Posted on 06/26/2024 1:19:38 PM PDT by hardspunned
La Paz is the world’s highest capitol city in elevation at 11,942 feet above sea level. If you are heading to fight in La Paz, you’d better take a bottle of oxygen.
neutral here in your ‘argument’ but,
can/how then can lithium be commercially extracted, and,
do you know this not to be the case in this instance?
That scene with Cosell and Dunphy is one of my faves . . .
Don’t expect a reply. The batchit crazy leftists are landing on FR in a major infestation, four months before the election.
Leftists will get triggered and spew left wing talking points whenever their eco-fascist orthodoxy is challenged. That explains the garbage post about lithium mining.
I’ve been here longer than you, SD—and conservative doesn’t mean anti-conservation.
Bolivia has a lot of silver mines, I knew a guy Brian who had an eco-mint that made the worlds purest silver.
He tried to get his rounds to be legal tender in Bolivia but failed eventually as did his dreams.
It does keep "enviromental consultants" employed. Full employment for the EPA and other such regulatory agencies.
One of the best reforms President Trump put in place was a ban on Cost to Benefit ratio studies being done by people who have been paid by the EPA, in order to prevent a conflict of interest.
“there isn’t any significant mining going on there, and never has been”
Really now? https://www.mining.com/bolivia-uyuni-plant-to-yield-first-lithium-by-2025-end/
It always helps to have UP TO DATE ARTICLES when you cite.
Just a helpful hint.
“can/how then can lithium be commercially extracted, and,
do you know this not to be the case in this instance?”
That is a very good question. The answer is well casings. Drill heads going far enough down to hit the salt water aquifer require more money if you put solid casings thru the fresh water aquifers. No one wants to spend money if they don’t have to.
Despite the idiot nonsense spewed out here from time to time I am actually more virulently opposed to leftism/state control of environmental issues than any person here on FR. I just believe that companies which cause true environmental DAMAGE should not only be legally liable to TORTS (not regulatory fines and penalties). The veil of corporate immunity should be stripped away from company officers who ignore “best practices” (which, again, should be removed from the state altogether, and transferred to private firms analagous to Underwriting Laboratories, a private lab that does a great job of standards issuing). No “EPA” nor state control of environmental standards, with its harboring of leftist nonsense, just true accountability and a “you broke it, you fix it” legal system.
Leftists will get triggered and spew left wing talking points whenever their eco-fascist orthodoxy is challenged. That explains the garbage post about lithium mining.
You need: 1) an enema. 2) a course in basic logic and coherence 3) some understanding of what you are talking about
Other than that, your comments are perfect.
I notice they claim the "first yield" will be in 2025. It doesn't seem like significant mining has going on, or is very recent.
From the article:
In December, it opened its first industrial-scale lithium plant. The $100 million facility is expected to produce as much as 15,000 tons of lithium carbonate a year.
That was in December of 2023. The "first yield" is expected in 2025.
sigh, from the article: 1) the article does NOT reference the beginning of mining in 2023/2024, but the construction by the Chinese of new plants with different extraction policies. If you had read it, you would know that, assuming basic English comprehension 2) quoting: "The South American landlocked country has a history of unfulfilled lithium dreams. It has tried and failed to develop its industry several times since the 1990s, producing an accumulated 1,400 tonnes since 2018."
THis means they have tried to mine it since the 1990s, used wells, had ponds but got no Lithium, or very little, until fairly recently
Is English your first language?
Solid casings are standard operating procedure for drilling wells.
That does not erase the fact that Lithium mining, when done without regard to freshwater aquifers, literally will destroy the ability of hundreds of thousands of people to have water for crops. You drill deep wells and pump salt water thru the fresh water aquifers and dry out the water to extract the lithium..... that is a seriously wanting explanation of the process but it hits the core. These aquifers will NOT recharge in one or two generations.
Where are you getting your information? What you wrote here is not reasonable.
No one "pump salt water through fresh water aquifers" The brine goes up a casing. Salar de Uyuni is an enormous salt flat. No significant number of people live on a salt flat. No one grows significant crops on a salt flat. Salt flats are poison to plants.
You may get subsidence if you pump out lots of brine. Why would you care if a salt flat drops down a couple of feet?
A more serious concern is the process probably uses fresh water to produce lithium by taking out other salts. It might use a lot of fresh water, and there probably isn't much available in a salt flat.
Curious as to your sources. Very few people live there. They cater to tourists.
Yes. Is it yours? Do you understand the word "significant"?
Do you understand the concept of "unfulfilled lithium dreams"?
You wrote this: It has tried and failed to develop its industry several times since the 1990s, producing an accumulated 1,400 tonnes since 2018."
I am so happy about last night that I just cant muster up any invective here, so I will just try to answer amiably.
The Uyuni salt flats are huge. They are equivalent to about 1/3 the state of Oregon in size. They are ringed by several small towns, with the largest being about 30,ooo (Uyuni) and tons of smaller towns and villages. Maybe 250,000 to 300,000 all making a “living” from the salt. They are mostly Quechua Indians, which are a HUGE people group that stretch from N Ecuador down into Chile. (For the record, I used to work with Wycliffe Bible Translators and hung out for a while in Colombia, then hitchiked down to Ecuador and Peru. I have some small acquaintance with them). They are, like any Indian group in S. America, either evangelical Christian or Marxist. They are extremely poor in Bolivia, as that country is a dumpster fire of leftism and drug barons and wealthy elites and poor indians like the Quechua (many Aymara, too). If the fresh water aquifer goes in Uyuni, the people will simply have to move, or die.
The well process in Lithium mining is, like all wells, varied by karst and topography. Most of the karst in Uyuni contains the salt brine, and thus does not need a sleeve to pull up the brine. You are correct in asserting that many wells do have a jacket to avoid spillage into the surrounding sediment, but the theory here is that we are dealing with such high pressure that they just don’t need it. As well, drilling almost never uses deep casing anyway. it is almost always assumed that it is too expensive. Finally, casing is USUALLY not installed until the hole is done and the casing is put in afterwards. I realize this is not always the situation and sometimes the hole is in danger of collapse. In such instances, you case AS you drill. Casing a hole is a pretty advanced subject that requires lots of knowledge about lots of subjects and is beyond our ability to hammer out here. Suffice it to say that the wells in Uyumi have already mixed brine with potable aquifer levels, and the Chinese are noted for being (as any state is) pigs and reckless. There are already plumes of brine seeping into fresh water sources from the drilling, and this is unarguable.
Not everyone who posts about warnings on environmental issues is some pink haired refugee screeching about “global warming” and reciting Chairman Mao. When people post such nonsense, they should expect to get pushback.
Always happy to help those who live on the low end of the IQ scale. Give me a call anytime.
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