Now that I have your attention, you will soon know why I put those two topics in the same sentence, but you will have to keep reading.

First, I will start with an old memory from around 2000.

While working in the Cablevision call center, I learned of Braintree Electric Light Department(BELD), another competitor for the cable TV market, but just in Braintree.  It was the same situation as with RCN; it was one of several towns where the caller ID said “competitive area” to alert the CSR that specially scripted talking points were to be used, when applicable.

Here it is, nearly a quarter of a century later, and Eversource has competition, but it’s sneaky!  More on that in a moment.  Last year was an election year in Nashua, and our mayor had nine ward “town halls” earlier in the year.  One of his David Letterman-style opening monologue talking points in his tooting-his-own-horn agenda was community power coming to Nashua.  There was a small handful of communities participating, and I didn’t pay close attention to who they were, but I thought they were cities because this kind of pilot project tends to be in customer-dense places in the infrastructure.

I had no idea that community power (or programs with similar names) was coming soon to smaller towns elsewhere until I watched a video by Nurse Terese, a Loudon resident, on recent town elections, warrant articles, and related matters. When she mentioned community power, it sent my mind back to last year, Punxsutawney Phil-style!

In Nashua, community power was such that one had to opt out, which I did the day I received the (probably mandatory) notice of its debut. I’ll let the accountants talk numbers, but my reason for doing so was that it was an election year, and I hate the mayor and will be darned if I do anything just because he wants me to. I would have to follow up with Terese to confirm, but I think she said Loudon has the same situation with them.

Why not make it opt-in?  You already know the answer as do all opposition members to bills on vax registry matters.  It’s the battle for customers/voters/consumers or whatever you care to name the population that’s asleep at the wheel.  THEY are the commodity both sides are fighting for.  It’s also eerily similar to some HR and benefits things during open enrollment time: passive vs. active enrollment. Too many people are too lazy to spoon-feed themselves, but the time is now for those to recognize the deadly sin of laziness when it comes to passive enrollment because it’s all by design.

A good bill idea might be to make community power programs (or whatever they’re locally named) opt-in.  My senator is the Energy chair and Terese’s is the vice chair.  The four of us should have a talk about this.

The post “Community Power” and “Vax Bills!” – Did That Get Your Attention? appeared first on Granite Grok.

The Bidenitas are working diligently to hide their border malfeasance. Hard work the media is happy to help shoulder. But with a little bit of research and some time, it has proven (dare I say child’s play) to expose the deliberateness of their indifference, especially regarding “migrant” children.

Allison Dyer took to  Rumble to show us, in just a few minutes, referencing a handful of key players, how the Biden administration is responsible. They allowed child trafficking, knew it was happening, and did nothing to prevent it. Children are little more than an abused side-effect of a policy choice.

Someone should call Child and Family Services and tie these bastards up in family court.

Check this out.

 

!function(r,u,m,b,l,e){r._Rumble=b,r[b]||(r[b]=function(){(r[b]._=r[b]._||[]).push(arguments);if(r[b]._.length==1){l=u.createElement(m),e=u.getElementsByTagName(m)[0],l.async=1,l.src="https://rumble.com/embedJS/u359331"+(arguments[1].video?'.'+arguments[1].video:'')+"/?url="+encodeURIComponent(location.href)+"&args="+encodeURIComponent(JSON.stringify([].slice.apply(arguments))),e.parentNode.insertBefore(l,e)}})}(window, document, "script", "Rumble");

Rumble("play", {"video":"v4gvk7l","div":"rumble_v4gvk7l"});

 

The post #WhereAreTheChildren – Child Trafficking is a Democrat Policy Choice appeared first on Granite Grok.

This follows up on my Adam Sexton Thinks Speech Codes Are “Interesting,” which involved a Democrat Communist State Senator’s demand that GOP State Senators not refer to illegal aliens as illegal aliens. The Communist State Senator later took to X to Comm-splain that referring to illegals as illegals is “dehumanizing”:

 

What an opportunity for the GOP State Senators, which, of course, they missed and squandered. Comrade Whitley and her ilk are all about “dehumanizing” the roughly half of America that won’t goose-step to their hard-Left agenda. Has Comrade Whitley ever “fought” against her side’s “dehumanizing language”? Of course not. She’s a Communist. She does NOT have to play by the same set of rules that she demands her opponents (she would see them as enemies) play by.

For example, if you mention any of the obvious ways the 2020 election was rigged … you are an election denier. If you question any of the climate-“science”, you are an election-denier. If you question the efficacy and safety of the COVID “vaccines,” you are a vaccine-denier. The point of this language is to make you the equivalent of a Holocaust denier. You are a NAZI if you don’t march in goose-step behind Whitley and her ilk.

If you don’t believe in abortion-on-demand through nine months -if you support even the most minimal restrictions -that makes you anti-choice. This from the people who wanted you to have NO choice about shooting up with an experimental drug (the COVID-“vaccine”) by having that be a condition of your employment. See how this works yet? Support a ban on abortions after six months and you are anti-choice. Support the de facto forced injection of an experimental drug and you are not anti-choice … you are a “public health expert.” One set of rules for them. Another set for us.

I could go on and on and on. As I wrote in the initial post: Disagreeing with Whitley and her ilk is discrimination, extremism, hate, etcetera, etcetera, etcetera … and makes you a racist, an election-denier, a climate-denier, a white-supremacist, anti-choice, a fascist, an insurrectionist, a transphobe, a homophobe, etcetera, etcetera, etcetera. It is not “dehumanizing” when Comrade Whitley and her ilk use this language. But it is “dehumanizing” to refer to illegals as illegals.

One set of rules for them. Another set of rules for us. It’s classic Communism. And our wonderful GOP State senators need to see it for what it is and grow the testicular fortitude to call it what it is.

The post The Becky Whitleys Are The “Dehumanizers” appeared first on Granite Grok.

Stay Safe by Michael Lacoy is set in the make-believe town of Beauville, New Hampshire, and features characters who fit into any number of pandemic archetypes. You’ll recognize them and associate them with people and behaviors experienced after the world was turned upside down in the spring of 2020.

The story begins with Cole Perrot, wearing a Pq32 respirator face mask and N16z face shield, as he drives his reluctant young daughter (also masked and shielded) to the clinic to get ‘vaccinated’ against the SPAARZ virus. The ‘vaccine” has been approved for the 12-year-old, and Cole can’t wait, even if Rosa isn’t so sure.

Only his son has refused, pushing back against his father’s (and much of the world’s) easy embrace of government mandates and media narratives and the Karen-like behavior that came with it.

Cole Perrot—a frustrated college administrator who spends most of his time on social media—ferociously loathes his next-door neighbor, Tyce Creamer, an internet celebrity and the very embodiment of “toxic masculinity.” Unfortunately for Cole, his wife Oona feels differently about Tyce, as do Cole’s teenage son and young daughter. Sensing a threat to his progressive values, not to mention his hold over his family, Cole secretly declares war on his “redneck” neighbor. What follows is a series of events that are by turns shocking, hilarious, absurd, and perfectly of our present moment.

Set amid a global flu pandemic, the novel chronicles the unraveling of both a man and a country in a time of heightened fear and deep social division. Mixing comedy, tragedy, and blistering satire, Stay Safe amuses and terrifies in equal measure.

It’s all in there, along with a cast of what I can only call Pandemic Era Archetypes.

Stay Safe offers a light-hearted opportunity to revisit the madness as an observer of players whose lives are forever impacted by the decisions they make during this unusual time in New Hampshire and the world.

And at 275 pages, it was a breeze to get through.

Check it out.

 

If you’d like us to review your book, email steve@granitegrok.com

The post Books: ‘Stay Safe’ by Michael Lacoy – A Dark Comedy Set During a Global Pandemic appeared first on Granite Grok.

As promised in Monday Memes, I have an overflow. My meme cup runneth over.  And yes there will be a Friday edition too.

Please do recall – most memes are posted in order of download.

Let the mayhem, mockery, and ridicule resume:

 

*** Warning, a few possibly off-color ones, in case tender eyes are about ***

 

 

>>>>>=====<<<<<

 

“The ultimate authority … resides in the people alone. … The advantage of being armed, which the Americans possess over the people of almost every other nation … forms a barrier against the enterprises of ambition, more insurmountable than any…” – James Madison (1788)

 

 

Available here (though you have to adjust filter settings from SAFE to PG-13):

Show why you own guns! They’re TYRANT VACCINE. Bumper Sticker | Zazzle

 

>>>>>=====<<<<<

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

And this is why the Dems seem so desperate to pass it – and doubtless a lot of the GOP as well.  Call it Silencing of the critics.

 

 

 

Not just that, but if you were injected pre-1986, you were getting vaccines that were subject to liability suits and, therefore, theoretically more watched for safety issues than today’s stuff.

 

 

Fire up the woodchippers.

 

 

 

Inspected by WHO in… ENGLAND???

 

 

 

 

>>>>>=====<<<<<

 

Embedding two of my essays from my old blog.  Apologies for the somewhat cumbersome reading; I PDFed them off to preserve them as I closed the blog down.  Links don’t work, alas.  But hopefully the text carries through well enough.

The first, on humans being hardwired for faith.

 

E Hardwired for Faith

 

The above applies to Climate Change, and also The Jab.

 

 

The second, about elections and how we need to make a clear differentiation between us and the Left.

 

E Ethnic Food and Elections

 

>>>>>=====<<<<<

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Nothing to do with her body being dangerous.  It’s the potential accusations coming from her mouth that are the problem.  For all that I now despise Mike Pence, his rule about not having a one-on-one meal with a woman, any woman, makes sense in these times.

 

 

 

When I started working professionally, it was a 40 hour week, with more hours if there was a genuine need for that.  Nowadays, it seems like 50 is the new 40, with 12 hour days not unheard of as a normal thing.

 

 

 

America’s and Europe’s output could fall to flat-out zero, not “net zero” but actually zero – and it wouldn’t make any difference.

 

 

 

 

 

>>>>>=====<<<<<

 

PSA – PSA – PSA – PSA – PSA

 

Read these.  And then ponder: do you REALLY think you’re going to vote your way out of this?  Spicy time approacheth.  Find your steel; the avalanche has started.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

>>>>>=====<<<<<

 

Links (some from me, some from my Jarhead friend):

 

Dr. David Martin: Almost 20 years ago the spike protein was known to be bioweapon – The Expose (expose-news.com)

They’ve been planning this for a long, long time.  Related:

Both Pfizer and GSK (Glaxo Smith) RSV vaccines now shown to be linked to Guillain-Barré Syndrome; SHARYL ATTKISSON’s report is shocking “CDC Preliminary Analysis: RSV vaccines for seniors linked to (substack.com)

Pathologist Arne Burkhardt Final Interview – Revealing the Grave Dangers of mRNA Vaccines (thelastamericanvagabond.com)

IIRC he died within a few months of this speech.  How… conveniently coincidental.

COVID-19 injections can damage your heart, your brain, your reproductive tissue, and your lungs.” (rumble.com)

Stunning claims of whistleblower need to go viral (substack.com)

Though – details omitted – a Telegram contact said he was FOR Jabs and claims that it was only after the “tides had turned” that he switched.

CDC Not Investigating Chronic Disease Epidemics Linked to Childhood Vaccines (substack.com)

Video, about 7 minutes.  Absolutely criminal.

—

Australia Signs WEF Treaty To Close ALL Major Banks and Switch to Fully Cashless Society – The People’s Voice (thepeoplesvoice.tv)

Open for discussion: how to resist this?

—

Poll: Almost a Third of Americans Say the First Amendment Goes ‘Too Far’ (reason.com)

When freedom dies, it will die with cheers.

—

Media Tries To Start Race War Over Cops Killing Black Kid Swinging a Shovel (rumble.com)

No matter how much you hate the enemedia, it isn’t enough.  Enemedia related:

The fake news about Trump’s ‘bloodbath’ speech – spiked (spiked-online.com)

Media Runs Hoax Trump Said There Would be a “Bloodbath” if He Loses Election – modernity

Tim Young on X: “Here’s 2 straight minutes of leftists using the term bloodbath… I guess they’re all threatening political violence. https://t.co/p5iRv4QuIp” / X (twitter.com)

The Media’s BLOODBATH HOAX Is Their BIGGEST LIE YET! | Larry Live! (rumble.com)

Control the information flow and control what people believe.

—

Our Invisible Chains, Our Stolen Vote (substack.com)

Anatomy of the 2022 Steal, Part 2 – by elizabeth nickson (substack.com)

More and more I am concluding TINVOWOOT.  Now, if there actually is an election – and honestly I’ll be surprised if there is – I will vote.  But I don’t expect it to actually amount to anything.  TPTB will work to make sure Trump doesn’t get in, one way or another.  Related:

Welcome to 2024: The Last Year of America? (emerald.tv)

—

“I’ve Changed My Mind”: Swedish Open Borders MP Makes Complete U-Turn – modernity

OOH, better late than never.

OTOH, the damage is done.  These invaders will not go quietly.  But they do need to go.

More on migration / borders:

Supreme Court Extends Freeze of Texas Law Authorizing State Police to Arrest Illegal Aliens | National Review

—

The Forgotten History of the World’s First Trans Clinic | Scientific American

This is a very uncomfortable subject, because under normal circumstances I decry even the idea of burning books.  But I’ve been learning about the sexual degeneracy of the Weimar Republic after WWI.  And this perversion prompted a backlash among the normal German peoples under a strongman who promised to clean up the filth.  Those books that were famously burned were LGBTQP stuff from that first transsexual clinic.

—

Sexual Restraint Helps Cultures Flourish, Immorality Brings Decay, Researchers Find (substack.com)

Fascinating.  But it makes sense to me.  And, shamelessly, here are three essays that – together – cover the above and more.  From my old blog:

 

Ignoring Hashem’s Wisdom parts 1-3

 

E Ignoring Hashems Wisdom 1

 

E Ignoring Hashems Wisdom 2

 

E Ignoring Hashems Wisdom 3

 

And I prominently mention my essays “Cultural Ion Thrusters”; there are four of them  If people comment YES, I’ll include them in Friday’s post.

 

>>>>>=====<<<<<

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

There are some that are conservatives but still skeptical about Trump.  That’s fair.  But… short of armed revolution (which may happen anyway, alas) what’s the alternative?

 

 

One of the biggest tools in a con, insofar as I have studied it, is to make the mark feel special and unique and superior.  Sounds like, for example, the Jab and making people feel superior and pro-science and all for taking it.

 

 

 

 

 

It truly amazes me how people who have never known actual hardship in their lives can so diss people who grew up in Communism and know what it actually is.

 

 

 

 

And I think that’s one of the issues: people don’t really want to think their fellow man is capable of that any more.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

On the plus side, many are Jabbed and boosted.

 

 

Used to have his autographed picture.  Can’t find it. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

>>>>>=====<<<<<

 

Pick of the Post:

 

 

Damning if you think of it.  NOTHING says “Safe and effective” like avoiding an independent review and evaluation of your product.

 

>>>>>=====<<<<<

 

Palate cleansers:

 

—

—

 

>>>>>=====<<<<<

 

Come back on Friday for more memes.  Same meme time.  Same meme channel.

 

>>>>>=====<<<<<

 

The post Meme Overflow appeared first on Granite Grok.

For at least two years, the Nashua Library has displayed the book “What Was Stonewall?” in the children’s room during June. This book is about the history of the treatment of lesbians and gay men in the US, and it is for children ages 8 to 12.

Related: Library Promotes Book That Teaches Kids to “Love Who You Choose”

These are impressionable young children without much experience of the world, and I am alarmed by the violence that is celebrated in this book.

The first alarming item in the book is an account of the horrific abuse of gay men in the past, including lobotomies and castration. Do kids this age need to know about this? Even adults will find this difficult to read. Sadly, this reminds me of what is happening today to too many young men who are confused about their gender identity and are castrated while under the delusion that they can become a woman.

In the account of the Stonewall Riots, the author celebrates violence against the police. After the police announce they are going to arrest people at the Stonewall Inn, the rioters yell slurs at the police. They proceed to throw bottles, rocks, and bricks, rock police cars, and slash their tires. The police officers were forced to retreat into the Stonewall Inn. The rioters broke the windows and ripped a parking meter out of the sidewalk, and used it to bash in the door. The police officers had to barricade themselves in. The rioters then threw Molotov cocktails into the building and pushed a burning trash can in through the window.

This is a dangerous situation where many people could have been seriously hurt and killed. It is not something to celebrate. The author minimizes it:

By now, the crowd numbered more than two thousand. The officers used a fire hose to put out the flames and disperse the mob. Outside, people laughed.  The water probably felt good on such a hot night!

These were serious crimes, and it is ludicrous to make light of it, most especially for impressionable children.

This is a far cry from the non-violent civil rights movement led by Martin Luther King that continues to be an inspiration to everyone. This is a story of out-of-control miscreants wantonly destroying property in the process of trying to kill police officers.

It is also concerning that the book’s resources include the website for The Trevor Project, which has drifted from its original mission of protecting gay youth from suicide. Read “Why does the Trevor Project want to separate kids from their parents?” and “Trevor Project in crisis amid financial woes, staff dissension, ‘union busting’: sources.”

 

The post Public Library Promotes Children’s Book Celebrating Violent Action Against Police appeared first on Granite Grok.

Two years ago, we discovered something interesting. If you ask too many questions about Taxpayer-owned Gunstock Resort, huge sums are spent, and pressure is brought to oust anyone in elected or appointed office who asks those questions. Suspicious?

It is, and we won’t get into the weeds, but Gunstock Mountain Resort is the property of the people of Belknap County and New Hampshire. It is a government organ, and when the people’s representatives began questioning its motives and integrity, the mere idea of impropriety became a third rail.

Suspicious?

A bi-partisan cabal of advocates for keeping whatever goes on hidden are also enthusiastic about making it more difficult and expensive for citizens to file right-to-know requests of this government entity or anyone familiar with its workings (HB1002).

Suspicious?

The current Gunstock Commission and County Delegation, which rose to replace those asking uncomfortable questions, oppose HB1414. They don’t want it audited (they have oversight, you see).

Suspicious?

The Gunstock Commission does not want to record public meetings or keep meeting minutes, and they do not want a forensic financial audit of Gunstock Mountain Resort (which HB1414 requires). Related: Gunstock- The Home of No Financial Controls?

Suspicious?

This majority came into power in part because of a well-funded campaign to ‘Save Gunstock.’ The implication was that the resort was in danger, but the only things they saved Gunstock from were transparency and accountability. It worked in 2022. Will it work again in 2024? Will Gunstock Resort dodge operational and financial scrutiny yet again?

What are they hiding? Why didn’t they want a financial audit? Why doesn’t a majority of the Commission or the Delegation want one, either? Don’t Taxpayers have a right to know?

We cannot guarantee that HB1414, should it pass the House, will survive the State Senate or Sununu’s gubernatorial veto pen (Gunstock insiders did illegally donate taxpayer dollars to His Excellency’s campaign not once but twice), but that’s no reason not to try.

Something stinks at Gunstock, and the people who don’t want you to find the source of the odor continue to spend a lot of time, energy, and money making sure you don’t or can’t.

If that isn’t the best reason to ensure they get audited (and) regularly, I’m not sure what is.

Support HB1414, and perhaps we’ll see what it is they don’t want you to know.

 

The post You Should Support HB1414 to Audit Gunstock Resort … Because They Don’t Want to be Audited appeared first on Granite Grok.

There is a rhythm to politics, but we usually live in the middle of the spectrum, leaning one way or the other. Barack Obama made the Progressive Radical Left popular, and for the last sixteen years, we have been pulled out of the middle to the more Socialist Left. The previous four years have been highly volatile, even on the state level.

We had a short reset period at the beginning of the Trump Presidency, but COVID stopped that. Biden, who had been a man of the middle for nearly fifty years, decided to drop to his knees and bend over backward to the Radical Left of the Democrat Party. America may never recover from the damage he has inflicted on her.

That sounds like hyperbole, like the senseless rhetoric of the Greenies. But if you look at the compilation of the activities of the Federal Government and some of the more active Blue States, we have taken strides with issues that cannot be reversed when adults move back into power.

Democrats still lament the overturning Roe v. Wade, but we have Blue States like New York and Maine that have adopted new laws that allow for abortions up to the crowning of the baby’s head at its mother’s cervix. Though still illegal at the Federal level, states have begun to legalize Marijuana for recreational use and have backed their decisions with ludicrous comments like there is no proof that Marijuana can harm the user or the distributor. The poisonous chemicals discovered in the legally grown weeds are enough to hurt or kill the users.

How many ways will we be harmed by the 10 million illegals that have invaded our country under Joe Biden? Many cities and towns have been forever harmed in the name of importing enough people to ensure Democrat Blue states forever. We will lose over 400,000 young Americans to Fentanyl during Joe Biden’s Administration because Biden does not have the spine to stand up to China. We have a DOJ and intelligence community that has been weaponized against the Right by a frightened Left that has destroyed the non-political position of these agencies forever. Our educational system has been proven to be more about indoctrination than education and has been strengthened and bolstered under Biden. We have developed a generation that is so confused about the gender they are supposed to be, rather than that they were born, that they are seeking drugs and surgeries to destroy their God-given bodies.

These bizarre, illogical, and unAmerican philosophies cannot be reversed by winning elections. These are irreversible for our existing generations. Barack Obama told us he would fundamentally transform America. He didn’t tell us that Joe Biden would put the exclamation mark on the work started by Obama. We did not need a foreign country to invade us and take control of our Republic. The people we elected to represent us did it without firing a shot. We can elect Republicans in November to put a halt to the destruction, but I fear the job has already been completed. America as we grew to know and love no longer exists.

The post Have We Reached The Point Of No Return appeared first on Granite Grok.

A revolutionary new technology to extract precious lithium from brine water is poised to be deployed in the Great Salt Lake in Utah. The element lithium is essential to electric vehicle (EV) manufacturing, for batteries and eventual grid storage capacity.

Precious mineral resources will grow in economic importance for many nations, yet their mining and disposal are increasingly proving a tricky political problem.

Revolutionary Extraction Method

The surge in EV production caused lithium prices to soar, boosting many mining industries and attracting venture capital globally. Most of the world’s lithium is mined from underground brine that is pumped to the surface and then stored for months in toxic lakes that evaporate the water and concentrate the lithium for extraction.

An American company has patented a novel extraction process that eliminates evaporation ponds with reusable ceramic “beads” that absorb the lithium. Waterleaf Resources, a subsidiary of Lilac Solutions, is constructing a facility at Utah’s Great Salt Lake, which it expects will produce 20,000 tons of battery-grade lithium annually. The company’s “proprietary ion-exchange media (IXM)” employs “holy grail” technology in its “mission to scale global lithium production to support the electric vehicle industry and energy transition.” Lilac’s process is far more efficient than conventional methods, returning processed brine water to the Great Salt Lake.

Lilac Solutions’ innovative technology promises a sweet-smelling answer to the significant environmental problems of traditional extraction of lithium from brine, especially in the Great Salt Lake, shriveled by years of severe drought. Waterleaf Resources plans to pump 80,000 gallons of briny water per minute from the lake, all of which will be recirculated back following lithium extraction. No massive lagoons are required.

Some environmental groups, however, have complained that the company’s planned drawdowns of 20,000 gallons daily of additional fresh groundwater positions Waterleaf ahead of farmers and other local land uses.

The China Connection

Lithium price volatility has revealed the seismic economic forces unleashed by the mass production of EVs. China is constructing coal-fired plants to smelt aluminum for EVs and expanding its rare earth mining operations both domestically and abroad. As America is denounced for past colonization, Beijing is securing massive supply lines that permit it to feed its industries, threatening global hegemony in multiple markets.

The largest traditional lithium producers are China, Chile, Australia, and Argentina, while the largest importers are China, Japan, South Korea, and the United States. The Lilac Solutions technology opens the door for national security protection for the United States rather than continued dependency on overseas markets strangled by China. The precious metals nickel, cobalt, and lithium are all vital inputs for the world’s military complex, including the territorial ambitions of China and Russia.

By subsidizing domestic lithium production, China drove up production and thus inventories. As EV sales slid, the price of lithium plummeted some 80%, a drop so precipitous as to make domestic mining and steel operations in Australia unprofitable. Warned the Australian Strategic Policy Institute: “Far from a hypothetical, Beijing has already used its near-monopolistic global supply-chain control of (rare earth elements) to strategic advantage against the US and Japan.” Jamie Seidel at News.com.au reported:

“Beijing’s willingness to subsidise every step of production and bear the environmental fallout of chemical and energy-intensive processes means it’s now the source of about 80 per cent of the rare earths processed worldwide. That includes 90 per cent of lithium, 70 per cent of gallium, and 70 per cent of germanium.”

China does not hesitate to flex this economic muscle to protect its interests – it imposed export restrictions on Australia when that nation called for an international investigation of the source of the COVID-19 pandemic. Conversely, China’s allies will benefit economically from rare material supply lines. Even as American lithium production firms Albemarle Corporation and Piedmont Lithium are laying off workers, Zimbabwe has attracted more than $1 billion in investment from Chinese mining companies to develop its hard-rock reserves.

Recent surges in EV sales in China point toward the eventual absorption of existing lithium stockpiles. The depressed global market has caused production slowdowns and delayed mining expansion, reducing future lithium supply lines. Such pressures suggest Lilac Solutions and its industry-transforming technology will be smelling like a rose. However, potentially intractable problems of EV battery disposal persist.

Disposal Problems Mount

Discovering innovative methods to harvest precious elements does not abate the daunting environmental disasters of EV manufacturing that include coal-fired plants to smelt aluminum, innumerable chemical inputs for car amenities, and disposal of toxic batteries. A 2020 Institute for Energy Research commentary claimed:

“It is estimated that between 2021 and 2030, about 12.85 million tons of EV lithium ion batteries will go offline worldwide, and over 10 million tons of lithium, cobalt, nickel and manganese will be mined for new batteries.

“Environmentalists expressed unfounded concerns about fracking, but they need to be worried about replacing fossil fuels in the transportation and electric generating sector with electric vehicles and renewable energy where lithium, cobalt and other critical metals are needed to produce these technologies.“

The world has so far “electrified” an estimated 3% of its global vehicle fleet – there is a mountainous amount of mining and manufacturing urgently required to achieve “net-zero.” The manufacturing demand is never-ending, but not costless. Solar panels and EVs have temporary “useful lives,” their obsolescence is inevitable, if not planned. Recycling and disposal of aging solar panels are environmentally nightmarish; EV batteries are worse.

‘Clean Energy Storage’ Is Filthy

Batteries labeled “clean energy storage” are anything but clean. Diverse battery designs and chemical composition combined with strong glues eliminate uniformity in processing. Like stalled recycling efforts of plastics, metals, and glass, there is currently no system to recycle precious metals from most batteries efficiently. Pyrometallurgy burns spent batteries into a slag to extract desired materials. Dissolving batteries in acids is called hydrometallurgy. Neither is cost-competitive with newly minted batteries.

Neither scientists nor politicians have ensured efficient battery recycling on any scale. It may be decades before the world resolves the hurdles – if ever. IXM technology that filters lithium from brine water in the Utah desert does not address the future environmental liability of toxic chemicals from the renewable (“clean”) energy industry. Ion-exchanging ceramic beads may be the Holy Grail for lithium mining, but regressive EVs and their intractable battery disposal problems are not panning out to be as eco-salvific as advertised.

 

John Klar is an Attorney, farmer, and author. Mostly farmer… And Regular Contributor to GraniteGrok and VermontGrok.

The post Night Cap: Novel Lithium Extraction Method Unveiled in Utah appeared first on Granite Grok.