https://www.miningweekly.com
Contractor|Copper|Energy|Technology|Underground|Water|Environmental|Operations
Contractor|Copper|Energy|Technology|Underground|Water|Environmental|Operations
contractor|copper|energy|technology|underground|water|environmental|operations

World’s largest oilfield contractor tackles lithium’s water woes

5th October 2022

By: Bloomberg

  

Font size: - +

Schlumberger, the world’s largest oilfield contractor, is teaming up with a Massachusetts Institute of Technology spinoff on efforts to limit the amount of water needed to produce lithium, a key environmental hurdle for the clean energy raw material.

Boston-based Gradiant, a developer of water treatment facilities, is aiming to deploy technology already in use in copper to nickel mines in Chile and Australia to help reduce the environmental footprint of producing lithium from salt lakes, a process that accounts for 43% of global supply.

Demand for battery minerals -- including lithium, the key raw material used in electric vehicle batteries -- is expanding rapidly as the global auto industry accelerates a transition away from fossil fuels. But the lithium supply chain has been facing environmental challenges, including over the vast volumes of water needed to pump lithium-rich brines from deep underground in key hubs like Chile.

“The lithium supply problem is very much also a water problem,” Prakash Govindan, co-founder and chief operating officer of Gradiant, said in an interview this week in Singapore. Gradiant was founded at MIT in 2013.

Dozens of companies are pursuing new technologies to lower costs, cut water use and improve the green credentials of lithium operations, including the deployment of direct lithium extraction, or DLE, a term used to describe ways to chemically capture lithium compounds that could speed up production. Most remain at a pilot stage, though US producer Livent already deploys similar techniques at operations in Argentina.

Gradiant’s process, which Govindan said can vastly improve lithium recovery and allow almost all wastewater to be recycled, has been developed in connection with Schlumberger’s NeoLith Energy venture. Schlumberger last year announced a plan to collaborate with a unit of Tesla battery supplier Panasonic on a DLE plant in Nevada.

Gradiant is seeking to raise $100-million by the middle of 2023 to fund expansion plans, including acquiring companies involved in clean-technology water and sustainability, Govindan said in the interview. In November, it raised more than $100-million in a funding round led by a Schlumberger unit and buyout firm Warburg Pincus.

Edited by Bloomberg

Comments

Showroom

Rentech
Rentech

Rentech provides renewable energy products and services to the local and selected African markets. Supplying inverters, lithium and lead-acid...

VISIT SHOWROOM 
SBS Tanks
SBS Tanks

SBS® Tanks is a leading provider of innovative water security solutions with offices in Southern Africa, East and West Africa, the USA and an...

VISIT SHOWROOM 

Latest Multimedia

sponsored by

Hyphen, Eva mine, ferrochrome price make headlines
Hyphen, Eva mine, ferrochrome price make headlines
27th March 2024
Resources Watch
Resources Watch
27th March 2024

Option 1 (equivalent of R125 a month):

Receive a weekly copy of Creamer Media's Engineering News & Mining Weekly magazine
(print copy for those in South Africa and e-magazine for those outside of South Africa)
Receive daily email newsletters
Access to full search results
Access archive of magazine back copies
Access to Projects in Progress
Access to ONE Research Report of your choice in PDF format

Option 2 (equivalent of R375 a month):

All benefits from Option 1
PLUS
Access to Creamer Media's Research Channel Africa for ALL Research Reports, in PDF format, on various industrial and mining sectors including Electricity; Water; Energy Transition; Hydrogen; Roads, Rail and Ports; Coal; Gold; Platinum; Battery Metals; etc.

Already a subscriber?

Forgotten your password?

MAGAZINE & ONLINE

SUBSCRIBE

RESEARCH CHANNEL AFRICA

SUBSCRIBE

CORPORATE PACKAGES

CLICK FOR A QUOTATION







sq:0.136 0.173s - 91pq - 2rq
Subscribe Now