Raquel Celina Rodriguez carefully navigates the Vega de Tilopozo in Chile’s Atacama salt flats.
This wetland, once sustained by groundwater springs, now presents a parched landscape, its surface cracked and riddled with holes marking the sites of former pools, Rodriguez explains.
“The Vega used to be entirely green,” she recounts. “The animals were hidden by the tall grass. Now, everything is dry.” She gestures toward a group of llamas grazing nearby.
For generations, her family thrived raising sheep on this land. However, with the onset of climate change and diminishing rainfall, the scarcity of grass has made their traditional livelihood increasingly difficult.
The situation worsened, she says, when “they” began extracting water from the area.
“They” refers to the lithium companies operating in the region. The Atacama Desert’s salt flats hold the world’s largest reserves of lithium, a crucial component in the batteries powering electric vehicles, laptops, and solar energy storage systems.
As the world transitions to renewable energy sources, the demand for lithium has surged exponentially.
Global lithium consumption more than doubled from approximately 95,000 tonnes in 2021 to 205,000 tonnes by 2024, according to the International Energy Agency (IEA).
Projections indicate that demand could exceed 900,000 tonnes by 2040.
The IEA anticipates that the majority of this increase will be driven by the growing adoption of electric vehicle batteries.
However, local communities report that this soaring demand has brought with it a rise in environmental costs.
This raises a critical question: Is the global race to decarbonize inadvertently exacerbating another environmental crisis?
Chile is the second-largest lithium producer worldwide, after Australia. In 2023, the Chilean government unveiled a National Lithium Strategy, aiming to increase production through a combination of partial nationalization and incentives for private investment.
Chile’s Finance Minister has previously stated that this strategy could potentially increase production by up to 70% by 2030, though the Ministry of Mining has clarified that no specific target has been set.
A significant milestone toward this goal is expected to be reached this year.
A planned joint venture between SQM, a private Chilean company, and Codelco, Chile’s state mining company, has recently received regulatory approval for a quota to extract at least 2.5 million metric tons of lithium metal equivalent per year, with plans to boost production until 2060.
The Chilean government has presented these plans as a contribution to the global fight against climate change and a vital source of state revenue.
The predominant method of lithium extraction involves pumping brine from beneath the salt flats into evaporation pools on the surface.
This process consumes vast quantities of water in a region already prone to drought.
Faviola Gonzalez, a biologist from the local indigenous community, works in the Los Flamencos National Reserve, located in the heart of the Atacama Desert. The reserve encompasses extensive salt flats, marshes, lagoons, and is home to approximately 185 bird species. Gonzalez has been monitoring the environmental changes occurring in the area.
“The lagoons are smaller now,” she reports. “We’ve observed a decline in flamingo reproduction rates.”
She explains that lithium mining affects the microorganisms that birds rely on for food, thereby impacting the entire food chain.
Gonzalez points to an area where flamingo chicks hatched this year for the first time in 14 years. She attributes this “small reproductive success” to a slight reduction in water extraction in 2021, but emphasizes that “it’s only a small improvement.”
“There used to be many. Now, only a few,” she laments.
The underground water originating from the Andes Mountains, rich in minerals, is “very old” and replenishes slowly.
“If we extract a large amount of water and only a small amount enters, there’s little to replenish the Salar de Atacama,” she explains.
Damage to flora has also been documented in certain areas. A 2022 report by the US-based National Resources Defense Council revealed that nearly one-third of the native “algarrobo” (or carob) trees on property mined by SQM had begun to die as early as 2013 due to the impacts of mining.
The issue extends beyond Chile. In a report for the National Resources Defense Council in 2022, James J. A. Blair, an assistant professor at California State Polytechnic University, stated that lithium mining is “contributing to conditions of ecological exhaustion” and “may decrease freshwater availability for flora and fauna as well as humans.”
He acknowledged, however, that finding “definitive” evidence on this topic remains challenging.
Environmental damage is often considered an inevitable consequence of mining. “It’s hard to imagine any kind of mining that does not have a negative impact,” says Karen Smith Stegen, a political science professor in Germany who studies the impacts of lithium mining globally.
The crucial factor is whether mining companies take adequate steps to mitigate that damage. “What [mining companies] should have done from the very beginning was to involve these communities,” she emphasizes.
For example, companies could conduct “social impact assessments” before extracting lithium, taking into account the broad impact their activities will have on water resources, wildlife, and communities.
Mining companies now claim to be more receptive to these concerns. Valentín Barrera, Deputy Manager of Sustainability at SQM Lithium, asserts that the firm is working closely with communities to “understand their concerns” and is conducting environmental impact assessments.
He strongly believes that “we need more lithium for the energy transition” both in Chile and globally.
Barrera adds that SQM is piloting new technologies, with the intention of implementing them at their Salar de Atacama plants if successful.
These technologies include direct lithium extraction from brine, eliminating the need for evaporation pools, as well as techniques to capture evaporated water and re-inject it into the land.
“We are conducting several pilot studies to determine which methods work best in order to increase production while reducing current brine extraction by at least 50%,” he states.
He reports that the pilot program in Antofagasta has recovered “more than one million cubic meters” of water. “We are going to begin this transition starting in 2031.”
However, the locals interviewed express skepticism. “We believe the Salar de Atacama is being treated like an experiment,” argues Faviola.
She expresses concern about how the salt flats will “resist” this new technology and the reinjection of water, fearing that the area is being used as a “natural laboratory.”
Sara Plaza, whose family also raised animals in the same community as Raquel, is deeply worried about the changes she has witnessed throughout her life.
She recalls water levels beginning to decline as early as 2005 but states that “the mining companies never stopped extracting.”
Sara becomes emotional when discussing the future.
“The salt flats produce lithium, but one day it will be gone. Mining will end. And what will the people here do? Without water, without agriculture, how will they survive?”
“Perhaps I won’t see it because of my age, but our children, our grandchildren will.”
She believes that mining companies have extracted too much water from an ecosystem already struggling due to climate change.
“It’s very painful,” she says. “The companies give the community a little money, but I’d prefer no money.”
“I’d prefer to live off nature and have water to live.”
Sergio Cubillos is the head of the association for the Peine community, where Sara and Raquel reside.
He says Peine has been forced to modify “our entire drinking water system, electrical system, and water treatment system” due to water shortages.
“There is the issue of climate change, and the lack of rainfall, but the main impact has been caused by extractive mining,” he asserts.
He explains that since the 1980s, companies have extracted millions of cubic meters of water and brine, at a rate of hundreds of liters per second.
“Decisions are made in Santiago, in the capital, very far from here,” he points out.
He believes that if the President is serious about fighting climate change, as he stated during his campaign, he needs to involve “the indigenous people who have existed for millennia in these landscapes.”
Sergio acknowledges that lithium is crucial for transitioning to renewable energy but insists that his community should not become a “bargaining chip” in these developments.
His community has secured some economic benefits and oversight with the companies but remains concerned about plans to increase production.
While he welcomes efforts to develop technologies to reduce the impact on water resources, he emphasizes that “this cannot be done sitting at a desk in Santiago, but rather here in the territory.”
The Chilean government maintains that there has been “ongoing dialogue with indigenous communities” and that they have been consulted regarding the new Codelco-SQM joint venture’s contracts to address concerns related to water issues, new technologies, and contributions to the communities.
The government states that increasing production capacity will be based on incorporating new technologies to minimize environmental and social impact, and that the high “value” of lithium, due to its role in the global energy transition, could provide “opportunities” for the country’s economic development.
Sergio, however, expresses concern about their area being a “pilot project” and warns that if the impact of the new technology is negative, “We will put all our strength into stopping any activity that could lead to Peine being forgotten.”
The Salar de Atacama serves as a case study for a global dilemma: Climate change is causing droughts and weather changes, but one of the world’s proposed solutions is, according to locals, exacerbating the problem.
A common argument from proponents of lithium mining is that even if it causes environmental damage, it generates significant benefits through jobs and revenue.
Daniel Jimenez, from the lithium consultancy iLiMarkets in Santiago, takes this argument further.
He claims that the environmental damage has been exaggerated by communities seeking financial compensation.
“This is about money,” he argues. “Companies have invested heavily in improving roads and schools, but the communities’ claims are ultimately about wanting money.”
Professor Stegen remains unconvinced. “Mining companies always like to say, ‘There will be more jobs, you’re going to get more money’,” she says.
“However, that’s not necessarily what many indigenous communities want. It can actually be disruptive if it changes the structure of their traditional economy [and] it affects their housing costs.”
“The jobs are not the be-all and end-all for what these communities want.”
In Chile, those interviewed did not express a desire for more money, nor did they oppose measures to address climate change. Their central question is why they are being asked to bear the cost.
“I think lithium is perhaps good for the cities,” Raquel says. “But it also harms us. We don’t live the life we used to live here.”
Faviola does not believe that electrification alone offers a comprehensive solution to climate change.
“We all must reduce our emissions,” she emphasizes. “In developed countries like the US and Europe, the energy expenditure of people is much greater than here in South America, among us indigenous people.”
“Who are the electric cars going to be for? Europeans, Americans, not us. Our carbon footprint is much smaller.”
“But it’s our water that’s being taken. Our sacred birds that are disappearing.”
Top image credit: Getty Images
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