Elon Musk tweeted Tesla might get into the lithium mining and refining business enterprise specifically and at scale mainly because the cost of the steel, a critical part in manufacturing batteries, has gotten so significant.
“Rate of lithium has gone to crazy stages,” Musk tweeted. “There is no shortage of the factor itself, as lithium is nearly just about everywhere on Earth, but rate of extraction/refinement is slow.”
The Tesla and SpaceX tech manager was responding to a tweet showing the normal cost of lithium for every tonne in the final two decades, which confirmed a huge boost in rates because 2021. In accordance to Benchmark Mineral Intelligence, the charge of the metal has gone up additional than 480% in the last calendar year.
There are in truth deposits of lithium all more than the United States, according to the the U.S. Geological Survey, a division of the U.S. Office of Interior.
Lithium is important in electric motor vehicle batteries due to the fact it is both of those the lightest steel and the minimum dense strong element. That implies that batteries built with lithium have a substantial energy-to-bodyweight ratio, which is essential when working with transportation.
Friday’s tweet is not the very first time Musk has lifted the idea of Tesla mining its very own lithium.
In 2020, Tesla secured its own legal rights to mine lithium in Nevada immediately after a offer to acquire a lithium mining organization fell by way of, according to Fortune, which was siting “people today acquainted with the subject.”
