Adding to our little list of scientific papers that might not really meet the definition of science. We’ve got this talking about the potential for the extraction of lithium in Bolivia:
Theoretical Background
The conditions of lithium extraction and production are a function of interrelated historical, social, economic, and ecological dynamics. Global capitalism has engendered the climate crisis on the one hand and uneven geographical development on the other; in the process of finding a solution to the former there is a risk of exacerbating the latter. Moore’s (Citation2003) work on world-systems theory as an ecological history of the origin and continuation of the capitalist mode of production speaks vividly to that point. The political ecology tradition studies how power relations mediate human-environment relations. Biersack and Greenberg (Citation2009) enumerate five constituent (re)orientations of political ecology: (1) a rejection of reducing the symbolic to the material and vice versa; (2) a critique of culture/nature dualism; (3) the combination of local and global articulations in world-systems theory; (4) a recognition of individual agency beyond inter-locking structures; and (5) an acknowledgment of social inequities and stratifications beyond class, including but not limited to gender, race, and ethnicity. By orienting our research within political ecology, we engage in the local-global articulation of human-nature and human-human interactions to examine the distribution of benefits to the diverse communities surrounding the Uyuni salt flat and how this is conditioned by the Bolivian state’s position in the global economy.
That’s, umm, not really science, is it? It’s wibbling about politics which is not, in any useful sense, science.
And now let us do some real background here. Yes, the world wants much more lithium dug up. Those electric vehicles and all that. So, how much lithium does the world want dug up?
Tesla, in their Master Plan 3, tell us the vehicles of the world will require about 20 million tonnes. That sounds about right, 10kg of Li per battery, 2 billion vehicles - sure, we can argue at the margins but we’ll need more than 2 million tonnes and nothing like 200 million tonnes. We’re OK with the guesstimate so far.
But how much lithium is there out there? True, it’s my calculation therefore it’s wrong but some 2,850,000 billion tonnes. We’ve enough to be getting on with then.
But that’s total availability and very little of that is going to be in nice, rich, economic, concentrations. Some of it will be in the fracking waters in Pennsylvania, just as one example.
A Vast, Untapped Source of Lithium Has Just Been Found in The US
Actually, that’s not interesting at all.
The MLE calculations suggest the estimated ultimate lithium recovery (10-year Li mass yield) from individual wells in SW and NE PA are 2.90 (95% CI 2.80–2.99) mt and 1.86 (95% CI 1.86–2.07) mt, respectively.
They’re using mt there to mean metric tonne, not thousands of tonnes. Each fracking well produces a couple of tonnes of lithium over a decade? Naah, not unless we get really desperate.
But we know we can get from the geothermal waters under the Salton Sea. Or Cornwall (both are, absolutely, technically possible. As yet economic viability is unproven but likely). Or there’s lots of spodumene around. And, of course, those salt flats in South America. Well, so how much is in resources - that stage where we think we can extract economically but haven’t wholly proven it yet?
Owing to continuing exploration, measured and indicated lithium resources have increased substantially worldwide and total about 105 million tons. Measured and indicated lithium resources in the United States—from continental brines, claystone, geothermal brines, hectorite, oilfield brines, and pegmatites—are 14 million tons. Measured and indicated lithium resources in other countries have been revised to 91 million tons. Resources are distributed as follows: Bolivia, 23 million tons; Argentina, 22 million tons; Chile, 11 million tons; Australia, 8.7 million tons; China, 6.8 million tons; Germany, 3.8 million tons; Canada, 3 million tons; Congo (Kinshasa), 3 million tons; Mexico, 1.7 million tons; Czechia, 1.3 million tons; Serbia, 1.2 million tons; Peru, 1 million tons; Russia, 1 million tons; Mali, 890,000 tons; Brazil, 800,000 tons; Zimbabwe, 690,000 tons; Spain, 320,000 tons; Portugal, 270,000 tons; Namibia; 230,000 tons; Ghana, 200,000 tons; Finland, 68,000 tons; Austria, 60,000 tons; and Kazakhstan, 50,000 tons.
While that’s the 2024 report that’s actually written in 2023 off information that’s - usually, about - collected in 2022. Those lithium resources are substantially higher now.
But we’ve plenty of identified and likely economic lithium to be getting on with. About 5 times what Tesla thinks we need in fact. Sure, it’s true that Bolivia has the largest single chunk of that. And yes, it’s up on that salt pan and we know how to extract from that.
At which point, back to Bolivia, the Uyuni salt flat and the political impact of lithium extraction from it.
None.
There is going to be no economic nor political impact upon Bolivia of that extraction. Because there’s not going to be any extraction. For the reason discussed - but not noted - in that not science paper at the top. Bolivia is trying to insist that they don’t simply dig up the lithium, instead all the value added has to be done there too. At one point the Morales government was trying to insist that not only does the extraction have to be done 12,000 feet up on the altiplano, the purification must be done there, the batteries built there and the cars manufactured up there. In what is, to be fair about it, a wasteland at present and also at about the very limit of where humans can live long term.
That’s simply not going to happen. For the reason we should be able to grasp having seen the numbers for lithium reserves. We’ve - already identified - five times more mineable lithium than we need. Bolivia only has one fifth of it. We can go exploit the other 4/5ths and simply do nothing in Bolivia at all - if Bolivia decides to try and get uppity about how much value add needs to be done up there where most humans cannot actually live.
What do we think’s going to happen? Quite, the Bolivian material won’t get developed or extracted. Precisely because the government there has been believing this sort of drivel about new economic paradigms.
Bit of a pity and all that but that is how it works. Ask for too much and you’ll get nothing. Bolivia sure could use the money from the lithium extraction but as I say it’s not going to get it. Simply because it’s also asking for all the other value add.
Amazin’ how bad economics keeps the poor poor, ain’t it?