Tracing lithium's atomic signature could help make ethical batteries

Murugesu is a journalist by the name of jason arunn.

A way of tracing the origin of lithium could help hold battery producers accountable and ensure that they only use ethical sources for the metal.

The majority of the global supply of lithium is used to make batteries for electronic devices. It is not always clear whether the element has been ethicallysourced. Some Indigenous communities in Argentina have objected to the mining of lithium on their land because of accusations of excess freshwater use.

Anne-Marie Desaulty of the French Geological Survey says that it's important to know the origin of the substance. Human-rights violations and water scarcity are major issues.

Desaulty and her colleagues wanted to find out if the atomic signature of lithium could be used to identify its origin. The atoms of the same element have different numbers of neutrons.

The ratio of these isotopes can serve as a kind of signature, as each source oflithium around the world has slightly different ratios.

The team looked at previous studies and found that brine deposits have a different isotopic signature to hard rock. The heavier element is more likely to mix with water.

The researchers weren't able to link lithium in batteries to specific locations as they didn't have accurate reference samples from the mines, but they should be able to do this in the future She wants a reference database with up-to-date data onlithium products.

There is a need to know where our energy comes from and how sustainable it is. Many of these procedures use a lot of energy.

James thinks we can build a database. It wouldn't be a big deal if mines gave out that data.

Nature Communications is published in a journal.

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