Elon Musk tweeted Tesla might enter the lithium mining and refining organization straight and at scale since the expense of the metal, an essential element in producing batteries, has actually gotten so high.
“Price of lithium has gone to insane levels,” Musk tweeted. “There is no shortage of the element itself, as lithium is almost everywhere on Earth, but pace of extraction/refinement is slow.”
The Tesla and SpaceX tech manager was reacting to a tweet revealing the typical rate of lithium per tonne in the last 20 years, which revealed a huge boost in rates because2021 According to Benchmark Mineral Intelligence, the expense of the metal has actually increased more than 480% in the in 2015.
There are undoubtedly deposits of lithium all over the United States, according to the the U.S. Geological Survey, a department of the U.S. Department of Interior.
Lithium is important in electrical car batteries since it is both the lightest metal and the least thick strong aspect. That indicates that batteries made with lithium have a high power-to-weight ratio, which is essential when handling transport.
Friday’s tweet is not the very first time Musk has actually raised the concept of Tesla mining its own lithium.
In 2020, Tesla protected its own rights to mine lithium in Nevada after an offer to purchase a lithium mining business failed, according to Fortune, which was siting “people familiar with the matter.”
