carbonates

Response to Jack Lifton's 'Lithium Batteries: Nothing But Illusion'

Lithium is toxic, eMedicine says this:
"An estimated 10,000 toxic exposures occur per year. These data indicate a gradual increase over the past 10 years." for the US.

The FDA banned lithium as a medication for many years due to its toxicity. Overdoses are a risk. Most MSDS sheets say something like this:

"Corrosive. Causes eye and skin burns. Water-reactive. Reacts violently and/or explosively with water, steam or moisture. May ignite or explode on contact with moist air. May cause severe respiratory tract irritation with possible burns. May cause severe digestive tract irritation with possible burns. May cause central nervous system effects. May cause lung damage. Light sensitive. May cause kidney damage. May cause pulmonary edema. "

As lithium carbonate it is only slightly safer.


On Apr 22 03:50 PM speculawyer wrote:

> Indeed, I think you hit on one of the most important points in your
> 'fourth' section. The amount of lithium in a lithium iron phosphate
> battery (the most promising Li-Ion battery for automotive applications)
> is relatively small. Less than 12% of a lithium iron phosphate battery
> is made up of lithium. The Iron, the phosphorous, and other less
> expensive materials make up the bulk of such batteries.
>
> Altaman, lithium is NOT highly toxic nor very expensive. In fact
> lithium is used as a medication for people with bi-polar disorder.
> Of course too much of any one thing, including water, can kill you.
> Lithium is NOT considered a highly toxic chemical.

Response to Jack Lifton's 'Lithium Batteries: Nothing But Illusion'

Lipton is right about one thing. Lithium is not abundant enough based on current economically recoverable reserves to supply a large automotive market. Lipton is correct in asserting that the Bolivian supply is overestimated, and since Bolivia clearly intends to nationalize its lithium reserves, the supply is hardly without its restrictions. Uyuni does have problems with both concentration and contaminants. I am a professional geologist who has visited Uyuni and Atacama salars to make a personal evaluation of the lithium reserves (note my name). Neither of you have touched on the environmental cost of these lithium supplies and that that may eventually place serious limits on supply (it already has in the US as I doubt anyone is going to allow mining the Great Salt Lake or the Salton Sea).

What neither of you seems to be explaining is that reserves are entirely based on economics. If lithium goes to the price of gold, there will be plenty of it available. However, I don't think many automotive applications will support a dramatically higher price for lithium. Lithium supply is currently expected to fall at least 30% below demand by at least one producer (Admiralty). The automotive market would likely destroy itself by creating more demand than the market can hope to supply.

Rather than debating and inferring definitions about reserves and resources, here is the AGI definition:
Reserves: Identified resources that can be extracted profitably with existing technology (my note: understand that as price goes up, so do reserves)
Resource: Reserves plus all other mineral deposits that may eventually become available.

There are plenty of lithium resources, since it is present in seawater. There are NOT plenty of reserves, since it can't be extracted from MOST resources profitably.

If any of you care to read a CURRENT resource/reserve estimate please read this (any 1992 estimates are based on seriously obsolete economics and are WRONG for that reason among others):
www.meridian-int-res.c...