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"Context"...mine is much larger than "Lithium" alone. We are faced with compelling, to say the least, challenges...

1) our accessible Fossil Fuels are definitely "Finite" and will not sustain us for another 7 generations...as BP and the EIA have already documented, the world has less than 50 years of proven reserves left...and getting substantially larger amounts from Un-proven reserves is definitely not a given, nor "Economical"...note: the U.S. has only 5 years of Proven reserves left.

2) The 'Climate Change Process' is accepted by every responsible scientist...the only issue is 'How Long' will it take before catastrophic changes are noticeable to all. Given that no sane person would fail to take action before such an outcome, it is wise to get going on remedies now, and one of them is the use of Lithium-Ion batteries.

Fortunately, the estimated quantities of Lithium needed are 'available', some harder to reach than others, but the hope is that in the same way we used ingenuity to develop "Fracking" for oil/gas, we'll do similar things to access sufficient quantities of that mineral.

Personally, I am not an advocate of heavy reliance on Lithium for "Grid Level" energy storage...the example I use is the UK in May/June of 2018...the island suffered 13 straight days of no wind...if they relied solely on Wind Power, at today's cost of Li-Ion battery storage for backup, it would have cost well over $1.2T...,moreover, the batteries only last ~15 years, so that expense would need to be repeated over and over again...assuming 13 days 'becalmed' was the longest period, and not followed shortly by another calm period of any duration...you get the picture.

This is not to say that we give up on Lithium batteries...the amounts we believe are available far exceed that required for cars and trucks...that's good enough for me...

btw, I'll 'Hawk' David JC MacKay's book again...Google "Sustainable Energy...Without the Hot Air"...I know a discerning person like yourself would appreciate it.