The new ‘gold rush’ for green lithium
Lithium is crucial for the transition to renewables but mining it has been environmentally costly. Now a more sustainable source of lithium has been found deep beneath our feet.
Cornwall, 1864. A hot spring is discovered nearly 450m (1,485ft) below ground in the Wheal Clifford, a copper mine just outside the mining town of Redruth. Glass bottles are immersed to their necks in its bubbling waters, carefully sealed and sent off for testing. The result is the discovery of so great a quantity of lithium – eight or 10 times as much per gallon as had been found in any hot spring previously analysed – that scientists suspect “it may prove of great commercial value”.
But 19th-Century England had little need for the element, and this 50C (122F) lithium-rich water continued steaming away in the dark for more than 150 years.
Fast forward to autumn 2020, and a site nearby the Wheal Clifford in Cornwall has been confirmed as having some of the world’s highest grades of lithium in geothermal waters. The commercial use for lithium in the 21st Century could not be clearer. It is found not only inside smart phones and laptops, but is now vital to the clean energy transition, for the batteries that power electric vehicles and store energy so renewable power can be released steadily and reliably.
Demand has soared in recent years as carmakers move toward electric vehicles, as many countries including the UK, Sweden, the Netherlands, France, Norway and Canada announce a phase-out of combustion-engine cars. In fact, five times more lithium than is mined currently is going to be necessary to meet global climate targets by 2050, according to the World Bank.
But there’s one big problem. Obtaining lithium by conventional means takes its own environmental toll, or rather three: carbon emissions, water and land.
Lithium is currently sourced mainly from hard rock mines, such as those in Australia, or underground brine reservoirs below the surface of dried lake beds, mostly in Chile and Argentina. Hard rock mining – where the mineral is extracted from open pit mines and then roasted using fossil fuels – leaves scars in the landscape, requires a large amount of water and releases 15 tonnes of CO2 for every tonne of lithium, according to an analysis of the whole lithium production process by raw materials experts Minviro. The other conventional option, extracting lithium from underground reservoirs, relies on even more water to extract the lithium – and it takes place in typically very water-scarce parts of the world, leading to indigenous communities questioning their sustainability.
Extracting lithium from geothermal waters – found not just in Cornwall, but Germany and the US as well – has a tiny environmental footprint in comparison, including very low carbon emissions.
By Catherine Early for BBC FUTURE, 25th November 2020
Global chip shortage: Samsung expects its profits to jump by 52%
Technology giant Samsung Electronics has said it expects to post a 52% jump in profit for the last three months of 2021, amid the global chip shortage.
The world’s biggest memory chip maker estimates that it made 13.8tn won ($11.5bn; £8.5bn) in the period. That would be its highest fourth quarter operating profit in four years. The company’s earnings were boosted by strong demand for server memory chips and higher profit margins in its chip contract manufacturing business. “Samsung is well placed to profit from the record-breaking demand for PCs and electronics,” technology analyst Sam Reynolds told the BBC. He also highlighted that the firm had benefited from currency fluctuations: "The Korean won continues to depreciate, making Korea’s exports more attractive on the global market."
However, the estimated profit was lower than the 15.2tn won predicted by many analysts. Samsung’s spending on such things as employees’ bonuses and marketing for its smartphone business were seen as reasons for it missing the market forecast.
In recent months, the global shortage of semiconductors has been causing major disruptions for manufacturers, from carmakers that have had to suspend production to Apple warning that iPhone shipments would be delayed.
Investors are also watching the company’s chip manufacturing operation in Xi’an, central China. The city has been in lockdown since 23 December due to a coronavirus outbreak. Samsung said last week that it would "temporarily adjust operations" at its sites in Xi’an but gave no further details of how the measures could impact the production of microchips.
In November, Samsung announced that it had chosen a site close to the US city of Taylor in Texas for its new $17bn computer chip plant. The local residents were absolutely thrilled at the prospect, although so far there have been no comments from local councils and administrators. However, there have been lots of recriminations from neighbouring cities who were hoping for the new plant to be built in their area. They blame outgoing US president Donald Trump for abandoning them and not intervening in a forceful manner on their behalf.
The plant is expected to be operational by the second half of 2024. It is the South Korean electronics giant’s biggest-ever US investment.
Shares in Samsung Electronics were trading around 1.8% higher in Seoul on Friday. It should create a major number of new jobs and attract further companies to an area crying out for investment to help counteract the negative effects of the global pandemic, which have been particularly severe in this provincial city.
The Guardian 12.01.2022
