Re:Tesla Flips the Switch on the Gigafactory
by jseliger on Wednesday January 04, 2017 @07:12PM
(#13323444)
So no, no lithium shortage in the foreseeable future.
In addition, as of now cobalt and nickel are actually more valuable: https://waste-management-world.com/a/1-the-lithium-battery-r....
There are efforts underway to make lithium recycling effective at commercial scale, but the current chemistry of it and the current (low) cost of lithium metal means that not much is happening in this domain at the moment. Still, I would expect commercial lithium metal recycling long before before we are even remotely close to exhausting lithium stocks.
Also enlightening, world lithium reserves known in 2010: https://minerals.usgs.gov/minerals/pubs/commodity/lithium/mc...
Note that reported reserves have increased by ~41% in 6 years (14 million tonnes in 2016 up from 9.9 million in 2010) even as extraction accelerated. Companies have been putting more effort into discovery which has increased known reserves much faster than increasing extraction is drawing them down.
So no, no lithium shortage in the foreseeable future.