Lithium is Essential for Renewables But Adverse to Water Sources

Renewable energy, such as wind and solar, produces little to zero GHG emissions, which is presented as an ideal solution to fight climate change. Thanks to the scaling up of production and manufacturing, renewable energy costs have plummeted, and in some cases, they are cheaper than coal, oil or gas. However, there will only be a widespread transition to renewable energy with the scaling up of battery storage.

The International Energy Agency (IEA) has reported that battery storage is experiencing rapid growth in 2023, with deployment more than doubling year-on-year. A total of 42 GW of battery storage capacity has been added worldwide in 2023, encompassing utility-scale battery projects, behind-the-metre batteries, mini-grids, and solar home systems.

Lithium-ion batteries have emerged as the favourite battery storage alternative in the energy sector, which now accounts for over 90% of annual lithium battery demand thanks to its falling costs since 2010 and its higher densities and longer lifetimes compared with other battery storage alternatives. The demands from the energy sector for lithium batteries are now surpassing those from personal electronic devices like smartphones and laptops, the Agency says.  

“The electricity and transport sectors are two key pillars for bringing down emissions quickly enough to meet the targets agreed at COP28 and keep open the possibility of limiting global warming to 1.5 °C,” said IEA Executive Director Fatih Birol. Batteries will provide the foundation for both sectors (Rapid Expansion, 2024).

According to the IEA, for the world to reach its energy and climate goals, battery deployment must increase significantly between now and the end of this decade. This means that the world will need to triple its renewable energy capacity by 2030 to reach 1,500 GW of energy storage, of which 1,200 GW will be required from batteries.

Lithium plays a critical role in powering electric vehicles and storing renewable energy. However, the process of mining lithium has significant impacts on water sources and local communities. Mining sites are often positioned near Indigenous communities, leading to various challenges. For example, the Rockwood lithium plant in the Atacama Desert in northern Chile extracts vast amounts of lithium-laden brine, depleting water supplies and affecting the livelihoods of residents and Indigenous communities living near the plant’s extensive brine ponds.

In Western Australia’s hard rock mine, mining occurs on Noongar, an Aboriginal land. The area has the world’s highest grade and largest defined hard rock deposit of the lithium mineral spodumene, making Australia one of the world’s top suppliers of this increasingly coveted metal. Although Australia granted a Native Title Settlement to the Noongar People, it does not equate to the level of recognition or rights, particularly on an economic level, given by numerous treaties of other settler-colonial Indigenous States, such as in the U.S., Canada, or New Zealand (Bigby, 2023).

Upstream extraction methods and downstream processes can affect the quantity and quality of water resources, leading to water depletion and contamination. 

Extraction methods like open-pit mining and brine evaporation are popular in the Andes and in China. Direct lithium extraction (DLE) is a new method that promises innovation and a more sustainable and efficient way to extract lithium from underground brine sources because it returns the water to the source. The mining and extraction process will also use geothermal energy for production in geothermal energy sites, where lithium is extracted.

A new paper, “Lithium and water: Hydrosocial impacts across the life cycle of energy storage,” discusses the impacts, benefits, and burdens on water and society throughout the life cycle of lithium, from the three extraction methods – open-pit mining,  lithium brine evaporation, and direct lithium extraction. According to the paper, each technique directly impacts water from the upstream to downstream processes, which include processing, manufacturing, using and disposing of and or recycling of lithium.

The paper offers a primer on lithium’s lifecycle’s cumulative impacts on freshwater and the mineralised or saline groundwater, also known as brine.  The paper notes that “while the impacts of mining on freshwater and communities connected to it have been documented, many studies have ignored brine because some legal frameworks treat it as a mineral rather than water, and industry actors often externalize brine as separate from surrounding wetlands.”

It also accounts for the cumulative impacts of industrial activities across lithium’s lifespan, including the use of freshwater, which, in the case of DLE, potentially uses significantly higher amounts of freshwater—more than 10 times that of the other two methods.

In water-scarce areas where lithium mining usually takes place, the long-term impacts of lithium extraction need to be further studied, as well as how it will affect surrounding communities and the ecosystem. The paper notes that wastewater from processing, chemical contaminants from battery manufacturing, water used for cooling in energy storage, and water quality hazards in recycling must also be accounted for.

Lithium processing, for instance, can result in ecotoxicity impacts and significant quantities of wastewater that need to be treated, reinjected, or disposed of in some other way. The paper says that processing wastewater may include heavy metals, other by-product minerals, silica, and solid wastes that require disposal at a materials recovery facility, landfill, or hazardous waste site.

Community pushbacks in the United States over lithium extraction projects

Renewable energy development’s most significant impact will be on water from mining essential minerals. In the United States, lithium extraction’s enormous need for water and the tailings that mining the mineral produces create pushback from environmental groups and communities (Myskow, 2024).

At the Salton Sea in California, often called Lithium Valley, local community groups and environmentalists have sued to stop a DLE site on the cusp of operation. They claim that lithium extraction operation can impact their freshwater supplies, and much of it will come from the Colorado River, which is already in decline.

Communities in rural Nevada have also united to oppose open-pit lithium over fears of what it will do to their local water supplies and wildlife home to the world’s most endangered fish. In Green River, Utah, locals and environmentalists have protested one of the DLE projects closest to operating in the US because of its potential impacts on their water supply (Myskow, 2024).

There is no silver bullet to solving the climate crisis. Unsustainable and irresponsible mining practices that enable the widespread growth of renewables can be counterproductive and lead to maladaptation because they can perpetuate environmental degradation and social inequalities. Hence, it is essential that increased mining decouples itself from the environmental and social risks it poses.

There are other means to fight climate change than increased lithium mining, such as prioritising public transport, implementing policies to encourage active transport, investing in multi-modal infrastructure, making cities more walkable, improving the energy efficiency of homes, buildings, manufacturing facilities to reduce energy use, and reducing waste.