DENVER METRO — First responders in the Denver metro area say fires caused by lithium-ion batteries are becoming increasingly common, with several recent incidents highlighting the dangers of these everyday power sources.
These batteries can be found in household items like phones, laptops, power tools, and toothbrushes. Lithium-ion batteries are also used in electric vehicles and e-bikes.
A cell phone left on a charger was the suspected cause of a fire that destroyed a Lakewood family’s home on Saturday, according to West Metro Fire Rescue. Fire officials said the lithium-ion battery in the phone overheated and ignited items around it, causing the fire to quickly spread throughout the home near W. 14th Avenue and Allison Street. West Metro Fire said no one was hurt.
West Metro Fire
“I happened to look out in the street and saw smoke rolling down the street,” said Dian Duclos, who lives next door. “I grabbed my phone and called 911 immediately, and then kind of watched it just escalate from there. It was pretty scary, and that fire picked up really quickly.”
The rapid spread of flames is a concerning characteristic of lithium-ion battery fires, according to West Metro Fire Captain Dan Wenger. He said the batteries can produce a significant amount of heat very quickly when they’re damaged or overcharged.
“Typically, when batteries receive some sort of exterior damage — it’s been hit or knocked or dropped — you may not be able to tell that there’s damage right away, but once you start to charge it, that’s when the problem can occur,” he said.
South Metro Fire
Earlier this month, South Metro Fire Rescue said a hybrid vehicle with lithium-ion batteries was involved in a garage fire in Douglas County. First responders said the garage was a total loss and there was some smoke damage to the home. In September, fire officials said overcharging of several lithium-ion batteries, including an e-bike, caused a Jefferson County garage to catch fire.
West Metro Fire
West Metro Fire Rescue said a charging lithium-ion battery pack sparked a fire inside a Lakewood apartment in early December. Fire officials said the battery overheated and ignited nearby items.
First responders said one family was displaced and the fire caused about $50,000 in damage.
Safety recommendations
Wenger explained that it’s important to properly charge devices with lithium-ion batteries. This means avoiding overcharging and using chargers specifically designed for the device.
“Our recommendation to people is always use a device that was manufactured for that actual device,” he said. “If you do have to get an extra charger, make sure you’re using one from the same manufacturer that was intended for the device that you’re charging.”
He recommends avoiding aftermarket and third-party vendors who may sell chargers for cheap.
Colorado first responders say fires caused by lithium-ion batteries are becoming more common
Fire officials recommend checking batteries for visible damage, especially if they have been dropped. Wenger also advises charging devices on non-flammable surfaces.
“Avoid charging a device, like a phone, in your bed, under covers, under your pillow, those types of places,” he said.
Wenger said if your electric vehicle is not charging the same or if your car has any damage to the underside, you should get your vehicle checked out to make sure the battery did not sustain any damage.
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The U.S. government is taking stake in yet another company, and this time it’s a mining company. Lithium Americas is currently developing one of the world’s largest lithium mines in northern Nevada. CBS News reporter Andres Gutierrez has more.
ST. PAUL, Minn. — A man was hospitalized after an electric bike started on fire inside an east St. Paul apartment building on Monday morning.
The St. Paul Fire Department says crews were called to the building, off East Fourth and Hancock streets in the Dayton’s Bluff neighborhood, at about 8 a.m. after the bike caught on fire, “filling the 3rd floor with smoke.”
Firefighters used a ladder to help rescue a man inside. Officials say three residents were evaluated at the scene, with one man taken to the hospital. His condition hasn’t been released.
What’s behind the uptick in lithium-ion battery fires?
Lithium-ion batteries — used in most electric bikes, scooters, vehicles, lawnmowers, power tools, laptops and other rechargeable gadgets — contain liquid electrolytes that burn at higher temperatures and for longer durations than electrolytes used in alkaline batteries.
CBS News reports that “unregulated aftermarket chargers” are helping to fuel the rash of battery-related fires across the country.
In a five-month span between late 2023 and early 2024, the Woodbury Fire Department says battery malfunctions were the cause of at least five house fires.
St. Paul Fire Department
The FAA says the number of battery-related fires aboard flights has also increased by more than 42% in the past several years.
The National Fire Protection Association says charging failures can cause “thermal runaway,” where an overheated cell inside a battery triggers a dangerous chain reaction. Another potential hazard, known as “off-gassing,” is when a malfunctioning battery can start to leak flammable gases inside an environment, leading to the threat of a sudden ignition.
The Woodbury Fire Department gave WCCO these battery-related safety tips earlier this year:
Read the label and know the voltage and rating.
Stop charging batteries once they’re full.
Charge devices on hard surfaces, like desks, tables or counters.
Only use the batteries that are designated for their devices, and the charging equipment that comes with them.
Stephen Swanson is a web producer at CBS Minnesota. A 21-year WCCO-TV veteran, Stephen was a floor director for a decade before moving to the newsroom, where he focuses on general assignment reporting.
Battery storage is what allows renewable energy to provide power even when the sun isn’t shining or the wind isn’t blowing. It’s key to making the electrical grid reliable as we transition away from coal and gas. Ben Tracy examines how battery technology is improving.
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SAN FRANCISCO — New legislation that took effect the first week of March set new safety standards for storing and charging personal mobility devices (PMD’s) in San Francisco that are powered by lithium-ion batteries.
With more people using electric bikes, scooters and skateboards to get around San Francisco, there are more lithium-ion batteries in the city and San Francisco Fire Lieutenant Mariano Elias says SFFD is seeing more lithium-ion battery related fires as a result.
“I’ve been around fires that have happened due to mostly scooters,” he said.
The new regulations are geared toward preventing these kinds of fires.
“Last year, over 60 fires were caused by lithium-ion batteries in San Francisco with, sadly and tragically, our first death,” said supervisor Aaron Peskin. “This is really a public safety piece of legislation.
People living in a multi-unit building, not single-family homes, are limited to four lithium ion-powered PMDs per household. When charging, they must be plugged into their own outlets, not power strips and they must be at least 3 feet away from each other. Damaged or reassembled batteries are also prohibited, per the code.
“What we’ve seen is the potential for overcharging,” Elias said. “Lithium-ion batteries do not like to be in excessive heat.”
Elias said these kinds of fires are very tough to extinguish.
“It happens very rapidly. Almost, like I said, an explosion,” he said. “It limits the time people can get out because of the amount of smoke being produced.”
Peskin introduced the legislation.
“In 2020, there was a big fire in a high-rise apartment building in my district that first alerted me to this,” he said. “It was a gentleman who had five electric scooters. One of the batteries combusted, it spread to the other four scooters that were charging. Fortunately, nobody was killed but 15 units of apartments were displaced.”
“We don’t want anyone to lose their life over anything,” Elias said. “This is one of the reasons why this new law is in effect.”
The new standards also apply to places that can hold more PMDs, such as storage facilities and repair shops. While they are permitted to charge more than four devices at a time, they’ll have to adapt to comply with the new safe charging and storage practices.
In Southern California’s Imperial Valley, unemployment is high, wages are low and agriculture is the dominant industry. But the move to electric vehicles may turn the region into “Lithium Valley.” John Blackstone explains.
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ANCHORAGE, Alaska (AP) — A large cargo ship with a fire in its hold is being kept 2 miles (3.22 kilometers) offshore of an Alaska port as a precaution while efforts are undertaken to extinguish the flames, the U.S. Coast Guard said Saturday.
There were no injuries to the 19 crew members aboard the Genius Star XI, which was carrying a load of lithium-ion batteries across the Pacific Ocean, from Vietnam to San Diego, the guard’s Alaska district said in a release.
The fire started on Christmas Day in cargo hold No. 1, a spokesperson for ship owner Wisdom Marine Group said in a statement. The crew released carbon dioxide into the hold and sealed it over concerns of an explosion.
Ship’s personnel alerted the Coast Guard early Thursday morning about the fire. The Coast Guard said it diverted the 410-foot (125-meter) cargo ship to Dutch Harbor, one of the nation’s busiest fishing ports located in Unalaska, an Aleutian Islands community about 800 miles (1,287 kilometers) southwest of Anchorage.
The ship arrived Friday, but an order preventing the Genius Star XI from going close to shore was issued to “mitigate risks associated with burning lithium-ion batteries or toxic gasses produced by the fire,” Coast Guard Lt. Cmdr. Mike Salerno said in an email to The Associated Press.
“The city’s primary concern is protecting the health and safety of our community members, the environment, fisheries and commerce,” Unalaska acting city manager Marjie Veeder said in a statement.
Veeder said the city’s emergency operations center “is acting on behalf of the community and advocating our position to protect our community. We are actively monitoring the situation.”
There is danger associated with any vessel fire, prompting the Coast Guard to issue another safety measure besides preventing the ship from getting closer than 2 miles (3.22 kilometers) to shore.
”The safety of Unalaska residents and the surrounding communities is a top priority for us, so as a precaution we are keeping a one-mile (1.61-kilometer) safety zone around the vessel,” Salerno said.
The owners said there has been no oil leaks associated with the incident.
A team of marine firefighting experts late Friday conducted an assessment of the ship and found no signs of structural deformation or blistering outside of the cargo hold, the Coast Guard said.
That team remains on board the ship to evaluate the situation, Salerno said.
An expert hired by the Taipei, Taiwan-based Wisdom Marine Group “is working diligently to create contingency plans, arrange for a firefighting team, and ensure the necessary equipment is in place,’ the group said in a statement.
The Coast Guard will investigate the cause of the fire.
The Genius Star XI left Vietnam on Dec. 10 en route to Dutch Harbor, according to the Marine Traffic website. The ship with a carrying capacity of more than 13,000 tons (11,793 metric tonnes) sails under the flag of Panama.
New York City — For the first time in 16 years, Migdalia Torres will spend the holidays without her partner, Hiram Echevarria.
Earlier this month, the 40-year-old Echevarria, who shared children with Torres, became the 18th person in New York City this year to die in a fire linked to a lithium-ion battery.
“I think they kind of knew already that the explosion was caused by the e-bike,” Torres told CBS News.
If lithium-ion batteries are improperly made or used, the results can be explosive. Lithium-ion batteries were responsible for at least 220 fires in New York City in 2022, according to city numbers, and were also to blame for at least 10 deaths and 226 injuries in 2021 and 2022.
On Monday night, a lithium-ion battery in an e-bike was suspected of sparking a three-alarm blaze in the Bronx that left three people with minor injuries and damaged a deli and several apartments, the New York City Fire Department said.
A fire last month at a home in Brooklyn that killed three family members and injured 14 others was caused by a lithium-ion battery, FDNY investigators found.
“This is all evidence,” New York City Fire Commissioner Laura Kavanagh said of the damage from the battery fires. “You know, each one of these caused either a massive fire or a death or both.”
Kavanagh has been vocal about the dangers of lithium-ion batteries, especially in electric bikes and scooters.
“These will go from, you know, nothing to a sudden explosion of fire,” Kavanagh said. “We see first responders not able to get in.”
The nonprofit group Consumer Reports advises buyers to always purchase from reputable companies and to look for batteries with safety certifications. Buyers should not mix manufacturers’ batteries and chargers, or leave devices charging unattended or near flammable items.
“While the onus should absolutely be on the manufacturer, and should be on the seller, right now it’s a little bit of buyer beware,” said Gabe Knight, a policy analyst with Consumer Reports’ safety team.
The FDNY also warns against blocking your exit path with a lithium-ion battery-powered device.
As she grieves, Torres hopes others heed the warnings.
“He was practically my best friend,” Torres said of Echevarria. “…It was just really unfortunate.”
As demand for electric vehicles continues to grow, one start-up company is looking to make the cars even more sustainable – by turning used tires into batteries.
Most electric vehicles rely on lithium-ion batteries for their power. But critics say that those batteries are far from being as efficient, environmentally friendly and sustainable as they could be. That’s where one Chile-based company says old tires come into play.
The company, called T-Phite is putting used car tires through a process called pyrolysis, which entails putting the tires under extreme heat so that they break down into smaller molecules. T-Phite CEO Bernardita Diaz says those molecules become three primary byproducts – pyrolytic oil, steel and carbon black, a substance that contains graphite material essential to providing an electric pathway within batteries for energy to surge.
According to black carbon supplier Imerys, which is not involved with this project, carbon black is usually produced “by the incomplete combustion of heavy petroleum products such as FCC tar, coal tar, ethylene cracking tar, and a small amount of vegetable oil.”
Along with having “excellent electrical conductivity,” Imerys says that the substance is also known for being wear-resistant.
Making this substance out of used tires solves two problems, Diaz told Reuters.
“One is the final disposal of tires and the second is the demand that is being generated for electromobility materials,” she said. “And when you obtain materials from other waste, you are generating what is known as the circular economy.”
In the U.S. alone, roughly 250 million tires are left for scrap every year, according to the Federal Highway Administration. Of those tires, less than half are either recycled into new products or used to create tire-derived fuel, the agency said.
“Natural resources are already very limited and the fact that new solutions can be found from waste is very important,” Diaz said, adding that their process can go beyond lithium-ion batteries and extend to sodium batteries, “the next-generation batteries in electromobility.”
“It is very important and gratifying for us that this innovation has not only focused on a business niche, but that it provides much more openness,” she said.
Diaz’s company told Reuters that potential investors have shown significant interest in the process and may be looking to help scale it up to an industrial level. But while their process is certainly impressive, it is built on years of research into this possible solution.
In 2014, scientists from Oak Ridge National Laboratory in Tennessee found that carbon can be isolated from tire rubber-derived materials, and that the substance performed better than when derived from other materials. Further research from separate scientists published in 2021 found that carbon black can “systematically improve” battery performance so that they can charge faster.
Battery giants are starting to put their money on new sodium-based technology, a sign that there could be yet another shakeup in the industry that’s crucial for the energy transition.
Sodium — found in rock salts and brines around the globe — has the potential to make inroads into energy storage and electric vehicles because it’s cheaper and far more abundant than lithium, which currently dominates batteries. But while chemically and structurally similar, sodium has yet to be used on a large scale, partly due to the better range and performance of similarly sized lithium cells.
That could be about to change. In the past week, Sweden’s Northvolt AB said it made a breakthrough with the technology, while Chinese EV maker BYD Co. signed a deal to build a $1.4 billion sodium-ion battery plant. China’s CATL already said in April that its sodium-based batteries will be used in some vehicles from this year.
“It’s serious investment,” said Rory McNulty, senior research analyst at Benchmark Mineral Intelligence. “It’s creating a confidence boost with them saying we are here to continue scaling capacity to commercialize this technology.”
If sodium products do prove successful, they could curb lithium consumption. It’s also a reminder of the perils of trying to forecast metals usage in a constantly evolving industry as companies seek cheaper and more efficient cells.
While sodium-ion batteries’ low energy density means they’re unsuitable for larger EVs, they could increasingly be used instead of lithium in lower-end, shorter-range vehicles — or for power-grid energy storage, where size isn’t such an issue.
BloombergNEF has said that sodium should cut about 272,000 tons of lithium demand by 2035, or more than 1 million tons if lithium supplies can’t meet usage.
Changes in the metals mix in batteries has upended supply-and-demand outlooks and whipsawed prices. Cobalt and nickel — which just a few years ago were seen facing long-term shortages — have had demand estimates revised by the emergence of cells that don’t use them.
And the potential for big price swings is particularly evident in lithium.
A buying frenzy sent prices soaring through last year — a spike that prompted battery firms to look at sodium as a cheaper alternative — before plunging as EV demand disappointed and supply prospects improved.
“Sodium-ion will have a part to play in improving the lithium supply-demand balance,” said Sam Adham, head of battery materials at consultancy CRU Group. “It will dampen those really severe swings in lithium prices.”
Even with the recent slump in lithium prices, sodium is still a cheaper option. If the market does grow, it could potentially echo the rise of lithium-ion phosphate (LFP) cells that have been preferred to higher-performing products due to their lower cost.
Its clearest potential advantage is in storing excess electricity for grids, something that’s becoming more important as the world shifts away from fossil fuels. There, battery performance is less relevant than a low cost.
Sodium’s success will also rest on improving cells’ cycle life — how many times they can be charged and discharged before needing to be replaced. Sodium cells currently average 5,000 cycles, compared with about 7,500 for the most cost-effective lithium products.
The big question is being able to do that, and if it works then there could be more demand from the energy storage sector, said Rystad Energy analyst Duo Fu.
For now, the developing sodium-based cell sector looks like it will be dominated by Chinese producers, who control most of the lithium battery production due to the large size of their operations that keeps costs down. That should give them an advantage over European and American rivals.
European and American manufacturers “have far less experience in producing sodium or lithium batteries at mass scale,” CRU’s Adham said. “You’re able to be cost competitive in reality through economies of scale.”
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Salton City, California — Damien Lopez, age 4, has symptoms that many people who live near Southern California’s Salton Sea also have.
“His cough gets very wheezy. I try to control him,” his mother Michelle Lopez said.
“Control” often means visiting pediatric nurse Christina Galindo at Pioneers Memorial Hospital.
“I can see up to 25 to 30 patients a day, and maybe half of those are dealing with respiratory issues,” Galindo told CBS News.
A 2019 University of Southern California study published in the International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health found that between 20% and 22% of children in the region have asthma-like symptoms, a little more than triple the national rate for asthma, according to numbers from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
Dr. David Lo, a professor of biomedical sciences at the University of California, Riverside, led a university study last year that determined the Salton Sea itself is responsible for the high incidence of asthma for those who live near it. It found that the contaminants in the sea could be causing lung inflammation in surrounding residents.
The Salton Sea was formed in the early 1900s after a dam broke and flooded the Imperial Valley with water from the Colorado River. Today, its primary source is nearby farm runoff, which includes fertilizer, heavy metals and toxins like arsenic and selenium, Lo explained to CBS News.
A receding shoreline at the Salton Sea on April 4, 2023, in the Coachella Valley of Southern California. The Salton Sea is a shallow, landlocked, highly saline body of water in Riverside and Imperial counties.
Brian van der Brug / Los Angeles Times via Getty Images
For decades, this dangerous mix sat on the sea floor. But without the replenishment of Colorado River water, the Salton Sea is rapidly receding, exposing a dry and toxic lakebed to the wind.
It is also attracting a new industry looking to mine another chemical that lies below the lakebed — lithium.
“If California wants to electrify every single vehicle by 2035, they’re gonna need every piece of lithium they can get,” said Frank Ruiz, director of the Salton Sea program for California Audubon and a board member for the Lithium Valley Commission, a California state agency which oversees lithium mining in the region.
“We don’t completely understand the impact of the lithium industry,” Ruiz said. “No industry is 100% free of environmental impacts.”
Ruiz says lithium could be liquid gold for a region facing some of the highest poverty rates in the state. For now, it’s unclear if lithium is a lifeline or a threat.
“This is a toxic, toxic dust,” Ruiz said, adding that he hopes the community around the Salton Sea doesn’t pay a health cost for what could be an economic boon.
“Taxes and revenues can potentially provide money to continue covering this toxic playa,” Ruiz said.
Lopez hopes her family is not left in the dust.
“”Some concern that one day they’ll be like, ‘You have to leave your house, because you can’t live in here any more,” Lopez said.
The transition from fossil fuels to sustainable electric power has gone mainstream, most visibly in the auto industry. The major car companies are chasing Tesla with ambitious plans for fleets of electric vehicles. Those cars and trucks run on lithium batteries.
The U.S. has massive quantities of lithium, but has been slow to invest in the mining and extraction of the metal. That’s about to change.
Lithium operations powered by clean energy are being developed in a long neglected, impoverished part of California by the Salton Sea, not far from the Mexican border.
The region is being called Lithium Valley and just like the 1849 Gold Rush, companies are racing to strike it rich.
East of San Diego and south of Palm Springs lies the Salton Sea – California’s largest inland body of water.
Lithium is being extracted in the Salton Sea area in California
60 Minutes
Eric Spomer: It is a world-class lithium resource.
Bill Whitaker: This is?
Eric Spomer: When you hear estimates of how big this resource could be, it’s usually measured on annual tons produced. And we’re confident that this is in excess of 300,000 tons a year. Right now, that’s way more than half of the world supply of lithium.
Eric Spomer is CEO of EnergySource Minerals, a company based by the Salton Sea in California’s Imperial Valley. It’s steaming ahead with plans to recover lithium using an existing electric plant, powered by the vast, underground geothermal field.
Bill Whitaker: We’re moving into an era of green technology, especially with our cars. Where does this fit in?
Eric Spomer: Our more conservative projection would support seven and a half million electric vehicles a year, which is half of the total U.S. car sales, cars and trucks.
Bill Whitaker: Coming from the Salton Sea area?
Eric Spomer: Correct.
Bill Whitaker: What about this plant?
Eric Spomer: This plant will be 20,000 tons per year, which is equivalent to about 500,000 vehicles per year.
Once up and running, the tons of lithium generated here will be shipped, refined, and processed into millions of rechargeable electric car batteries.
Mark Stewart is head of Stellantis North America – a global carmaker that owns some of America’s best known brands.
60 Minutes
Mark Stewart: Over 50% of our lineup and our retail sales will be from battery electric vehicles by the end of the decade.
Mark Stewart is head of Stellantis North America – a global carmaker that owns some of America’s best known brands, including Chrysler, Jeep and Ram trucks.
Mark Stewart: It really is quote-unquote “the industrial revolution” the next phase, right? This is the most interesting and exciting time to be a part of our industry.
Stellantis is investing $35 billion in an ambitious, historic transformation.
Mark Stewart: We’re reimagining our factories — on our assembly plants. They’re already rolling our plug-in hybrids as well as looking to two new battery joint ventures that are in con– full construction right now.
Bill Whitaker: The new industrial revolution.
Mark Stewart: It absolutely is. It’s really the, the biggest technological changes in our industry in nearly 100 years.
Bill Whitaker: We were down in the Salton Sea region, they believe they can supply the lithium needs for all American car manufacturers.
Mark Stewart: Absolutely, that is the case.
Bill Whitaker: Whatever they can produce, you guys will be buying it?
Mark Stewart: We for sure will take as much as we can get and as much as we have, we have already secured early.
Lithium is key to powering electric cars. The dense metal helps make batteries rechargeable. There’s a lot of it around, but extracting lithium is dirty business. Most comes from rock mines in Australia, or as powder evaporated from mineral ponds in South America. The U.S. has onelithium evaporation plant in Nevada. EnergySource plans to break ground on a clean, billion dollar facility here by the Salton Sea in the next few months.
Bill Whitaker: So the plant will fit in this spot right here?
Eric Spomer: Correct. That spot right there.
Bill Whitaker: That’s not a big, that’s not a big footprint.
Eric Spomer: No.
Bill Whitaker: What are these?
Eric Spomer: We call them the mud pots. And they are CO2 vents– hot CO2 with fluid that’s bubbling to the surface.
Bill Whitaker: So this is evidence of the heat and activity going on underground?
Eric Spomer: Correct.
Mud pot
60 Minutes
The 600-degree geothermal brine that powers the region’s electric plants comes from more than a mile beneath the earth. The boiling brine produces clean steam, which drives turbines to generate enough electricity to power 400,000 homes. In the past, the mineral-rich brine was simply returned to the earth. Now EnergySource plans to extend the process and extract lithium from the brine before reinjecting it underground.
Eric Spomer: Our process in combination with this resource, will be the cleanest, most efficient lithium process in the world.
Bill Whitaker: And how long before the lithium processed here will be in commercial use in the U.S.?
Eric Spomer: In 2025.
David Deak: A lot of the components that go into the batteries have been coming from, you know, anywhere around the world but America.
Bill Whitaker: Why was that?
David Deak: We have a lot of decent resources in North America, they’ve just been undeveloped.
David Deak worked for Tesla, traveling the world to find the best sources of lithium as it was building up production of its electric vehicles, or EVs. Tesla turned to the lithium-ion battery to power its cars, the same kind of rechargeable battery Sony first mass-produced for its camcorders.
David Deak: There was a new market for consumer electronics. But the vast majority is for electric vehicles.
Bill Whitaker: And that was pretty much triggered by Tesla?
David Deak: Triggered by Tesla. Also, you know, there’s a lot of EV growth and EV demand and production in, in China. That’s been a big part of, big part of the global lithium demand story.
Deak is now EnergySource’s chief development officer, and says he had a eureka moment when he saw its unique technology.
At the company’s lab, Deak showed us the mechanics in miniature. The full-sized plant will be 100 times larger.
Bill Whitaker: So what goes on inside this cylinder? Is it pellets? Or what, what is the matrix–
David Deak: Yeah. Think of it as beads in a column, much like the activated carbon that you would find in a Brita filter. It works in a, in a similar concept. A Brita filter will filter all impurities out of water. This sorbent is something that would only take in lithium, and not absorb everything else.
The system takes just a few hours to turn this orange brine into this clear lithium solution, which will be dried into powder.
Bill Whitaker: And this is what everybody’s looking for.
David Deak: That’s what everyone wants.
Bill Whitaker and EnergySource president and CEO Eric Spomer
60 Minutes
Here by the Salton Sea, EnergySource is leading the race for lithium. Warren Buffett’s BHE Renewables runs 10 geothermal power plants in the region. And there’s another on the drawing board by an Australian company – Controlled Thermal Resources. Both ventures are moving to tap the promise bubbling under the earth.
CEO Rod Colwell told us Controlled Thermal Resources had been fine-tuning the process at this test facility for 90 days.
Rod Colwell: We’re producing lithium from live brine here behind us. This is our optimization plant.
Based on what it learns here, Controlled Thermal Resources plans to build a new plant for recovering lithium, which costs about $4,000 a ton to extract and currently is selling for six times more.
The noise is from the machines cooling 600-degree brine rising from the well, releasing steam.
Rod Colwell: This is a battery grade product from Salton Sea brine.
Bill Whitaker: This for you is Eureka?
Rod Colwell: This is absolutely Eureka, yes.
Rod Colwell told us this bottle of clear lithium chloride is the purest product from this test facility so far.
Rod Colwell told us this bottle of clear lithium chloride is the purest product from this test facility so far.
60 Minutes
Rod Colwell: This is the first time this has been in my hands since it happened last night, Bill. So that’s– I might take that home with me. That’s about $10 worth of lithium right there. So…
Bill Whitaker: You know it works.
Rod Colwell: We know it works.
The question here in the Salton Sea Basin is will it work for everyone? This rich lithium resource lies beneath one of the poorest sections of California.
The Salton Sea was created when the Colorado River flooded the basin in 1905, but for the past 50 years the main source of water has been chemical-laden agricultural runoff and for decades now the sea has been evaporating and shrinking. A once thriving tourist industry has been replaced by environmental decay, toxic dust and economic hardship. And with unemployment in the region hovering around 16%, there’s a lot riding on turning the Imperial Valley into Lithium Valley.
Frank Ruiz: Governor Newsom called it, you know, the Saudi Arabia of lithium. I think, you know, it can change the landscape of the region.
Frank Ruiz, the Audubon Society’s local program director, is fighting to include the community in that change. He was a commissioner on the state panel studying how the entire region can benefit from the potential underground.
Bill Whitaker: You’re an environmentalist. How do you reconcile the industrialization of this area with saving the wildlife and the communities?
Frank Ruiz: We need to learn how to balance the tables. The lithium industry can be really good, you know, for these communities. It can, you know, it can provide better paid jobs. It can provide more job opportunities, especially for the younger folks. It can provide the revenues, you know, to offset the challenges that we have here at the Salton Sea.
Geologists predict once the industry is fully operational, the lithium underground should last for generations before running out. Good news for Stellantis which ran out of batteries for its plug-in hybrid Jeep Wrangler last year.
Mark Stewart: We sold out.
Bill Whitaker: What happened?
Mark Stewart: The uh– if I could turn back my crystal ball, Bill, I would have secured a little more capacity for, for last year.
To prevent that from happening in the future, Mark Stewart and Stellantis have committed to buying lithium from Controlled Thermal Resources at the Salton Sea, knowing it will be years before its product is commercially viable.
Mark Stewart: We secured a large supply from them over a ten-year period—because we are very positive on their technology.
So is carmaker General Motors, which has invested in Controlled Thermal Resources.The Department of Energy and U.S. auto makers are eager for domestic lithium. The companies were stung when the pandemic disrupted the world-wide supply chain, stalling shipments of microchips, parts and batteries. Still today, three quarters of all lithium batteries are processed in Asia.
Bill Whitaker: So will having this domestic supply of lithium help keep the cost of electric vehicles down?
Mark Stewart: It will certainly help.
Prices for electric cars are coming down and are projected to be on par with gas vehicles within a few years, driven in part by the tax incentives in the 2022 Inflation Reduction Act. Eric Spomer of EnergySource told us the tax benefits have also been a catalyst for developing domestic lithium.
Eric Spomer: We’re starting to see big announcements of investments to create that domestic demand so it doesn’t ever have to go across an ocean.
Bill Whitaker: This seems like this is a game changer for American industry?
Eric Spomer: It’s a competitive advantage. It’s an opportunity that we can be a leader globally. And why not lead?
Produced by Sara Kuzmarov. Associate producer, Mabel Kabani. Broadcast associate, Natalie Breitkopf. Edited by Matt Richman.
