Spanish Scientists develop 60% efficiency solar panels

Cobalt is used for litheum. Yet again you show your ignorance....

“We've just seen an explosion of proposed projects in the planning, piloting, demonstration stage across a much wider array of countries,” says Caroline White-Nockleby, a PhD candidate who studies renewable energy transitions in MIT’s doctoral program in History; Anthropology; and Science, Technology, and Society.

Both brine and hard rock mining come with environmental and social costs. Sixty percent of the world’s lithium stores are located in brine deposits in South America’s “lithium triangle,” sometimes in ecologically sensitive areas.4 Mining of all kinds can disturb landscapes. And though hard rock mining uses more freshwater, both types of mining require significant water use, a resource that may be scarce in certain mining regions.5 In areas of lithium extraction from brine, brine loss is also significant, says White-Nockleby. Because brine is often not considered freshwater suitable for human use, it may have fewer regulatory protections, though mining from it can still impact ecosystems and communities.6

When it comes to energy use, brine mining, which largely uses energy from the sun, is much less intensive than hard rock mining, which requires heavy machinery to dig up and crush rock. The energy used by mining machinery creates climate pollution like carbon dioxide, which warms the planet. A 2021 study found that lithium concentration and production from brine can create about 11 tons of carbon dioxide per ton of lithium, while mining lithium from spodumene ore releases about 37 tons of CO2 per ton of lithium produced.5

The social impacts of lithium mining depend on how mining companies behave and how governments regulate them. Ideally, communities that host lithium mining would share in the economic benefits, and not be left on their own to deal with cleanup and the loss of local resources—though this is far from always the case. Last year, California, where companies are planning to extract lithium from brine, created a law to try to redirect some future mining profits towards local communities. The government will tax lithium extraction at $400 to $800 per ton, which will go to environmental restoration and community benefit projects, as well as directly to counties impacted by extraction.7

The impacts of this policy are yet to be seen, and White-Nockleby urges caution as companies propose more extraction projects across the globe. "Historically and today, lithium mining has disproportionately affected low-income and marginalized communities, and has also often impacted lands with cultural importance to Indigenous communities," she says. “It's important that communities be a part of any lithium mining planning process from the very beginning. People always have the right to reject an extraction project.”

New methods of lithium extraction, which may use less energy and resources, are also being pioneered. In “direct lithium extraction,” specialized filters are used to separate lithium from brine. The process can have a smaller footprint than traditional brine operations, and water can be recycled in the process. White-Nockleby says some companies are also investigating how to pull lithium from old mine waste. 

Democratic Republic of the Congo: Industrial mining of cobalt and copper for rechargeable batteries is leading to grievous human rights abuses..

Growing demand for so-called clean energy technologies has created a corresponding demand for certain metals, including copper, and cobalt, which is essential for making most lithium-ion batteries. These are used to power a wide range of devices including electric cars and mobile phones. The DRC has the world’s largest reserves of cobalt, and the seventh largest reserves of copper.

The average electric vehicle battery requires more than 13kg of cobalt, and a mobile phone battery about 7g. Demand for cobalt is expected to reach 222,000 tonnes by 2025, having tripled since 2010.

Donat Kambola, president of IBGDH, said: “People are being forcibly evicted, or threatened or intimidated into leaving their homes, or misled into consenting to derisory settlements. Often there was no grievance mechanism, accountability, or access to justice.”

Candy Ofime and Jean-Mobert Senga, Amnesty International researchers and co-authors of the report, said: “We found repeated breaches of legal safeguards prescribed in international human rights law and standards, and national legislation, as well as blatant disregard for the UN Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights.”

To produce Powering Change or Business as Usual? Amnesty International and IBGDH interviewed more than 130 people at six different mining projects in and around the city of Kolwezi, in the southern province of Lualaba, during two separate visits in 2022.