Afghanistan Mineral Resources

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DaveinOlyWA

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http://www.nytimes.com/2010/06/14/world/asia/14minerals.html?th&emc=th

from the NY Times; a new report showing (once again) another country we dont see eye to eye, having huge vital mineral resources including what could be one of the largest Lithium sources in the world.

now is the sticking point on battery prices, LI availability and would this drive prices down or would it being in an unstable?? country mean its jus something else we would pay thru the nose for?
 
Yes, this news has been going around.

Here is a useful look at the state of Lithium mining (before Afghan discoveries).

http://www.theoildrum.com/node/6228

Very little Li is used in Li batteries. Current cost of Lithium is $11/kwh - obviously insignificant.

Current price is $500 to $700 / kwh - though Nissan supposedly has even lower price for their Nissan Leaf. Let us take $500 / kwh. Since 24kwh battery is said to use 4 kg of Li - 1 kwh would use some 170 gm. Taking metalic Li price as $40 / kg, we are looking at some $7 / kwh. Let us make that $10/kwh.

So, currently only 2% of the battery cost is because of Lithium. How much would that have to increase to make the battery cost 5 times ? (Lithium price needs to go from $40/kg to $2,040/kg or 126 times)

We can cross check this using information from here. "They showed that you need 1.4 kg of lithium carbonate per kilowatt hour of battery." That gives a cost of $11 / kwh (using $8/kg).

http://evworld.com/article.cfm?storyid=1180&first=6240&end=6239
http://www.transportation.anl.gov/pdfs/TA/149.pdf

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I expect Pakistani generals/Taliban & Karzai to strike a deal soon. They will suspend hostilities in the mines and share the proceeds. In rest of the places they will continue to fight. :lol:
 
well considering the resources were first discovered by the Russians, it does shed A LOT of light as to why they wanted the area so badly since it would appear to serve no other purpose.

the original assertion that Russia wanted the area as a strategic military base never did fly with me
 
Mineral resources are different than oil. With oil, a major supply disruption can bring the world's economies to their knees in a matter of weeks. A tankful of gas doesn't last very long. Once you have a battery, it's a battery for a long time.
 
The lithium cells we want to use in EVs - LiFePO4 and LiMn - don't use metallic lithium, they use lithium salts. There's PLENTY available in sea water. It's cheaper and easier to get the salts from areas formerly under water. There are recently discovered lithium deposits in the US as well.
 
AndyH said:
There's PLENTY available in sea water. It's cheaper and easier to get the salts from areas formerly under water. There are recently discovered lithium deposits in the US as well.

But it's quite dilute actually in seawater (0.1-0.2 ppm). Like you say, cheaper and easier to get the salts that were in seawater.
 
There are Lithium mines in the US. They have either been closed (NC) or are still operating (Nevada) under foreign ownership. But it is cheaper to mine lithium in Chile. So, many American mines remain closed.

http://www.greenenergyinvestors.com/index.php?showtopic=110

In other words, nobody would ever invade or even spend time in Afghanistan for Lithium. Just tin foil hattery.
 
People who understand geopolitics say Afghanistan is a very important. It has always been - it connects south Asia with central Asia and East Europe - from the time of Aryans migrating to India some 4,000 years back.

Anyone read Kipling ?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kim_(novel)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Great_Game
 
- rant on -

A lesson we SHOULD have learned about Afghanistan: the 10 year war with the soviets ended up bankrupting them, that's what REALLY ended the cold war.

We need to remember that, as no one can "win", they have brought down a superpower before, and we are not really in the greatest financial shape to fight this war. We really have no business even being there, Osama was within sight years ago (special forces was within a few miles), and GWB gave the order to "back down". there's no point in pursing it further... In reality, the attacks of 9/11 where very effective, pretty much destroyed our economy, and we keep damaging it further with this foolish waste of money and lives.

- rant off -
 
mitch672 said:
- rant on -

A lesson we SHOULD have learned about Afghanistan: the 10 year war with the soviets ended up bankrupting them, that's what REALLY ended the cold war.

We need to remember that, as no one can "win", they have brought down a superpower before, and we are not really in the greatest financial shape to fight this war. We really have no business even being there, Osama was within sight years ago (special forces was within a few miles), and GWB gave the order to "back down". there's no point in pursing it further... In reality, the attacks of 9/11 where very effective, pretty much destroyed our economy, and we keep damaging it further with this foolish waste of money and lives.

- rant off -

You know what I have to say to rebut your opinion?!?!?!


Nothing.

;)
 
mitch672 said:
A lesson we SHOULD have learned about Afghanistan: the 10 year war with the soviets ended up bankrupting them, that's what REALLY ended the cold war.

We need to remember that, as no one can "win", they have brought down a superpower before, and we are not really in the greatest financial shape to fight this war. We really have no business even being there, Osama was within sight years ago (special forces was within a few miles), and GWB gave the order to "back down". there's no point in pursing it further... In reality, the attacks of 9/11 where very effective, pretty much destroyed our economy, and we keep damaging it further with this foolish waste of money and lives.

I think there was a window of opportunity just after the fall of Taleban. We did two things wrong. We let Osama slip out of Tora Bora (because we let war lords do the policing). More importantly resources and mind share was shifted to Iraq - a needless war. I'm fairly sure we would have "won" this war a long time back but for these ...
 
evnow said:
People who understand geopolitics say Afghanistan is a very important.

One benefit of an Afghan ally is that oil from former Soviet republics could be piped to seaports without passing thru Russia...

On the heartfelt anti-war sentiment (with which I agree)... I stumbled across a number yesterday that gave me pause. Is it really possible that since the beginning of recorded human history we've only had 29 years without war somewhere on the planet? :cry:
 
evnow said:
I'm fairly sure we would have "won" this war a long time back but for these ...

Something else we did wrong was stay there. We could have got rid of the Taliban, left, and gone back again to sort things out again, if the need arose, several times in the last ten years, and still not spent as much as we have just staying there!
 
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