Battery Technology Innovation/Electric Vehicles – Page 81

Nickel mining is key for electric vehicles. Experts say the industry can be greener (CBC Radio – June 25, 2022)

June 28, 2022

https://www.cbc.ca/

Making the most of already mined elements can help meet future demand while reducing carbon emissions

Greg Dipple wants to turn the waste from nickel mines into large-scale carbon sinks. The idea, which he has developed over two decades, would help reduce the environmental impact of mining for metals that are highly sought after for electric vehicle batteries.

“We can see a pathway towards nickel mining in the future where it produces a net positive environmental benefit from the context of greenhouse gases,” said Dipple, a professor at the University of British Columbia and founder of Carbin Minerals, an environmental services company.

Race to the Bottom: Deep Sea Mining Is the Next Frontier – by Christina Lu (Foreign Policy – June 26, 2022)

June 28, 2022

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The untapped trove of metals on the ocean floor might be the key to a greener future—or an environmental catastrophe.

To power the energy revolution, nations have stripped their lands for the metals crucial to build everything from Teslas to wind turbines. The hunt for cobalt has left a trail of pollution and human rights abuses in the Democratic Republic of the Congo while Zambia’s copper mining industry has poisoned nearby rivers. In nickel-rich Indonesia, mining has generated enough runoff to dye the country’s waters red.

Many countries have now set their sights on a new market: the deep ocean floor. These depths potentially hold an untapped trove of metals—nickel, cobalt, copper, and manganese—tucked into polymetallic nodules, potato-shaped deposits that are millions of years old. Mining these riches, they say, is the key to a greener future. Some are already fiddling with the lock.

Sayona and Piedmont approve C$98m Quebec lithium restart – by Mariaan Webb (MiningWeekly.com – June 28, 2022)

June 28, 2022

https://www.miningweekly.com/

Emerging lithium producer Sayona Mining has cemented plans to get its North American spodumene production off the ground in 2023, following a formal agreement of the North American Lithium (NAL) restart programme.

Sayona Quebec, which is 75% owned by Sayona and 25% by Piedmont, has formally authorised the restart of spodumene concentrate production at the NAL operation, in Quebec, requiring significant plant and infrastructure upgrades.

The new Atlantic Canada exploration boom – by Alexandra Lopez-Pacheco (CIM Magazine – June 14, 2022)

June 23, 2022

https://magazine.cim.org/en/

Gold, clean-energy metals and even salt offer the promise of a bright future

Canada’s Atlantic region is experiencing a mining exploration rush the likes of which has not been seen in the area since the 1990s boom that followed the discovery of the nickel-bearing deposit at Newfoundland’s Voisey’s Bay. Once again, Newfoundland and Labrador is leading the way with more than 100,000 mineral claims staked in 2021 – the second largest annual claims total in the province’s history after 1995.

This time, the majority of exploration companies descending on the provinces of Newfoundland and Labrador, Nova Scotia and New Brunswick are looking for gold instead of nickel. A handful of others, however, are not setting their sights on the precious metal but on critical minerals and metals that are vital for decarbonization of modern technologies.

The race is on to make EV batteries truly sustainable – by Mike Finelli (Fortune Magazine – June 23, 2022)

June 23, 2022

https://fortune.com/

The electric vehicle battery supply chain that has been built over the last 20 years will not be the same one that carries us through the next 20 years. With demand for EVs growing rapidly, fundamental changes are needed to address the ethical and sustainable challenges in creating EV batteries.

As a growing number of Americans trade in their gas guzzlers for environmentally friendly EVs, auto manufacturers and those who create EV batteries should prepare to go under the American consumer’s microscope on issues like semiconductor supply chains, carbon footprints in manufacturing, and circularity.

Nickel, Tesla and two decades of environmental activism: Q&A with leader Raphaël Mapou – by Nick Rodway (Mongabay.com – June 22, 2022)

June 23, 2022

https://news.mongabay.com/

GORO, New Caledonia – Known widely as the “Madagascar of the Pacific,” New Caledonia is coated in remnant Gondwana rainforest and surrounded by reefs rich in marine life that constitute one of the largest marine parks on earth. It is a French territory located approximately 1,470 kilometers (900 miles) northeast of Brisbane, Australia.

Despite its size, New Caledonia punches far above its weight ecologically. It houses the longest continuous barrier reef in the world and is internationally renowned for its plant species, over 80% of which are endemic. The territory is also one of the world’s largest producers of nickel and holds a quarter of the earth’s known reserves.

PDAC 2022 features a heavy emphasis on optimizing the mining world for the EV revolution – by Mehanaz Yakub (Electric Autonomy – June 20, 2022)

June 22, 2022

https://electricautonomy.ca/

As the world moves toward electrification and electric vehicles, many discussions at PDAC, the annual international mining conference in Toronto, centred around Canada’s opportunity to leverage its unique resource base and policy environment to supply the critical minerals that will drive the revolution forward

After going virtual for the previous two years, the Prospectors and Developers Association of Canada (PDAC) Convention, one of the mining industry’s largest annual conferences, returned in person this year, with thousands of executives, suppliers, investors and government officials attending the three-day event.

With stakeholders flooding to the conference from around the world, PDAC 2022 offered the first real in-person opportunity to marry the mining industry and the electric vehicle transition with Canada at the centre of the conversation.

Lithium Battery Valley emerges in Quebec – by Shane Lasley (Metal Tech News – March 16, 2022)

June 22, 2022

https://www.metaltechnews.com/

Becancour, a small Quebec town along the shores of the St. Lawrence River about midway between Montreal and Quebec City, is rapidly emerging as an epicenter for producing the advanced materials needed for lithium-ion batteries powering the electric vehicle revolution.

This rural Canadian town of around 12,800 people surfaced in the battery space about a year ago when Nouveau Monde Graphite Inc. announced plans to build a facility there to produce the coated spherical purified graphite that goes into the anodes of lithium-ion batteries. Now, General Motors, POSCO Chemical, and BASF are setting up shop to produce cathode active materials and lithium battery recycling in this strategic Quebec locale.

All eyes on Tesla as it invests in a troubled nickel mine – by Nick Rodway (Mongabay News – June 22, 2022)

June 22, 2022

https://news.mongabay.com/

GORO, New Caledonia — On the south side of Grand Terre, the largest and principal island of New Caledonia in the south Pacific, mountains rise like a spine out of a vast, turquoise lagoon that forms part of the longest continuous barrier reef in the world.

Although a French overseas territory, New Caledonia—located approximately 1,470 kilometers (900 miles) northeast of Brisbane, Australia—has been home to the Indigenous Kanak people for thousands of years and has a history and culture as rich as its ecology.

Piedmont Lithium looks abroad amid North Carolina uncertainty – by Ernest Scheyder (Reuters – June 22, 2022)

June 22, 2022

https://www.reuters.com/

June 22 (Reuters) – Piedmont Lithium Inc’s (PLL.O) first steps toward securing lithium supplies will be in Quebec or Ghana, not the United States, as an intensifying North Carolina regulatory review delays the miner’s goal of anchoring America’s electric vehicle battery renaissance.

The delay has forced Piedmont to expand its strategy beyond its proposed North Carolina mine – a project it has touted as the best way to help secure American energy independence, but one that now faces a regulatory quagmire – and fund mines abroad.

Internal DND study calls green technology minerals 21st-century ‘oil weapon’ – by Chris Arsenault and Philippe Le Billon (CBC News Business – June 20, 2022)

June 21, 2022

https://www.cbc.ca/news/business/

Skyrocketing demand for copper, lithium and rare earths sparks geopolitical race, worrying environmentalists

Minerals needed to power the green transition from fossil fuels could become “the 21st-century version of the ‘oil weapon,'” warns an internal study commissioned by Canada’s Department of National Defence.

There is widespread agreement among scientists that drastic cuts in fossil fuel consumption are needed to stave off catastrophic climate change — and a transition to electric cars, wind and solar power form key pillars of this shift.

Yellen Urges Less Dependence on Other Nations for Key Supplies – by Christopher Condon and Danielle Bochove (Yahoo Finance/Bloomberg – June 20, 2022)

June 21, 2022

https://ca.finance.yahoo.com/

(Bloomberg) — Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen said the US should work on shifting its dependence away from some rival nations for supplies of critical inputs as global supply-chain logjams have hurt the domestic economy.

“We saw during the pandemic that our supply chains were very brittle and really lacking in resilience,” she said Monday.

Red Flags for Forced Labor Found in China’s Car Battery Supply Chain – by Ana Swanson and Chris Buckley (New York Times – June 20, 2022)

June 21, 2022

https://www.nytimes.com/

The photograph on the mining conglomerate’s social media account showed 70 ethnic Uyghur workers standing at attention under the flag of the People’s Republic of China. It was March 2020 and the recruits would soon undergo training in management, etiquette and “loving the party and the country,” their new employer, the Xinjiang Nonferrous Metal Industry Group, announced.

But this was no ordinary worker orientation. It was the kind of program that human rights groups and U.S. officials consider a red flag for forced labor in China’s western Xinjiang region, where the Communist authorities have detained or imprisoned more than 1 million Uyghurs, ethnic Kazakhs and members of other largely Muslim minorities.

Mining billionaire Robert Friedland launches IPO for Ivanhoe Electric – by Andrew Willis (Globe and Mail – June 19, 2022)

June 21, 2022

https://www.theglobeandmail.com/

Miner Robert Friedland is planning to kick-start a moribund IPO market this week with a US$180-million debut from Ivanhoe Electric Inc.

Mr. Friedland, a 71-year-old billionaire and Ivanhoe Electric’s chief executive, has developed mines around the world. He is now pitching the Vancouver-based company as a dependable, North American supplier of copper and other critical minerals for electric cars and related clean-energy technology.

The Drift: Glencore makes battery vehicle order from MacLean Engineering – by Staff (Northern Ontario Business – June 16, 2022)

June 16, 2022

https://www.northernontariobusiness.com/

Onaping Depth mine project will be an all-electric underground operation at production start in 2024

Glencore’s deepest new mine in the Sudbury Basin will be populated by electric vehicles from MacLean Engineering.

MacLean’s battery electric mining vehicles (BEVs) were chosen to be one of the mobile equipment suppliers of fleet vehicles for Glencore’s Sudbury Integrated Nickel Operations and its Onaping Depth mine project, now under construction.