Rewriting Nevada’s Mining Story | University of Nevada, Las Vegas | Daily News Byte

It is being called a new chapter in Nevada’s mining history, a potential boom based on Nevada’s rich supply of lithium. The mineral is key to rechargeable batteries and promises to help wean the world off its reliance on fossil fuels. But the expected increase in lithium production in the country comes with big challenges, dramatic plot twists and visits from ghosts from the past.

Research geologists and economists at UNLV are working to unite diverse groups in a way that was almost unheard of less than a generation ago. Given the devastating effects of climate change and carbon-induced global warming, much more than another mining boom hangs in the balance.

At UNLV’s Center for Business and Economic Research (CBER), director Andrew Woods turns the corner. “The demand for energy storage between electric cars, homes and commercial buildings is only going to grow exponentially,” says Woods. “Demand for batteries is predicted to grow fivefold over the next eight years.” Climate change is no longer a matter of mitigation, but of human survival.”

This year, the center released a white paper on lithium-rich Nevada and why it’s an ideal home for the fast-growing lithium-ion battery industry. But modern mineral extraction is no longer as simple as digging a hole in the ground. Rhyolite Ridge in Esmeralda County contains vast lithium deposits, but is also home to the endangered Tiehm Buckwheat, which grows on just 10 acres. At Thacker Pass near the Oregon border in Humboldt County, another huge lithium deposit lies beneath land considered sacred by the Paiute and Shoshone tribes.

“We have no choice but to find a way forward in extracting essential metals used in various clean energy applications such as lithium, cobalt and nickel,” says Woods. “But we can’t solve one environmental problem by creating another for future generations to clean up.”

There’s the rub.

In Nevada, the story of mining’s cycles of exploitation and decline is known as sage and sand. The rich ore of the Comstock Lode gave the “Silver State” its name, but Virginia City’s fortunes rose and fell with the mines, while the profits built mansions elsewhere.

Lessons in the Silver State

Although its gold mines remain among the most productive in the world, Nevada is the only state that currently extracts lithium through primary mining rather than as a byproduct of mining other minerals. It’s been happening since 1966 in central Nevada’s Esmeralda County at Silver Peak, a place that once produced silver and gold back in the 1860s. As the nation and the world woke up to the use of lithium in batteries for electric vehicles, laptops and countless other devices, Nevada’s lithium went from a trivial answer to potentially the next big mineral boom in a state whose history they highlight.

The potential is great to expand lithium mining beyond the Clayton Valley at Silver Peak, but other proposed sites have sparked environmental and indigenous controversy. The only long-term solution is to find a way to balance these interests.

For Andrew Hanson, a geologist and dean of the Honors College, the emergence of the lithium economy is a living history lesson in a state that has struggled to learn from the past. He brings to the subject scientific expertise as well as life experience growing up on a ranch in arid eastern Montana next to the Northern Cheyenne Indian Reservation.

“I want the lithium economy to grow in Nevada,” Hanson says. “But there is a part of me that looks at history. All you have to do is drive around the state to different mining districts and you’ll realize, time and time again, that we’ve been in these multiple boom and bust cycles. When a resource is discovered, the place booms. When the resource runs out, everything ends. I would hate for that to happen again. I wish there was a way to make this a sustainable resource and what the Earth has provided for us.”

With writing a new ending to an old story and an $80,000 grant from the Nevada Gold Mine in mind, Hanson coordinated efforts to help educate UNLV students outside the classroom and out in the real Nevada. He took them on a trip through the nation’s seventh-largest state, through its rural ranches and mining operations, its hinterland and sacred sites.

Understanding the complexities of public land and water issues, as well as indigenous rights and environmental concerns, is critical for those who will soon make the decisions, he believes. And if the lithium economy is to benefit all stakeholders, it could be the thinkers and leaders who ensure that the coming lithium boom does not end in a devastating crash for the lands and peoples of Nevada.

Simon Jowitt, a professor of economic geology, says increased lithium production could transform Nevada mining and more.

“Nevada is kind of naturally endowed with lithium, which has been known for a while,” he says. But having many little necessary things does not mean economic development. “Until recently, if you had brought a large lithium mine to power, what would have happened?” You may have saturated the market and driven down the price of lithium. Now we see demand for the metal growing. So it’s more a matter of time than anything else.”

And the timing is now ripe, he says.

Downstream capabilities

Changing the state’s mining story will require Nevada to embrace the bigger picture, one that starts with lithium extraction alone. To avoid a crash, Nevada will need to invest in the lithium economy once the mineral comes out of the ground.

“We don’t just want to mine lithium.” We want to capture more of the value that happens downstream. You process lithium, you put it into batteries, you put batteries into end-use products like vehicles and so on. That’s where the real value is.”

For decades, Jovitt notes, processing and manufacturing have been done overseas.

CBER’s Woods compares the potential of the lithium economy to the rise of another new and once controversial industry: the post-World War II casino industry.

“There’s an economic term called agglomeration, which basically means that when you group a bunch of businesses in the same industry together in a location, they learn from each other, they grow together, and you become specialized relative to your competitors outside of that region,” he says. he.

“It’s exciting to think about what Nevada’s lithium economy could look like 10, 20 or 30 years from now if we start investing in it today with human capital (workers), research, infrastructure and facilities.”

Achieving such a transformation will require a new level of cooperation and understanding of what is at stake. Succeed and help preserve the climate; fail and end up just another blip in Nevada mining history.

“There is a balance between mining, mineral processing, manufacturing and so on, and the challenging effects created by those industries,” says Jovitt. “You have environmental challenges and social challenges like we see at Thacker Pass and so on. It reaches the public consciousness.”

Gathering of players of the energy ecosystem

Spurred on by Gen Z and millennials who cite climate change as their top concern, the public is increasingly aware of “greenwashing,” or superficial signaling of environmental sensitivity by corporations and politicians with little long-term effect.

“The public, if they want to have a Tesla, if they want to do something about climate change, if they want to invest in renewable energy and zero-carbon technologies and electric vehicles, or whatever — it all comes at a price.” … We’re going to have to dig an awful lot, and even more, if we want to actually do things in a meaningful way about climate change.”

One sign that the message is starting to reach its target audience: For the first time, in August, CBER and the Guinn Center on Public Policy Priorities convened a roundtable on the clean energy ecosystem, Woods reports. The players were formidable and represented industry, indigenous and environmental communities, the governor’s office and academic experts. With topics ranging from labor supply to environmental impact, Woods says, the gathering “felt like a really good first step of many.”

Then, he says, “It’s up to academia, researchers, students, industry and the community to come together and carve out a path forward that allows us to transition while doing it in the best possible way.” We must follow the same principles as medicine under the Hippocratic Oath: Do no harm.

With so much potential, it would be a shame if Nevada missed perhaps its best opportunity to write a new ending to a story as old as statehood.