Startups and automakers are also racing to design and build next-generation batteries that eliminate material challenges and boost efficiency. Meanwhile, mining companies and entrepreneurs have plans to mine the seabed for minerals, which could damage a fragile, poorly understood ecosystem (Chile is pushing a moratorium on such ocean mining).īattery developers seek to cut back on the use of rare metals and improve recycling. Chile, a key producer of lithium, wants to wrest control of production from multinationals. Much of the US supply of raw materials is on tribal lands. The vast majority of cobalt, a common cathode component, comes from the Democratic Republic of the Congo, infamous for child and forced labor. More than a dozen battery plants and numerous potential mining projects are in development in the US alone.īut the quest for raw materials comes with extensive environmental, political, and social costs. The price of lithium carbonate, the compound from which lithium is extracted, stayed relatively steady between 20 but shot up nearly tenfold between 20, spurring new investments across the globe. Lithium atoms in the anode get separated from their electrons again the ions pass through the electrolyte and the electrons flow through the outside circuit, which powers the motor.ĮV expansion has created voracious demand for the minerals required to make batteries. During discharge cycles, the process reverses. The electrons flow around an outside circuit to the anode-which is typically composed of graphite, a cheap, energy-dense, and long-lasting material that excels at storing energy-while the ionized lithium atoms flow to the anode through the electrolyte and are reunited with their electrons. During the charging cycle, an electric current introduced via an external source separates the electrons from the lithium atoms in the cathode.
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