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Lithium drilling advances at the Salton Sea

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Re: Lithium drilling advances at the Salton Sea

#71

Post by usrn »

pjc50 wrote: post #63
usrn wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>replace all ICE with EV I'm honestly not convinced this will happen. I think the ratio will get a lot more even but I highly doubt ICE will be replaced. Especially as the atmospheric CO2 concentration increases the economic viability of reducing it back into hydrocarbons increases. Already it's much easier to grow microalgae than it was during the first government experiments in the 60s. As these technologies improv…

> Especially as the atmospheric CO2 concentration increases the economic viability of reducing it back into hydrocarbons increases Even if the concentration were to hit 5,000ppm - not only beyond dangerous climate levels but directly dangerous to human breathing - that's still only 0.5%, which makes very little difference to the feasibility of extracting it from the air. There is also no natural market for doing so.…

I'm currently running a small scale project that's extracting and reducing CO2 from the air with the current concentration. You can do it now it's just a matter of doing it for less than the current price of gasoline which I haven't managed to do (yet.)

Re: Lithium drilling advances at the Salton Sea

#72

Post by bromuro »

themitigating wrote: post #40

All this talk about Lithium feels like it's describing a new destructive force in the environment but won't this replace/reduce oil extraction? The Exxon Valdez, Deepwater Horizon oil spill, and I'm sure many other smaller disasters happened due to oil. I would even add in both gulf wars which costs massive amounts of money, resources, and lives wouldn't have happened if the US didn't have a vested interest in oil. A…

No, it won’t replace oil. This is an economy based on growth and exploitation of natural resources.

Re: Lithium drilling advances at the Salton Sea

#73

Post by pjc50 »

usrn wrote: post #71
pjc50 wrote: post #63

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Especially as the atmospheric CO2 concentration increases the economic viability of reducing it back into hydrocarbons increases Even if the concentration were to hit 5,000ppm - not only beyond dangerous climate levels but directly dangerous to human breathing - that's still only 0.5%, which makes very little difference to the feasibility of extracting it from the air. There is also no natural market for doing so.…

I'm currently running a small scale project that's extracting and reducing CO2 from the air with the current concentration. You can do it now it's just a matter of doing it for less than the current price of gasoline which I haven't managed to do (yet.)

Interesting - what's the technology? Is that vs the wholesale price of gasoline or the retail post-tax price "at the pump"?

Re: Lithium drilling advances at the Salton Sea

#74

Post by TSiege »

idontwantthis wrote: post #10
TSiege wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The salton sea is a man made disaster. I couldn't see how it could be any worse than it is now. Given the dire climate situation we're in, it seems like a no brainer https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8TjGAWxL23c

If it dries out completely it will be much much worse.

It's going to dry out completely either way

Re: Lithium drilling advances at the Salton Sea

#75

Post by Retric »

usrn wrote: post #70
ggm wrote: post #44

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Pure H2 is a nightmare. Hydrogen up converted to Ammonia is much easier to handle, comparable to LNG for the cost of management. For volume shipment between economies, Ammonia is the way to go.

Ammonia produces NOx when burned. You think CO2 is bad that stuff is absolutely nasty. I don't know why that would be an improvement.

You get NOx from burning most things including hydrogen. It’s can form from atmospheric Nitrogen and Oxygen combining at high temperatures such as found in flames. You do produce more or less with various types of fuel but production isn’t the issue it’s failing to get rid of them afterwards that’s the problem.

They are unstable breaking down either in the fire making complete combustion important, but a catalytic converter or at worse just the atmosphere works. They last just long enough to be a problem locally. But that also means people have local incentives to fix the issue unlike CO2 which has a much larger tragedy of the commons issue.

Re: Lithium drilling advances at the Salton Sea

#76

Post by AtlasBarfed »

onethought wrote: post #64
ggm wrote: post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

BYD is about to release its ~ $45k AUD car in Australia. 1500 units sold out almost immediately. MG, which is another Chinese manufacturer these days is expected to price-match. Hyundai (the Ioniq) may price match. The BYD has really good range for price (400km NEDC) https://www.drive.com.au/news/byd-dolphin-electric-city-car-... If the federal and/or state governments go with some price support, and unit costs to a…

I don't think the Made-in-China Tesla's ever suffered the build quality issues the Fremont built cars did. There have been minor issues. I think the "low price point" EV is a myth in the short term. I don't think there is enough materials to make the volume required at that price point. This seems to be why Tesla put a hold on their $25k model - which they now seem to be making a "dedicated robotaxi" and betting on s…

IMO the 25k model is on hold because:

1) they are just scaling existing models (same reason roadster / semi / cybertruck is on hold)

2) the chinese already own that price point worldwide, and Tesla likely can't compete in that segment, well, or the margins aren't worth the effort right now.

As for limits on materials, as I described, Sodium-Ion and LFP are the path for 10-20 million BEVs per year (or... 3x-5x that in PHEVs) over the next four years. Lithium is not the major limiter, additional sources (Salton Sea, many others) will come online, but Cobalt/Nickel for LMC chemistries are.

Long term most of the global production of consumer vehicles (~80 million/year in 2021) should be doable with 180-200 wh/kg sodium ion technologies, while 260 wh/kg LFP, 300-400 wh/kg LMC, and 400-??? densities from Li-S/solid state battery can address long haul shipping, sports cars, trucks with towing, etc.

To emphasize, that's is why these viable densities of Sodium Ion and LFP chemistries are so important.

IF Tesla did achieve usable robotaxi self-driving (and while I find their current achievements amazing, it's still fundamentally short of the mark), much like IBM and Microsoft in the early days, it would be stupid to limit their software to Teslas only. Release the software for licensees and make at 3-5 grand on EVERY car.

Re: Lithium drilling advances at the Salton Sea

#77

Post by AtlasBarfed »

algo_trader wrote: post #69
AtlasBarfed wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sodium Ion batteries are approaching somewhere in the 120-160 wh/kg in production, per CATL. I believe 200 wh/kg is on the industry "roadmap" in 3-5 years. I believe Sodium Ion is like LFP in its safety with thermal runaway, so it, like LFP, doesn't require as much cooling and equipment overhead so its Cell-to-Module, or even better, Cell-to-Pack is bettery than cobalt/nickel li-ion chemistries. A sodium ion battery…

> Hopefully in 2-4 years we get the following IMO, current LFP batteries are already "good enough" and "cheap enough" for 80% of car sales. Reportly in 2021 China, 5000-cycle LFP at ~$70/khw. Chop off 1000 cycles, add 20% price margins, and it is still good enough. If you could conjure up x10 manufacturing scale, you would still sell every single cell. It will be easier to improve charging infra, that to improve NMC…

totally agree, but lithium supply may still block the REALLY big volumes, so 160 wh/kg sodium ion being as good as LFP from a year or two back means that isn't an issue. At this point, it should be more mundane factory scaling problems.

The world governments really need to get onboard with pushing worldwide manufacturing of these cells and modules. Tesla's Berlin delays were shameful. If you are running coal plants, you as a government can't say anything about environmental damage from a new BEV or battery plant with a straight face.

I'm thankful that at least science and technology have given humanity a path forward that is clearly economically superior, because it is clear that humanity's collective political governance is incompetent.

The fact you can take decades of global warming science, point out the end state and dangers, and the effective intelligence of worldwide leaders over that time is less than the intellectual and logical capacity of a third grader, even one that has missed their nap, is one of the most depressing things in the world.

I'm loathe to credit the Chinese government with anything based on their current leadership's autocratic and genocidal leanings, but their policies subsidizing battery and solar cell production have been the only effective governmental level environmental policy in the global warming era.

Re: Lithium drilling advances at the Salton Sea

#78

Post by coward123 »

idoh wrote: post #55
coward123 wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Keep in mind there are already states like Washington, which has mandated no new licenses for non-EV personal vehicles after 2030. This isn't to say that EV will completely replace ICE in that timeline (or even on a multi-decade timeline), especially for commercial and specialized industrial vehicles, but for Jane and John Q. Taxpayer, it certainly feels like the end of ICE vehicles as daily transportation is drawing…

I'm willing to bet that 2030 is too soon and they'll kick out the deadline as it approaches and turns out to be impossible to meet. It's one thing to mandate a thing to happen, it's another when it collides with reality.

I suspect you are correct, but at the same time I think about 7 years ago what EV options were available. There could be a lot more options for car buyers 7 years from now. Realistically, the mandate is a starting point - it's just saying that new license plates go to EVs and the clock starts running on ICE. It's still a multi-decade switch over.

Re: Lithium drilling advances at the Salton Sea

#79

Post by wsinks »

idontwantthis wrote: post #18
wsinks wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Just out of curiousity, how would it get much worse? I wonder if it wouldn't make it better since a lot of the water seems to just be so salty it kills everything. Do you mean it'll just be drier and therefore suck more water out of the local ecosystem?

It is full of toxic materials from agricultural runoff. If it dries out then that will become a gigantic dust cloud that will poison millions of people.

Thank you! I completely forgot about the agricultural runoff, that would make things worse.

Re: Lithium drilling advances at the Salton Sea

#80

Post by themitigating »

mburee wrote: post #57
froh wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Please add the Ukraine war, Georgia (the country) and even Afghanistan to the list of oil/gas drilling or pipelining related. Ukraine: https://www.trade.gov/energy-resource-guide-ukraine-oil-and-... Georgia: https://www.atlanticcouncil.org/blogs/new-atlanticist/the-gr... Afghanistan (more disputed though) https://www.outlookindia.com/website/story/pipeline-politics...

Didn't Ukraine regularly steal from Russian pipelines?

What does that have to do with the impact of oil production?
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