USA, California:

Tesla Said to be Eyeing Salton Sea's Lithium (The Desert Sun)

Lithium could be sourced from geothermal power plant partner

A Tesla Motors employee recently visited the Imperial Valley while the automaker considers Southern California as a potential source of lithium for batteries, a board member of the Imperial Irrigation District said Tuesday.

Tesla is looking to secure additional sources of lithium as the Palo Alto-based electric car maker moves forward with plans for its "Gigafactory," the world's biggest plant to produce lithium-ion batteries. And while the location of that factory remains unclear, one potential source of lithium appears to be Simbol Materials, which has a small plant in Calipatria demonstrating a new technology that extracts lithium from the brine used to generate geothermal energy.

Simbol Materials' demonstration plant is located at Energy­Source's Featherstone geothermal plant near the Salton Sea. It extracts lithium and other minerals after the hot brine has been used to generate energy.

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