Hot commodity
Officials see big potential for lithium extraction in Valley
Could Imperial County be the next hotbed of commercial lithium mining? County officials certainly hope so.
The Imperial County Board of Supervisors on Tuesday approved a comment letter to the California Energy Commission regarding the prospect of recovering the mineral lithium from geothermal brine at the Salton Sea.
“This potential new industry holds a great deal of promise for new job creation and economic development here in Imperial County. In addition, it could serve to provide an important domestic source of a critical resource that is a key component in batteries that can be used to improve electric grid reliability and electric vehicle deployment in the state of California.
“In addition, mineral extraction, in conjunction with other renewable energy development around the Salton Sea should contribute to ongoing efforts to address issue around the troubled body of water,” the county wrote in a comment letter signed by county Supervisors Chairman Ray Castillo.
In the process of mining geothermal energy, hot brine is extracted from the earth, and minerals such as lithium, zinc and manganese are present in the hot fluid, Deputy County Executive Officer Andy Horne said. Collecting those minerals has long proven a reality, but doing so on a large-scale, commercial and economically feasible basis has yet to be done.
The conventional process of mining lithium in countries like Australia, Argentina and Chile is through evaporative ponds. Very little lithium is mined in the United States through this process.
County officials hope a recent gathering of local, state and federal officials and private industry to talk about lithium extraction produces results. Horne said that on Nov. 15 the California Energy Commission held a workshop on lithium recovery through geothermal brine at the Salton Sea resource area in Sacramento.
“Lithium has become a hot commodity in the literal sense because of the demand for batteries in electric vehicles, personal electronic devices and electric grid (battery) storage,” Horne said. “Demand is up tenfold in the next 10 years, and the supplies of lithium on the world market are not great.”
The price of lithium, Horne said, is something akin to $10,000 a metric ton.
A 2015 report from the National Renewable Energy Laboratory valued mineral recovery of lithium from Salton Sea geothermal brine as potentially producing up to $860 million annually in total business revenue, according to a California Energy Commission blog written ahead of the Nov. 15 workshop.
In Castillo’s letter to the CEC, the county recommends discussion on forming a “Lithium Task Force” meant to bring together stakeholders who would be involved in the development of the extraction efforts.
“Imperial County strongly encourages the CEC to move forward with this ‘task force’ concept, as we believe that the potential benefits would greatly increase the eventual success of this exciting opportunity. Our county would be directly involved in the permitting process for these facilities, and has the ability to provide significant incentives to future developers of mineral extraction projects here,” the letter reads.
Lithium extraction has been done in smallscale pilot projects before, namely through Simbol Materials, Horne said. According to past Imperial Valley Press reports, Simbol was successful at extracting lithium, potassium and silicon through geothermal brine before the company laid off workers and closed operations in 2015.
“It’s a huge market. The potential for creating jobs and new revenues down here seems to be more than just a pipe dream,” Horne said. He added these would not be entry-level positions, either; rather they would be technically skilled positions like chemists, engineers and operators working on extraction projects.
A new mineral extraction facility would probably be a half-billion-dollar project, Horne said. “We’re talking several billion in new constriction necessary for all the facilities up there,” he added.
Horne, who attended the CEC workshop, said talk centered around the technical and economic challenges to mining the lithium in Imperial County. “Can it be done at an economically workable price?”
They also talked about what government agencies can do to help bring along the process.
Horne said Assemblyman Eduardo Garcia was also on hand, and he could put forth legislation that would facilitate efforts as well.
“There’s enough potential upside from an economic standpoint,” Horne said. “The advantages of having a local reliable supply for this material is too important from a strategic standpoint.”
Imperial County is the only place that exists in the country where local, state and federal officials believe this can be done.
Horne said county officials were to meet with Berkshire Hathaway Energy (which owns CalEnergy geothermal operations) officials today to talk about lithium recovery.
“I think our board is very optimistic about this. It’s been talked about for some time, but it’s gathering momentum to move this forward at some very high levels, and I think that’s encouraging,” Horne said.