{"id":594292,"date":"2026-05-01T00:30:00","date_gmt":"2026-05-01T00:30:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/buglecall.org\/?p=594292"},"modified":"2026-05-01T00:30:00","modified_gmt":"2026-05-01T00:30:00","slug":"massive-lithium-lode-in-appalachia-could-power-130-million-evs-usgs-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/buglecall.org\/?p=594292","title":{"rendered":"Massive Lithium Lode In Appalachia Could Power 130 Million EVs: USGS"},"content":{"rendered":"

Massive Lithium Lode In Appalachia Could Power 130 Million EVs: USGS<\/span><\/p>\n

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America’s worrisome dependency on foreign sources of lithium could become a thing of the past: <\/strong>About 328 years’ worth of last year’s lithium imports is buried in Appalachia, according to a new analysis<\/a> published by the US Geological Survey (USGS). That’s about 2.3 million metric tons<\/strong> of undiscovered but economically recoverable lithium — aka “white gold.”\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cThis research shows that the Appalachians contain enough lithium to help meet the nation\u2019s growing needs \u2013 a major contribution to U.S. mineral security, at a time when global lithium demand is rising rapidly,\u201d\u00a0said<\/a> USGS Director Ned Mamula. “The United States was the dominant world producer of lithium three decades ago, and this research highlights the abundant potential to reclaim our mineral independence.\u201d<\/strong>\u00a0Today, Australia is the top producer, and China in second place — however, China boasts about 60% of the world’s lithium refining capacity for batteries.\u00a0 \u00a0<\/p>\n

The deposits are spread over a large swath of territory.\u00a0The southern Appalachians — primarily the Carolinas<\/strong> — have about 1.43 million metric tons, while the northern Appalachians hold 900,000 metric tons, most of it in\u00a0Maine, New Hampshire and Vermont, <\/strong>USGS says. Added up, it’s enough to put the requisite lithium in 130 million electric vehicles, or a thousand years worth of laptop production.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

USGS project\u00a0global lithium production capacity will double over the next three years<\/strong>. In April, Finland became the first European country to host the full continuum of lithium production, from an open-pit mine that produces battery-grade lithium hydroxide, to a refinery. “The \u20ac783 million project is operated by Keliber Oy, a Finnish mining and battery-materials company,” EuroNews<\/em><\/a> reported.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Today, there’s only one<\/a> operating lithium mine in America<\/strong>: the Albemarle Silver Peak Mine in Nevada. Earlier this week, environmentalists sued to stop exploratory drilling<\/a> in Oregon near the Nevada border. The US Bureau of Land Management had given the green light for HiTech Minerals to set up 168 drill sites over five years, on a 7,200-acre expanse of public land. The plaintiffs include “Great Old Broads for Wilderness.”\u00a0In a 2024 analysis, USGS concluded that brines in southwest Arkansas’ Smackover Formation<\/strong> hold 5 to 19 million metric tons<\/a> of lithium, but didn’t determine what proportion is economically recoverable.\u00a0<\/p>\n

To say the more-promising Appalachian deposits were created a long time ago is an understatement. “Lithium-rich pegmatites in the northern Appalachians formed from the same geologic forces that built the mountains more than 250 million years ago,”<\/strong> explained the USGS, a Department of the Interior organization and the country’s largest water, earth and biological science mapping organization. “The high heat and pressure during the mountain-building caused some of the deeper crustal rocks to melt, and some of these magmas were rich in lithium.”\u00a0<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

Tyler Durden<\/a><\/span>
\nThu, 04\/30\/2026 – 20:30<\/span><\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Massive Lithium Lode In Appalachia Could Power 130 Million EVs: USGS America’s worrisome dependency on foreign sources of lithium could become a thing of the past: About 328 years’ worth of last year’s lithium imports is buried in Appalachia, according to a new analysis published by the US Geological Survey (USGS). That’s about 2.3 million… Continue reading Massive Lithium Lode In Appalachia Could Power 130 Million EVs: USGS<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":594286,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"rop_custom_images_group":[],"rop_custom_messages_group":[],"rop_publish_now":"initial","rop_publish_now_accounts":[],"rop_publish_now_history":[],"rop_publish_now_status":"pending","footnotes":""},"categories":[18,19,10,21,12,11,9],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-594292","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-cancel-culture","category-censorship","category-civil-liberties","category-election-integrity","category-equal-justice","category-free-speech","category-religious-freedom","entry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/buglecall.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/594292","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/buglecall.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/buglecall.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/buglecall.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/buglecall.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=594292"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/buglecall.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/594292\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/buglecall.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/594286"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/buglecall.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=594292"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/buglecall.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=594292"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/buglecall.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=594292"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}