Photo: Tom Hegen
Due to the increased popularity of electric batteries, lithium is in great demand worldwide. Electric car batteries, laptops and cell phones all rely on this element they call “white gold.” It is an alkali metal, the least dense of all metals, produced from hard rock and brines in Chile, Australia, Peru and China.
After being brought to the surface, the mined ore sits in large pools of water. Evaporation eventually eliminates the liquid, leaving lithium behind. Salt ponds and potash ponds work the same way to isolate their desired substances. Lithium fields appear in tones of vivid yellows, sea greens and turquoise blues. When the pools turn light blue, the lithium is ready to be dried and packaged. The entire process takes up to eighteen months to complete.
Although lithium helps in the manufacturing of batteries that provide an “eco-friendly” form of energy, the extraction process does have its issues. As The Guardian points out, “If Americans continue to depend on cars at the current rate, by 2050 the US alone would need triple the amount of lithium currently produced for the entire global market, which would have dire consequences for water and food supplies, biodiversity, and Indigenous rights.”