Lithium is The New Silicon

Energy storage as an industry is no longer a curiosity or academic pursuit. Creating a future which is 100% renewable will require the collective focus of the entire energy industry. With its ability to support the weaknesses of variable resources such as wind and solar, low-cost…

Hi, Andrew. I’m a bit worried about the availability of lithium at scale. Will we run into finite limits about how much is on/in the planet, as with uranium for creating power? Is it as ubiquitous as silicon in sand?

http://www.evworld.com/library/lithium_shortage.pdf says current reserves fall far short of linearly…

Andrew, thanks for this nicely written case. I’d quibble about non-lithium chemistries (several look quite promising), but on the whole your points are valid — except your basic premise about need. Cheap batteries would be very
useful, but are not essential for renewables to make most or all of
our electricity reliably. We have other and cheaper ways…

Teslas deal with Rare Earth Minerals PLC (http://www.rareearthmineralsplc.com/) in their Sonora project(http://www.lse.co.uk/share-regulatory-news.asp?shareprice=REM&ArticleCode=qtsatzgo&ArticleHeadline=Sonora_Project_Signs_Lithium_Supply_Contract) is huge and currently only about 10% of their resource is currently explored. Plus they have interests…

In any discussion on a coming battery revolution, you have to take into account not only market constraints, but also physical/geological constraints. The constraints on silicon are nowhere near as limiting as those on lithium, and the other components needed, e.g. cobalt and graphite. It has been argued that, assuming a large ramp up of battery…

Awesome article. In fact, I believe that a mix between lithium and renewable energy could be a game changer as well. I am testing my luck with renewableenergy.london project where I am looking to create a system where I would use smart contracts (maybe Ethereum) and sell the excess of renewable energy (biomass, solar,hydro,wind) to all major bitcoin…