The global change to electric vehicles is not only driving the development and efficiency of lithium batteries but also the need for the metal itself.
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Tom Heap took us to Cornwall yesterday – and the old tin mines are promising new metals:
BBC iPlayer – Countryfile – Somerleyton
The latest technologies to extract the metal are particularly interesting:
Cornish Lithium believes that the presence of lithium-bearing geothermal brines in Cornwall may now represent a commercial opportunity. Recent advances in lithium extraction techniques, without the use of solar evaporation, now offer the potential to extract lithium from brine at much lower levels of concentration.
Cornish Lithium Ltd | Cornwall Mining Alliance
With particularly environmentally-friendly technologies:
How Cornish Lithium plans to produce lithium with a net-zero footprint – MINING.COM
The UK government is interested:
Green recovery: Geothermal lithium recovery plant in Cornwall secures Government funding
With a summary from the Cornish Stuff website:
The global change to electric vehicles is not only driving the development and efficiency of lithium batteries but also the need for the metal itself. Because of this, Goldman Sachs called it “the new gasoline” and suggests demand could triple by 2025.
Lithium is a soft silvery alkali metal, the lightest metal and the lightest solid element. The need for lithium has never been stronger. There are many other uses apart from car batteries from phones and fridges to aeroplanes and industry robots, which should see a global ‘lithium rush’ in the forseeable future.
The deposits of Lithium found in Cornwall’s geology are largely untouched from the old days of Cornish mining.
The UK Government has highlighted lithium as ‘a metal of importance’ within the technology sector. This means it recognises how beneficial to the future economic outlook of the country a secure supply of this precious metal would be.
More money for Lithium exploration in Cornwall | |
There is indeed a lot of interest:
Advanced Automotive Battery Technology, Application, and Market
How to shift the UK from also ran to winner in the electric car race | Inside track