Why Seawater Isn’t the Answer to the Lithium Squeeze

[OKIsItJustMe]

http://www.salon.com/technology/the_gigaom_network/clean_tech/2010/03/10/will_seawater_stave_off_a_lithium_squeeze

Wednesday, Mar 10, 2010 08:00 EST

Why Seawater Isn’t the Answer to the Lithium Squeeze

By Josie Garthwaite

Seawater: It offered the Ancient Mariner not a drop to drink, but plenty of scientists and entrepreneurs have ideas for how to use the salty stuff for green technologies. Some aim to desalinate it with high-tech membranes to produce fresh drinking water, while others envision it providing irrigation for salt-loving plants to be used as feedstock for biofuels. Add to the list South Korea’s ambitious plan, reported Tuesday by the Financial Times, to collect lithium from sea water for electric car batteries.

According to a release from the South Korean government, its Ministry of Land, Transport and Maritime Affairs plans to jointly invest 30 billion won (about $26.4 million) with steel giant POSCO into the technology. Together with the Korea Institute of Geo-science and Mineral Resources, they plan to develop the tech and set up a plant (with capacity to produce 20,000-100,000 tons of lithium) by 2015. The hope, according to the release, is to “not only meet domestic demand but dominate the global lithium market.”

“If the price of lithium does go high enough, it theoretically is possible to extract lithium from seawater,” Brian Jaskula, the U.S. Geologicical Survey’s mineral commodity specialist on lithium told us in an email today. ”Just about every element in the periodic table is available in seawater. It’s just that its a very expensive way of extracting metals and minerals,” he explained.

Mitsubishi has estimated that demand for lithium — which now costs less than a dollar per kilogram — will outstrip supply as early as 2015, and Jaskula told us last year that he expected demand to begin driving lithium prices up in the next 10-15 years. But high costs make it unlikely that schemes to pull lithium from seawater will succeed in the near future, Jaskula said.

...

[kristopher]

1. There is no shortage of lithium.

There may be temporary bottlenecks as production ramps up, but there is no raw material shortage. Evans has produced a fairly recent update to this, taking new trends into account and the conclusion stands; it is also available online:

AN ABUNDANCE OF LITHIUM

R. Keith Evans

March 2008

Keith Evans, a geologist by profession, first became involved in the lithium business in the early
1970’s when, on behalf of Selection Trust Ltd., was asked to evaluate the future potential of
Bikita Minerals in what, at that time, was Southern Rhodesia (later Zimbabwe). Selection Trust
was the majority owner of the operation which, prior to the imposition of United Nations
sanctions, had been the dominant producer of lithium ores for direct usage in the glass and
ceramics industry.
Subsequently, he joined Lithium Corporation of America, the then leading lithium chemical
producer and later moved to Amax Exploration.
On behalf of Amax and a Chilean partner he negotiated with Corfo, a Chilean government entity,
the rights to evaluate and develop that part of the Salar de Atacama that had not been leased to
the Foote Mineral Company.
He was responsible for all aspects of the evaluation but when Amax decided not to proceed with
the project it was acquired by Sociedad Quimica y Minera (SQM) and the company is now the
world’s largest lithium chemicals producer.
Throughout his career in the lithium industry it was his responsibility to monitor industry
developments particularly in respect of new resources and he has continued as a consultant in a
number of industrial minerals.






ABSTRACT

In 1976 a National Research Council Panel estimated that Western World lithium reserves and
resources totaled 10.6 million tonnes as elemental lithium.

Subsequent discoveries, particularly in brines in the southern Andes and the plateaus of western
China and Tibet have increased the tonnages significantly. Geothermal brines and lithium
bearing clays add to the total.

This current estimate totals 28.4 million tonnes Li equivalent to more than 150.0 million tonnes
of lithium carbonate of which nearly 14.0 million tonnes lithium (about 74.0 million tonnes of
carbonate) are at active or proposed operations.

This can be compared with current demand for lithium chemicals which approximates to 84,000
tonnes as lithium carbonate equivalents (16,000 tonnes Li).

Concerns regarding lithium availability for hybrid or electric vehicle batteries or other foreseeable
applications are unfounded.

[Ian David]

2. How much could we extract from used waterless urinal canisters?

http://cat.inist.fr/?aModele=afficheN&cpsidt=21678869