There could be enough lithium in an ancient seabed below southwest Arkansas to “meet projected 2030 world demand for lithium in car batteries nine times over,” a United States Geological Survey (USGS)-led study has found.
The study, a collaborative initiative between the USGS and the Arkansas Department of Energy and Environment’s Office of the State Geologist, used a combination of water testing and machine learning to determine that there are between 5 million and 19 million tons of lithium within the Arkla Basin’s Smackover Formation, a seabed of porous, permeable limestone beneath parts of Arkansas, Louisiana, Texas, Alabama, Mississippi, and Florida.