To post a comment: 1) click on the Sign In button in the upper right hand corner of the blog page, then sign in using your gmail account and password (If you don’t have a gmail account, sign up for one – it only takes a couple minutes); 2) scroll down to the bottom of the page and click on the word “comments,” which appears right below the list of sources.
Time line: You will have 2 weeks to complete the on-line discussion as a team. Use this blog to capture your thoughts, perspectives, ideas, and revisions as you work together on this problem. This activity is discussion-based, meaning you will participate through a collaborative exchange and critique of each other’s ideas and work. The goal is to challenge and support one another as a team to tap your collective resources and experiences to dig more deeply into the issue(s) raised in the scenario. Since the idea is that everyone in the discussion will refine his/her ideas through the discussion that develops, you should try to respond well before the activity ends so that the discussion has time to mature. It is important to make your initial posts and subsequent responses in a timely manner. You are expected to make multiple posts during each stage of this on-going discussion. The timeline below suggests how to pace your discussion. This is just a suggestion. Feel free to pace the discussion as you see fit.
Tuesday Week 1 Initial Posts: All participants post initial responses to these instructions (see below) and the scenario.
Thursday Week 1 Response Posts: Participants respond by tying together information and perspectives on important points and possible approaches. Participants identify gaps in information and seek to fill those gaps.
Tuesday Week 2 Refine Posts: Participants work toward agreement on what is most important, determine what they still need to find out, & evaluate one or more approaches from the previous week’s discussion.
Thursday Week 2 Polish Final Posts: Participants come to an agreement on what is most important, and propose one or more approaches to address the issue/s.
Discussion Instructions
Imagine that you are a team of engineers working together for a company or organization to address the issue raised in the scenario. Discuss what your team would need to take into consideration to begin to address the issue. You do not need to suggest specific technical solutions, but identify the most important factors and suggest one or more viable approaches.
Suggestions for discussion topics
• Identify the primary and secondary problems raised in the scenario.
• Who are the major stakeholders and what are their perspectives?
• What outside resources (people, literature/references, and technologies) could be engaged in developing viable approaches?
• Identify related contemporary issues.
• Brainstorm a number of feasible approaches to address the issue.
• Consider the following contexts: economic, environmental, cultural/societal, and global. What impacts would the approaches you brainstormed have on these contexts?
• Come to agreement on one or more viable approaches and state the rationale.
Lithium mining for lithium-ion electrical vehicle batteries
The US government is investing heavily in sustainable resource research and development in order to decrease national oil consumption, and automotive industries around the world are competing in a global race for “sustainable mobility”. There were about 52 million total vehicles produced in the world in 2009, and replacing a significant amount of them with highly electrified vehicles poses a major challenge. The state of California is targeting 1 million electric vehicles (EVs) on its streets by 2020. By that same date, Nissan forecasts that EVs will become 10% of all global sales.
Battery technology is currently the major bottleneck in EV design. In 2009, President Obama announced $2.4 billion in grants to accelerate the manufacturing and deployment of next generation batteries and EVs. Lithium-ion batteries are the first choice for the emerging EV generation, (the Chevy Volt, the Volvo C30, the Nissan Leaf), because they feature high power density, manageable operating temperatures, and are relatively easy to recharge on the grid.
In spite of its potential, lithium may not be the answer to the EV battery challenge. Lithium, which is recovered from lithium carbonate (Li2CO3), is not an unlimited resource. Lithium-based batteries are already used in almost all portable computers, cell phones and small appliances. Utility-scale lithium-based energy storage devices are in the works for smart grid applications, such as balancing energy supply-demand fluctuations. Lithium is also extensively used in a number of processes we take for granted: the manufacturing of glass, grits, greases and aluminum, among others. This makes accurate estimations of future demand in relation to resource availability almost impossible.
According to Meridian International Research, an independent renewable-energy think tank, there is insufficient recoverable lithium in the earth's crust to sustain electric vehicle manufacture based on Li-ion batteries in the volumes required by the mass market. Lithium depletion rates would exceed current oil depletion rates, potentially switching dependency from one diminishing resource to another. The United States Geological Survey reports that the Salar de Uyuni salt pans of Bolivia contain the largest untapped reserve of lithium in the world – an estimated 5.4 million metric tons or almost 50% of the global lithium reserve base. Other estimates put the Bolivian resource as high as 9 million metric tons. Bolivian president, Evo Morales, has consistently rejected bids by Mitsubishi and Toyota to mine lithium in his country and has announced plans to develop a state-controlled lithium mining operation. Prices of lithium carbonate (Li2CO3) have more than doubled since 2004. Lithium batteries are costly, too; battery packs for vehicles cost upwards of $20,000 alone, driving up the overall cost.
Lithium CAN be recycled, but there is little existing infrastructure. In 2009, a California company, Toxco Waste Management, received $9.5 million in grants from the US Department of Energy to help build the first US-based facility for recycling lithium batteries in anticipation of demand.
How much lithium is needed to power an electric vehicle?
Energy requirements………………………..16 kilowatt hours (specified for Chevy Volt)
Lithium estimates per kWh……………….0.431 kg (US Department of Transportation estimate)
Total lithium for one Chevy Volt……….6.86 kg
Total Li2CO3 for one Chevy Volt ......... 36.5 kg
Total Li2CO3 one million PHEVs ..........36,500 metric tons
Sources
Lithium Dreams: Can Bolivia Become the Saudi Arabia of the Electric-Car Era? (March 22, 2010). The New Yorker.
Lithium Largesse? (August 2009). American Ceramic Society Bulletin.
US Department of Energy, Press Release. (August 5, 2009)
Bolivia’s Lithium Mining Dilemma. (September 8, 2008) BBC News.
The Trouble with Lithium: Implications of Future PHEV Production for Lithium Demand. (2007). Meridian International Research.
Initially, I can think of no good and instantaneous solution this problem. Which, I’d be willing to bet, is why it was selected as the prompt for our ABET discussion.
ReplyDeleteLithium batteries appear to be a promising solution as we’ve seen from such examples as the Chevy Volt and the Nissan Leaf which have shown impressive MPG numbers. However, the overall economic cost of these vehicles because of their Lithium battery is proving too great. Without an overabundance of Lithium on the Earth we are potentially just trading one vice for another (from gasoline to Lithium).
One benefit brought about by Lithium batteries is that Lithium can be recycled and thus, is not a finite resource as gasoline is now. However, without a large enough material-base to support the initial restructuring to the Lithium battery, I still do not see this as a good solution. Additionally, without the “silver bullet” to solve the energy issue caused by the limits of gasoline I see our culture being fickle towards the idea.
On the plus side, if a complete restructuring was to occur with a large portion of the market moving towards Lithium batteries, scientists and engineers may be able to make this idea more feasible. However, I see several things that would need to occur first for this to happen. The first of the problems to overcome would be that the Lithium batteries would need to be created using physically less Lithium as it is the limiting factor in this technology. Similarly, we would need to either find more natural Lithium on Earth or find a way to synthesize this material because there is still no where near the amount of physical Lithium on Earth to provide all that is needed or would be needed in the future.
This is a complicated issue that I’ve nowhere near solved; these are just some of my initial ideas.
Primary and Secondary Problems
ReplyDelete1.Perceived Problem: Concerns that our current fossil fuel powered automobiles through the greenhouse effect are leading to global warming and that we are running out of oil. Proposed Solution: Replace current automobiles with electric vehicles.
2.Problem: These vehicles need some way to store energy. Proposed Solution: Batteries.
3.Problem: Batteries weigh a lot. This cuts down on how efficient the vehicle is. Proposed Solution: Use lithium batteries. They have great energy density while weighing less than nickel or lead based ones.
4.Likely Problem: There is not enough lithium in the world to meet all of our needs for electric automobiles especially coupled with its uses in defense and consumer electronics. Solution: Currently unknown. Mining lithium in Bolivia would be a step in the right direction, doubling or even quadrupling the total amount of lithium available worldwide.
5.Problem: The president of Bolivia, Evo Morales, has repeatedly turned down foreign efforts to mine Bolivia’s lithium reserved. In addition the Bolivian governments strong anti-capitalism measures make it unlikely that that foreign companies would be willing to invest there. Possible Coming Solutions: President Morales does not trust foreign (western) governments to not exploit Bolivia’s natural resources and plans to develop a domestic mining effort, where the benefits will be shared among all Bolivians.
6.Problem: Bolivia has a dismal infrastructure and the cost of building the necessary mining operation will cost $600 million or more, a lot of money for a small impoverished country. Solutions: Bolivia currently has a small proof-of-concept mining operation underway. Other than that, since Bolivia is currently refusing any outside help there seems to be little else that can be done.
7.Problem: The cost of lithium is not currently high enough to justify development expenditures on the order of $600. Bolivian lithium, while plentiful is more expensive to extract than other sources because of the salts it is mixed with. Solution: Time should solve this problem. The need for lithium is estimated to be increasing at around 40% over the next four years to meet consumer electronics and electric car battery needs. As the demand for lithium goes up so will the price and the large supplies of Bolivian lithium will become more attractive.
8.Problem: Mining operations could have a negative impact on the environment and the indigenous people of Bolivia as it has in several of its neighbors. Solution: Bolivia’s current president is an Indian himself and is a heavy supporter of protecting the rights of the indigenous peoples of Bolivia (Part of his rational for refusing outside help), so this seems for the moment under control. What is being done about environmental issues we might have to do more research on.
9.Problem: Lithium batteries that are not being recycled causing that lithium to be removed from the supply once the battery is finished. Solution: One way western governments could reduce their dependency on pricy foreign lithium is by recycling the lithium we currently have. Once again prices would have to rise to make this economically feasible.
Well, it is pretty clear that the problem revolves around vehicle energy. How will we power vehicles after we can no longer use gasoline? Although it may be a lifetime before oil resources start to disappear, this is a question that must be discussed, answered and planned for.
ReplyDeleteThis brings up the question of whether or not lithium batteries are a good way to power vehicles in the future. As of now, battery powered cars are not the most desirable form of transportation. The battery technology just isn’t where it needs to be for people to depend on these vehicles as everyday cars. Do to the batteries, these cars are extremely heavy, and don’t last too long on a single charge before a recharge is needed. Also, these cars tend to lose their capacity to charge over time. A major problem with lithium batteries is that they are not a completely renewable resource. There are ways of recycling a portion of the valuable material from a lithium ion battery, but as of right now there isn’t a great enough infrastructure to account for a large recycling operation of these batteries. The recycling operations must be enhanced for this to be a realistic alternative to gasoline. This also raises the question whether it is possible to recycle all the valuable materials from a lithium ion battery. It is clear that if the lithium battery technology and recycling can improve, then this begins to look like a viable alternative.
From the numbers mentioned above in the problem statement, it is apparent the United States is becoming a major investor in electric vehicles and lithium batteries now that our access to oil is diminishing. Should we be making this investment?
The energy issue seems to be the problem for our generation to solve. This seems like a good topic to discuss. The discussion will be interesting to see the different ideas we can come up with as this is truly a relevant topic.
ReplyDeleteThe broader problem is finding a good replacement for gas powered vehicles, the specific problem is how to manage the lithium with electric vehicles being so dependent on them. If EV's are to increase so much by 2020 then so should the infrastructure to support the use and re-use of lithium. Meaning, there needs to be a proper plan put into place to recycle the lithium batteries so that as these cars begin to die the lithium is not put to waste. It is about lifecycle management. Another problem is the cost as production increases the price of this valuable material will increase and drive up the prices. The lithium needs to be mined in an effective way.
The way I see it is that we have a lot of problems and not a lot of answers. Hopefully we can brainstorm some over the course of this next week and a half.
I'm hesitant to fully address this issue until I can do a bit more research into lithium batteries, mining, and other related topics. For example, it mentions (or at least alludes to) environmental impacts but doesn't fully describe the scope or full effect. Some research will be required on my part before I can form an opinion on the issue.
ReplyDeleteWhile the main problem seems to be regarding use of lithium in alternative energy sources (or, projecting a "what-if" scenario to see if it could work), the bigger concern seems to be viability of alternative energy. It raises the question of how "green" some alternative energies really are.
As with all of our previous posts, I agree that the problem at the heart of this discussion is that we need an alternative energy source to power cars other than petroleum based fuels. I also agree that we don't necessarily know how Lithium batteries will turn out since there are so many unknowns. We don't really know how much Lithium there is, how efficient we can make the recycling process, or how the political tensions around Lithium will pan out.
ReplyDeleteAt this point I am kind of leaning towards slowly introducing the use of Lithium batteries in cars because it will give scientists and engineers the opportunity to further develop the battery technology, start the mining of lithium, and we would better figure out the recycling process. What do you guys think?
A couple of thoughts off of things glancingly mentioned in the above posts:
ReplyDeleteThe reason this energy issue is so complex is in the accounting. In the old days, before we were born the markets were ruled by capitalism. Hydroelectric is the cheapest so we use that first. We run out of rivers to dam we move onto coal and natural gas. Solar gets an abominable energy return, so we shouldn’t use it at all. There was a pure measurable, relatively unbiased metric, money, attached to each energy source and companies would use that to determine which energy source to use. Then someone said, “You can’t use coal because the carbon dioxide its producing is causing global warming,” and, “You can’t use wind turbines because its blades are chopping up migratory birds. And you can’t use nuclear because it creates waste that lasts for thousands of years and there is the chance of a catastrophic disaster coming out of it.”
This is where the math got hard. Now you are trying to equate factors with uneven unit scales. How much is one salmon worth in comparison to a flock of migratory birds? How do you compare that to nuclear waste that might not cause us any problems now, but could a hundred years from now? And how you compare this to the financial costs associated with all of these energy sources? While this debate brought greater attention to health risks and environmental safety, it also brought in ideology and biases. Different people and groups place greater value on different metrics and therefore arguments ensue. And public perceptions begin to play into it. People may perceive nuclear as scary and dangerous while they absorb more radiation each year from watching television. They way also perceive solar as perfectly clean because the energy comes from the sun, but fail to take into account the environmental impact of the chemicals and processes used to manufacture the solar panels.
The above paragraphs may seem like a digression, but they are relevant to electric car batteries for two reasons. First, similar discrepancies in opinions when looking at how to solve the electric car problem arrive as when talking about energy through the fact that different people and groups place a lot of emphasis on particular metrics. The state of California puts a lot of value on electric vehicles and not generating energy actually in California. The country of Bolivia puts a lot of emphasis on protecting the way that lithium is mined within their country and thus conflicts arise. Secondly, it is relevant because of the question of where the energy is coming from has not been discussed yet. Lithium batteries are only good for storing energy that has already been generated and depending on how that energy was generated can have a big impact on how good of a solution lithium batteries are. If we import less oil because we are all using electric cars, but import more oil to generate the power for those cars then that it is not much of a solution.
The object of this whole effort toward electric vehicles is really an effort away from gasoline. Not only should there be a move away from gasoline, but also a move from using gasoline to harvest any other form of energy. Only if an effort like this is made will we truly end our dependence of oil and gas.
ReplyDeleteThis doesn’t have to be done with one form of energy or even one way to apply that energy. What the United States is doing is completely fine. Let there be monies invested toward the research of one way to apply electrical power to vehicles. If it turns out that lithium ion batteries won’t serve as the complete solution, maybe they can serve as a partial solution to the problem. There are many types of energy and technologies which can be explored as partial replacements for gasoline and the spark ignition engine. One example involving electric power is with Nickel metal hydride batteries. These batteries have a high energy density, and don’t contain any toxic metals, making them easy to recycle. The problem with these, as Josh mentioned, is the weight of them. Let’s say that lithium ion batteries cannot be used as the universal technology behind EV, perhaps they can be used as a transition technology or even work together with a technology such as nickel metal hydride batteries for the same purpose. The research behind alternatives forms of energy and how to apply them can be done, and in the end, perhaps a combination of energies and technologies will be used to replace oil and gas in not only cars, but other consumptive practices as well.
To expand on previous comments, the problem with lithium or all electric cars for that matter is that it's only one half of the problem. Fossil fuels are direct in that they convert combustion reactions into mechanical work very well. For electricity, its always a two step process: some other resource converting to electricity and then storing the electricity on a battery to power a motor for mechanical work. So the viablity of lithium batteries will always be capped by the viability of the resource it draws power from.
ReplyDeleteI see the energy problem as well. The energy for these batteries must come from somewhere. there seems to be a couple factors with the decision to increase production in EVs. There is the need to decrease the need for oil as thoughts of peak oil is always in the back of people's minds. Also there is a need to move away from oil based combustion engines due to pollution which is californias concern. However the energy for these EVs come from the wall in your home, which comes from many polluting and non renewable sources. To me the EV just diverts the energy creation process away from the busy cities in california which will reduce the smog which is becoming increasingly better through different regulations. But this doesnt really change how the energy is created.
ReplyDeleteWill to respond to your last post:
ReplyDeleteI agree with a lot of what you said in your last post that we don’t need just one solution and that lithium batteries could be just one stepping stone in that overall solution. We realize we have an energy problem and at least we are working on something. I also thought your point about nickel metal hydride batteries was a good one that hadn’t been previously discussed. Yes there is a tradeoff in weight, but there has to be some applications they can be used for that we are currently using lithium for. As the price of lithium goes up we can work on developing better nickel metal hydride battery technology that is hopefully better and just as energy packed.
I do disagree with your point about moving away from gasoline entirely. Biodiesel could still potentially be a good augmenting solution if the price of oil continues to rise. And unlike oil it creates a closed carbon cycle where you are putting just as much carbon back into the atmosphere as the plants took out. Like lithium and nickel batteries there is still much research to be done in this area, but as we find better ways to extract the energy from plants and develop specialty biofuel plants like rapeseed, this option could become more attractive like many of the others. The other nice thing about biodiesel is it is best for countries that have a lot of arable land like the United States.
In short I like your idea William of using more nickel metal hydride batteries in addition to lithium and keeping ourselves focused on a range of solutions. If we moved more money into investing in nuclear infrastructure to support safe, reliable nuclear energy including reprocessing of spent fuel, fast reactors, breeder reactors, and the proper waste disposal facilities we could power those batteries for a long time (literally hundreds of years) at a low cost and have a much more secure fuel supply.
Another problem that hasn't been talked about is the mining of lithium. The government of Bolivia has control over the biggest supply of lithium known currently. Bolivia is a big stake holder in this whole transaction. They already refused bids by Toyota and Mitsubishi. So developing an economical relationship with Bolivia is important to developing this resource. It would be beneficial too for the US to create a good partnership with Bolivia to streamline the process. Also if the US can have a hand in helping the process we can assure that the lithium is mined with the most efficiency since there is a limited supply. Plus if the US can be apart of the mining process then it will give insight to better recycle the lithium.
ReplyDeleteI agree with the general consensus that lithium batteries may just be one of the many solutions that we use to solve the energy crisis that we are heading towards. Perhaps more scientific development towards both Lithium and nickel batteries would improve the technologies to the point that they would be more feasible energy solutions, but at this point, we don't really know.
ReplyDeleteRicky's point of the economic issues with the mining of lithium are definitely points for future study because we do not know how Bolivia will react to this mining in the future. It appears that they are going forward in a way that is potentially best for the country but hurtful to the Lithium battery science and business. We will see if Bolivia is more apt to start mining this material in the future and thus allow this technology a chance to grow and potentially succeed.
The general consensus I am hearing is that lithium batteries are just too useful (or just necessary) to outright avoid as an energy resource. To what degree they should be used and the consequences of lithium mining, production, and supply are yet to be ironed.
ReplyDeleteThe next step would be research, especially life-cyle analysis. There are just too many unknowns running around for a solid conclusion on lithium batteries. We generally agree that they will eventually see increased usage into larger battery applications (cars, etc), but we need to know how this will be done and the true impacts.