Lithium finding

[Arde]

Colossal Cache of Lithium Found in US May Be World's Largest

In the race to hoard lithium, a metal crucial for creating the batteries that power electric vehicles, the US may have fortuitously stumbled on the world's biggest deposit yet. A new study, published in the journal Science Advances, estimates that the McDermitt Caldera, a volcanic crater on the...

www.yahoo.com

Good news, assuming batteries stay on lithium instead of the promising C-ion.

I welcome the fact that "The caldera formed after a massive magma eruption approximately 16.4 million years ago"
so that even our most recalcitrant politicians cannot take credit for the lithium formation .

 

[Ohmess]

Hopefully we can mine, and refine here, within my lifetime.

 

[Arde]

Hopefully we can mine, and refine here, within my lifetime.

Eat healthy and exercise my friend.

 

[Gary Knox]

Chris,
Quote: "Hopefully we can mine, and refine here, within my lifetime"

The permits for everything associated with extraction and refinement can only be granted within our combined lifetimes IF someone in DC (wonder who??) cuts some red tape.

 

[JFENG]

someone in DC (wonder who??) cuts some red tape.

Right, it is time for pro-EV politicians to put up or shut up.

 

[BMW Pete]

Gents,

Might I comment as somebody who is involved in mining, has been involved in many projects over 35 years in many different countries and in the last few years helping lead a company involved in cleaning waste water in mining. I have spent most of those years on the other side of the equation, as either the miner or an investor in a mining project. Please don't believe the self interest comments (BS) you hear from those with vested interests in not spending the money cleaning up mining.

Yes, we need mining desperately if we want a green future, but it has to be sustainable mining. I could bore you all with regulations in different countries, excuses used by miners to not be clean, the hoodwinking of the regulators saying "that cant be done economically" etc etc.

Its a complicated issue, different metals, different jurisdictions, different contaminants, different toxicity impact in receiving environment, I dont pretend its easy, but mining needs to be done in a clean and sustainable manner. As an example there needs to be sustainable closure plans from the day you start the project, for the very simple reasons that unleashing certain contaminants into the environment will impact our waters and I hope we all can agree, poisoning our waters are not a good thing.

Apologies, as Its a car site and I have rambled a little, but as its something I know just a little tiny bit about, I had to comment

 

[sfdon]

In mining you can do it right or wrong.
In Colombia we shipped our concentrates with high lead content to Japan. They are incredibly good at smelting. In Panama we used cyanide and learned our lesson on leaking leach pads….

Ultimately your stock performance mirrors your mine management.

 

[BMW Pete]

In mining you can do it right or wrong.
In Colombia we shipped our concentrates with high lead content to Japan. They are incredibly good at smelting. In Panama we used cyanide and learned our lesson on leaking leach pads….

Ultimately your stock performance mirrors your mine management.

Funnily, small world eh? I now look forward to the day we meet in person even more

We actually have now built more SART (sulfidization, acidification, recycling and thickening) plants than just about anybody out there, it's an interesting process (when done correctly) invented by one of our directors, certainly helps if you can recycle the cyanide from your heap leach system and in turn recover any soluble copper - should you have some.

Yes, you can do it right or wrong and in turn there are good companies and bad ones.

 

[Arde]

Interesting comments. I did not meant to imply I know what to do with it. Also that is good that we have it in the US.

 

[craterface]

Interesting story. Great to hear the perspective from those in the industry.

Having a mine closure plan before you start seems very wise.

I think about the town of Gilman, CO, very close to Vail and Beaver Creek CO.

Gilman, Colorado - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

There was no planning ahead back when they started. Now it is a toxic ghost town hanging above the Eagle River, and we as taxpayers are all paying to keep it from getting worse.

But I am glad we have a potential big store of Li right here at home.

 

[BMW Pete]

Interesting story. Great to hear the perspective from those in the industry.

Having a mine closure plan before you start seems very wise.

I think about the town of Gilman, CO, very close to Vail and Beaver Creek CO.

Gilman, Colorado - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

There was no planning ahead back when they started. Now it is a toxic ghost town hanging above the Eagle River, and we as taxpayers are all paying to keep it from getting worse.

But I am glad we have a potential big store of Li right here at home.

Hi Scott,

Yes, many of them like Gillman, I could share so many horror stories for place that are similar. Even worse all over the country, in fact the world, there are these giant tailings dams full of contaminated water or just mountains of contaminated rock piles, again left for the average tax payer to pay for the clean up or obliterate what was pristine land/waters.

Of course we all want to see mining, all of us have a lot of rolling metal in our lives (some too much ) and it can be done in an environmental sustainable manner. I personally would love to see this project above become a reality, it would be great for America and the unnatural supply and demand curve we see today

It really is an interesting industry, as every mine site is different and while it might say its a "copper" a "lithium" or a "gold" mine, the amount of other metals released in freeing up the principal metal are often extensive, some sealable with the right processes, many not. Therefore they either become a penalty at the smelter or left behind to be dealt with (or not) in some way shape or form.

Having no wish to bore our friends on the subject, I will shut up now

 

[Arde]

It is not boring, it is sobering to realize what is at stake, and I wonder who are the leaders or institutions one can trust to figure these things out?

 

[Arde]

Well, the topic interests me partially because my son just started a job in energy. Pretty much a calling, because of his passion for climate. I just read that there is also Lithium "urban mining", which is not really excavating under the NY subway, but rather recovering lithium from old batteries. Apparently for EV battery lithium recovery to be viable you need 95% recovery rates, and that is not the case at all so the only recovery done is for Cobalt... When you look up EV battery recycling the idea is that a battery that is below 90% say for a car, can still be useful in your garage to use during a blackout or some other nonsense. I think the regulatory policy for EV batteries is much more straightforward than for mining. Wasted EV batteries should go back to the car manufacturer just like HP printer heads come with a bag to go back to HP.
The urban recycle loop should be closed and priced at the manufacturer level, not the lowly consumer...Batteries would follow a lease model pretty much. I am sure smarter people than me already thought about this...

 

[BMW Pete]

It is not boring, it is sobering to realize what is at stake, and I wonder who are the leaders or institutions one can trust to figure these things out?

Hi Arde,

Firstly, if your son is interested in further discussions about what we do as a company and the ups and downs of whats possible in mining I would be happy to impart an old grey headed (how I wish I had enough grey to cover my head ) business mind. I am certainly not technical, as I like to say, we have 100 people in our company and I make sure every single one of them is smarter than I.

On to your question - It's a tough one to answer, but if you asked me to answer it in short order "Get money out of politics".

One side after receiving money for their campaign will shout "remove red tape' ...........as long as it doesn't impact them or their family, not caring about the environmental impact.

The other side will say "we have to protect the environment" unless you make a big contribution to my campaign.

Best example I can give today that North Americans will understand. Teck, massive Mining company, massive coal assets in Canada, Canada has pretty decent environmental rules, both federally and even more in BC. Yet Tecks ability to play the politicians mean they have different rules to all the other miners up there. I have absolutely no doubt, if Glencore win their current bid for Teck, and they do not have the political impact in Canada Teck has, the coal mining assets will very soon have to adhere to the same regulations as the rest BC.

Many more nuances and permutations, but if you asked me for one possible answer, this would be it.