sea.

https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0892687521002673

 

[elektra]

There's also lots of lithium in the Dead Sea.

https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0892687521002673

Nice, we will destroy the Dead Sea, the Salton Sea, and the Great Salt Lake, for short lived electric cars.

Are there any other places you are advocating, to destroy.

 

[surada]

Nice, we will destroy the Dead Sea, the Salton Sea, and the Great Salt Lake, for short lived electric cars.

Are there any other places you are advocating, to destroy.

You're a moron.

 

[elektra]

You're a moron.

you are the fool on the pimple of a moron's ass

 

[Moonglow]

Nice, we will destroy the Dead Sea, the Salton Sea, and the Great Salt Lake, for short lived electric cars.

Are there any other places you are advocating, to destroy.

Anyplace with oil,gas,coal, nickel, copper, etc, etc, etc.

 

[surada]

It's not the smell of salt you smell, it's the smell of .gov subsidized grift in the air.

Afghanistan has over 1,400 mineral fields, containing barite, chromite, coal, copper, gold, iron ore, lead, natural gas, petroleum, precious and semi-precious stones, salt, sulfur, lithium, talc, and zinc, among many other minerals. Gemstones include high-quality emeralds, lapis lazuli, red garnet and ruby.

 

[1srelluc]

Afghanistan has over 1,400 mineral fields, containing barite, chromite, coal, copper, gold, iron ore, lead, natural gas, petroleum, precious and semi-precious stones, salt, sulfur, lithium, talc, and zinc, among many other minerals. Gemstones include high-quality emeralds, lapis lazuli, red garnet and ruby.

What the blue fuck does that have to do with grift at a lake in UT?

 

[surada]

1srelluc

T

What the blue fuck does that have to do with grift at a lake in UT?

There's lithium everywhere. Why are you upset?

 

[1srelluc]

1srelluc

T

There's lithium everywhere. Why are you upset?

But we need tons and tons of grift to process it!

 

[Seymour Flops]

Afghanistan has over 1,400 mineral fields, containing barite, chromite, coal, copper, gold, iron ore, lead, natural gas, petroleum, precious and semi-precious stones, salt, sulfur, lithium, talc, and zinc, among many other minerals. Gemstones include high-quality emeralds, lapis lazuli, red garnet and ruby.

If I may . . .

Afghanistan likely feel a mix of anger and scorn towards the U.S. arguably, we brought that on ourselves across multiple administrations.

So, what they have or don’t is irrelevant to us. We won’t get it.

At least our politicians haven’t yet managed to turn Utah against us.