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Thacker Pass As with the Salton Sea, lithium extraction in Thacker Pass is complex and multi-dimensional. In the eight interviews conducted with stakeholders, multiple themes emerged. The challenges posed by the Thacker Pass project are all interconnected and cross-cutting. The largest issue confronting the mine site is whether the project should continue or not, with some environmental organizations vehemently opposed to lithium mining. Stakeholders spoke to environmental impacts, environmental review processes, community engagement, economic impacts, and raised questions concerning domestic and global lithium demand. ENVIRONMENTAL IMPACTS Stakeholders from environmental organizations raised issues about the potential impacts to the ecosystem of the McDermitt Caldera. Stakeholders from the County government and the industry conversely felt environmental impacts are properly mitigated. The dynamic between the two groups plays throughout this this section. The main concerns are manifested in land use, plants and wildlife, and specific water concerns that are intertwined with the first two. Land Disturbance One of the first issues the majority of environmental stakeholders discussed was the overall land disturbance that would result from a lithium mine at Thacker Pass. According to environmental groups, the environmental consequences of the mine would last generations, affecting everything in the region including water, soil, the organisms and bacteria deep within the earth, and the plants and wildlife that populate the area. The Reclamation Permit given to Lithium Americas from the Department of Conservation and Natural Resources indicated the total land disturbance is registered at just below 5,600 acres (2020). However, the acreage is likely an underestimate. The acreage pertains to just the project site, with stakeholders indicating that damages encircle a much wider geography. As such, several organizations asserted the land impact from a mine would categorially alter the ecosystem. One stakeholder questioned the ability for land to return to its natural state after mining: “I don't know that mining here is commensurate with healthy landscapes on a site- specific level. And I don't know that once you tear it all apart, that you can actually put it back together again; we're not that smart.” Nonetheless, Humboldt County officials pushed back on this narrative, claiming the impacts were an exaggeration: “resistance to the mine makes it seem like going back to what we used to see in the 1930s and 40s and we're going to be washing away the mountainside and we're going to be polluting streams and groundwater. Nothing could be farther from the truth.” County officials maintained the integrity of Nevada’s mining laws and were to some degree perplexed by the focus on the Thacker Pass lithium mine given other mines developed in Humboldt County, Nevada. Plants and Wildlife Protection According to environmental organizations representing litigation to stop Thacker Pass mining operations, the mine presents a fairly extensive danger to plants and wildlife. Again, while the current project site is listed at 5,600 acres, the impacts of the mine operations could extend beyond the parameters of the mine site, affecting a wider area and a larger number of species. Several environmental organizations commented that the McDermitt Caldera is characteristic of Nevada’s landscapes and is a region full of endemic plants and wildlife. Noted wildlife deemed at-risk include the Kings River pyrg (an endemic freshwater snail), pygmy rabbit, greater sage-grouse, and golden eagle. Losing any of these species would have downstream repercussions, according to one environmental representative. A mine would potentially negate the work done by conservationists to protect species, preventing them from needing to be listed under the Endangered Species Act (ESA). For example, the Kings River pyrg has been listed twice (in 2005 and 2012) in the Nevada Wildlife Action Plan as a “Species of Conservation Priority” (Great Basin and Resource Watch 2019; Nature Reserve 2022). Additionally, the greater-sage grouse has been the subject to one of the largest conservation efforts in U.S. history to prevent listing on the ESA (Kershaw 2015). The © TNC Potential Lithium Extraction in the United States: Environmental, Economic, and Policy Implications 60 AUGUST 2022PDF Image | Potential Lithium Extraction in the United States
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