#Tiehm's buckwheat

[rjzimmerman]

U.S. approves massive lithium mine in Nevada, overriding protests. (Washington Post)

Excerpt from this Washington Post story:

The Biden administration Thursday approved a massive lithium and boron mine in southern Nevada, overriding some environmentalists’ protests that it could drive an endangered wildflower to extinction.

The final approval of the Rhyolite Ridge Lithium-Boron Project underscores the tensions between two of President Joe Biden’s top environmental priorities: accelerating the nation’s transition to clean energy and combating a global biodiversity crisis.

Ask your climate questions. With the help of generative Al, we'll try to deliver answers based on our published reporting.

In a final permit issued Thursday afternoon, the Interior Department’s Bureau of Land Management found that the mine would not jeopardize the survival of Tiehm’s buckwheat, a rare, cream-colored wildflower that grows only on lithium- and boron-rich soil in Esmeralda County, Nevada. The agency noted that Australia-based Ioneer, the company behind the project, plans to protect roughly 719 acres designated as critical habitat for the wildflower.

“The Rhyolite Ridge lithium mine project is essential to advancing the clean energy transition and powering the economy of the future,” Laura Daniel-Davis, acting deputy interior secretary, said in a statement. “This project and the process we have undertaken demonstrates that we can pursue responsible critical mineral development here in the United States, while protecting the health of our public lands and resources.”

But Patrick Donnelly, Great Basin director at the Center for Biological Diversity, said the conservation group plans to challenge the final permit in court. The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service cited mining as the greatest threat to Tiehm’s buckwheat’s survival when the agency listed it under the Endangered Species Act in 2022; Donnelly said the suit will argue that the BLM violated the law in allowing the new mining operation to move forward.

[zehub]

Etats-Unis : Le gouvernement fédéral autorise une mine de lithium au Nevada sur les terres d’une fleur unique au monde

Le gouvernement américain a autorisé la construction d’une mine de lithium au Nevada. Cependant, ce projet menace une fleur rare et en danger, le Tiehm’s buckwheat

[hellofromuranus]

In less than half a day, you could walk all the way around the 10 acres the endemic species Tiehm’s buckwheat calls home in the Silver Peak Range of Nevada, where the small wildflower with yellow pom-poms grows in part thanks to the soil beneath it being filled with lithium and boron.

Those two minerals have attracted the attention of Ioneer LLC, a mining company, which if permitted to begin construction would destroy 22 percent of Tiehm’s buckwheat’s critical habit while degrading 100 percent of the flower’s range via dust from construction, the disruption of pollinating insects and the introduction of more invasive plant species to the area, according to a report sent to the Bureau of Land Management by environmental groups and scientists fighting to save the species from the proposed mine. The BLM is overseeing the permitting of the project given its location on public lands owned by the federal government.

[dionysus-complex]

Most days I’m very grateful not to be in STEM (tried it, didn’t work out) but I do occasionally feel like I’m wasting every day that I’m not working on conservation efforts for ultra-rare endangered species that only exist in micro-habitats in the Mojave desert

[fatehbaz]

Buckwheat and lithium mining in high desert of the Great Basin. News from June 2021:

From AP:

An extremely rare wildflower that grows only in Nevada’s high desert where an Australian mining company wants to dig for lithium should be protected under the Endangered Species Act, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service said Thursday [3 June 2021].

The agency outlined its intention to propose listing Tiehm’s buckwheat as a threatened or endangered species as part of its belated, 12-month review of a listing petition conservationists filed in 2019. A federal judge said last month the finding was six months overdue and ordered the agency to render a decision within weeks.

The conclusion announced on Thursday that federal protection is warranted could jeopardize Ioneer Ltd.’s plans to build the mine halfway between Reno and Las Vegas. [...]

Ioneer acknowledges Tiehm’s buckwheat hasn’t been documented anywhere else in the world but insists it can co-exist with the mine. Nevertheless, the looming listing presents the biggest regulatory hurdle to date for what would be only the second large-scale lithium mine operating in the United States.

Under the court order, the service now has until Sept. 30 to submit a formal rule proposing protection of the plant as a threatened or endangered species. A 60-day public comment period will follow. The Center for Biological Diversity first petitioned for federal listing in October 2019 and weeks later filed suit against the U.S. Bureau of Land Management to block construction of the mine at Rhyolite Ridge west of Tonopah in the Silver Peak Range about 20 miles (32 kilometers) east of the California line and 200 miles (322 km) southeast of Reno — where Tesla Motors’ largest lithium battery factory is located. [...]

Ioneer Managing Director Bernard Rowe said Thursday they expected the warranted finding [...]. “We remain confident that the science strongly supports the coexistence of our vital lithium operation and Tiehm’s buckwheat.”

The tiny population of Tiehm’s buckwheat is found on 21 acres (8 hectares) spread across 3 square miles (7.8 square kilometers) at the mine site.

Scientists say the plant plays an integral role in the desert ecosystem by stabilizing soils, dispersing seeds and creating a sort of oasis that provides rare food and moisture for bees and other pollinators.

The service said a 2019 survey estimated the plant’s global population totaled 43,921 — all at the mine site. [...]

The only large-scale lithium mine currently operating in the U.S. is also in Nevada, only about 10 miles (16 kilometers) from where Ioneer proposes its mine. The North Carolina-based Albemarle’s Silver Peak Mine has been in operation since the 1960s. A third lithium mine proposed in north-central Nevada near the Oregon line at the largest known lithium deposit in the U.S. also is facing legal challenges.

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Photos and text from: Scott Sonner. “Federal agency: Nevada flower near mine should be protected.” AP News. 3 June 2021.

[oskarlevant]

Environmentalists say the benefits of Tiehm's buckwheat could be vast, but its full significance is unknown. What's certain, they say, is that guarding Tiehm's buckwheat is important for preserving biodiversity on Earth. The flower is so newly discovered that it hasn't been studied thoroughly, they say. But botanists say they're impressed with Tiehm's buckwheat's ability to thrive where few species can — poor soil that's full of boron and lithium. That lithium in Nevada, and elsewhere in the world, increasingly has the attention of businesses and governments. Ioneer, an Australian mining company, has said it's ready to break ground on a lithium mine later this year on the land where Tiehm's buckwheat grows. Under the barren soils lies 146.5 million metric tons of lithium and boron. The project has been valued at $1.265 billion. The fate of Tiehm's buckwheat highlights the tradeoffs and tough decisions surrounding "green technologies." Businesses that talk of helping the environment may not be above putting a species at risk of extinction. Ioneer argues that from a big-picture perspective, building its lithium mine is good for the environment. It believes the plant can survive being largely relocated, a claim the environmentalists question. The push for lithium stems from the electric vehicle craze that's unfolded in the last year. States such as California and Washington have said they'll phase out gasoline cars. Tesla has become the world's most valuable automaker. Automakers like VW and GM have begun to invest billions to transition to electric cars and trucks. Electric vehicles are a cornerstone of President Biden's infrastructure plan, with a $174 billion investment. Electric vehicles can't happen without lithium — and a lot of it. Lithium is a critical mineral in the batteries that power electric vehicles. The world will need to mine 42 times as much lithium as was mined in 2020 if we will meet the climate goals set by the Paris Agreement Experts say Tiehm's buckwheat can grow nowhere else in the world. Building the mine is likely to trigger extinction, they say.

[freemindtech]

Endangered status proposed for Nevada flower at lithium mine, Auto News, ET Auto

Endangered status proposed for Nevada flower at lithium mine, Auto News, ET Auto

RENO, Nev. – Federal wildlife officials proposed endangered species protections Friday for a desert wildflower known to exist only on a remote Nevada ridge where an Australian company plans a lithium mine. The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service issued a proposed rule to add Tiehm’s buckwheat to the endangered list, subject to 60 days of public comment. “We find that Tiehm’s buckwheat is in danger of…

[rjzimmerman]

Excerpt from this story from Reuters:

The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service said on Thursday it will propose listing the Tiehm's buckwheat flower as an endangered species, dealing a blow to ioneer Ltd's (INR.AX) proposed Rhyolite Ridge lithium mine in Nevada.

The decision reflects the ongoing tension between environmentalists and industry as the United States tries to wean its economy off fossil fuels and go electric. Lithium is a key component of electric vehicle (EV) batteries.

The endangered species designation does not immediately block the project, but could impede permitting and financing efforts. Construction had been slated to start this year, with the mine opening by 2023.

Reuters reported last week that U.S. President Joe Biden plans to look abroad for most supplies of EV metals, part of a strategy designed to placate environmentalists.

"The impact to Tiehm's buckwheat from mining, salvage operations, or both would be permanent and irreversible under the proposed project," the Fish and Wildlife Service said on Thursday.

A cluster of Tiehm's buckwheat - which are found nowhere else on earth - were destroyed last summer by squirrels gnawing roots for water in the arid Nevada desert. That incident, along with the mine's development, would reduce the flower's population by at least 70% and as much as 88%, the agency found. read more

[orbemnews]

Some big risks to investors have been hiding in plain sight For months, it’s been clear that snarled supply chains could hold back the post-pandemic recovery and trigger worrisome inflation. Now, that fear is once again coming to the fore, sparking a global sell-off in tech stocks that looks poised to continue on Tuesday. What’s happening: Nasdaq Composite futures are down sharply in premarket trading. The tech-heavy index tumbled 2.6% on Monday. In Hong Kong, shares of tech giants Baidu and Alibaba dropped 3.5% on Tuesday, while delivery company Meituan’s stock plunged more than 5%. While economists expect price increases to be temporary, investors remain concerned that rising costs could force central banks to hike interest rates sooner than expected, hurting the investment case for high-growth stocks. “The [Federal Reserve] has reiterated its intention to stay behind the curve on inflation,” Jean Boivin, head of the BlackRock Investment Institute, told clients Monday, referring to a new Fed policy that would let inflation temporarily rise above its target. “Yet this has been met with some skepticism in markets, against the backdrop of a powerful economic restart.” It’s clear that Wall Street has been on edge even as stocks have continued to hit record highs, leaving markets vulnerable to any inflation-related triggers. That could come in the form of positive data, for example, that suggests the economy is close to overheating. Investors have been looking for signs of rising prices for months. Still, the pandemic is stretching supply chains in new ways that could apply further upward pressure to prices. See here: A record-breaking wave of Covid-19 infections in India threatens to send shockwaves through several important global industries. Should the crisis deepen, it could affect everything from clothing and pharmaceuticals to financial services and global shipping. So, risks from the pandemic aren’t going away. Then there’s the cyberattack. Security experts have warned for years that ransomware poses major risks to businesses, so it’s hard to describe the attack on the Colonial Pipeline, which delivers nearly half of the diesel and gasoline consumed on the East Coast, as a black swan event. But with the disruption raising the specter of $3-a-gallon gasoline in the United States for the first time since 2014, it’s a reminder that any problems with the supply side of the economy have major resonance at a delicate moment for the recovery. China records its slowest population growth in decades China’s population grew at its slowest rate in decades in the 10 years prior to 2020, according to census data released on Tuesday — a trend that could pose serious issues for the world’s second-largest economy. According to China’s National Bureau of Statistics, the population rose by 5.4% over the past decade — or 72 million people — to 1.4 billion people, my CNN Business colleagues Ben Westcott and Eric Cheung report. The latest data represents an average annual population growth rate of 0.53%. It’s the slowest rate for China since at least the 1960s. Ning Jizhe, the head of the National Bureau of Statistics, said the falling growth rate was a result of couples putting off having children longer and the rising costs of raising a family. Why it matters: The figures raise the prospect of a demographic crisis for the world’s most populous nation, with a falling birth rate and rapidly aging work force threatening to curtail its rapid economic growth. The 2020 census data showed the proportion of the population aged over 65 rose rapidly, from 8.9% in 2010 to 13.5% in 2020. This increase is a “major headwind” for the Chinese economy, said Yong Cai, a professor of sociology at the University of North Carolina. “[But] China is not alone in this.” Big picture: Aging populations are a risk for countries around the world, raising the prospect that higher pension costs will kick in just as economic growth begins to lag. “Because of the aging of our populations, that there will be fewer and fewer persons of working age to support more and more older people,” the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development has written. The race for lithium could wipe out this species Fewer than 40 years after humans discovered Tiehm’s buckwheat, a Nevada plant with yellow flowers, they may drive it to extinction in pursuit of electric vehicles, my CNN Business colleague Matt McFarland reports. Environmentalists say the benefits of Tiehm’s buckwheat could be vast, but its full significance is unknown. They’re impressed with its ability to thrive where few species can — poor soil that’s full of boron and lithium. That lithium, a critical mineral in the batteries that power electric vehicles, increasingly has the attention of businesses and governments ramping up sustainability plans. Ioneer, an Australian mining company, has said it’s ready to break ground on a lithium mine later this year on the land where Tiehm’s buckwheat grows. The project has been valued at $1.3 billion. Step back: The fate of Tiehm’s buckwheat highlights the tradeoffs and tough decisions surrounding green technologies. Businesses that talk of helping the environment may not be above putting a species at risk of extinction. Ioneer argues that from a big-picture perspective, building its lithium mine is good for the environment. It believes the plant can survive being largely relocated, a claim the environmentalists question. Patrick Donnelly, Nevada state director of the Center for Biological Diversity, told CNN Business his group is ready for years of fighting in court to protect Tiehm’s buckwheat. He believes society needs to think more critically about the appropriate sites for lithium mines. “On top of an endangered buckwheat isn’t the right place,” he said. “Biodiversity is what gives us clean air to breath and clean water to drink and it’s what puts food on our plates.” Up next Palantir reports results before US markets open. Lemonade follows after the close. Also today: The latest US Consumer Price Index, a key measure of inflation, posts at 8:30 a.m. ET. Coming tomorrow: Another look at inflation from the Producer Price Index. Source link Orbem News #Big #hiding #investing #investors #Plain #Premarketstocks:Somebigriskstoinvestorshavebeenhidinginplainsight-CNN #Risks #sight

[casorasi]

Old documents fuel latest bid to halt Nevada lithium mine

RENO, Nev. (AP) — Few people had ever heard of Tiehm’s buckwheat when conservationists filed a petition two years ago to list the desert wildflower as an endangered species. Old documents fuel latest bid to halt Nevada lithium mine

[automobilesz]

America's need for rare earths mines to power EVs could create political quandary for Biden

America’s need for rare earths mines to power EVs could create political quandary for Biden

Last September, in the arid hills of northern Nevada, a cluster of flowers found nowhere else on earth died mysteriously overnight. Conservationists were quick to suspect Ioneer Ltd., an Australian firm that wants to mine the lithium that lies beneath the flowers for use in electric-vehicle batteries. One conservation group alleged in a lawsuit that the flowers, known as Tiehm’s buckwheat, were…

[tubepgonoithatvd]

https://noithatviendong.com 0937626295 Nội thất gỗ Viễn Đông https://l.facebook.com/l.php?u=https%3A%2F%2Finhabitat.com%2F17000-tiehms-buckwheat-rare-wildflowers-of-nevada-destroyed%2F&h=AT2j7lPmllQAE6YlMtAO1XWb2-VDJTVG0SulfKlNZdXzny0frovhl8rTchhGC3pxfxELYnPv6f5C8RoO4YaMnzxRbpzJaIi8HENaGUViqD6Xb1x7b7P2uNWvsX9EVg&s=1

[trueconservatives]

have been working to protect Tiehm’s buckwheat from a proposed mine for lithium and boron, elements involved in producing clean energy technology

https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2020/sep/17/nevada-rare-wildflower-tiehms-buckwheat

[fatehbaz]

There is this desert wildflower -- a rare plant, an endemic species -- known to inhabit only about 10 acres of land along the base of the Silver Peak Range at Rhyolite Ridge. The plant is small, short, unimposing. The plant’s home -- within Nevada borders, a bit north of Death Valley, a bit west of Tonopah, and a bit east of the Inyo Mountains and the desert valley below -- sits near the ecological transition zone between the Great Basin ecoregion and the Mojave Desert.

Surveillance cameras, installed in the desert, now monitor the wildflowers.

The plant: Tiehm’s buckwheat (Eriogonum tiehmii). More than half of all of the surviving plants -- more than half of the species -- were killed or damaged in summer 2020.

Amidst ongoing mining surveys in the region, Australian mining company ioneer is seeking a permit to open a lithium mine at Rhyolite Ridge. If their plans are approved, it has been estimated that about 50% to 75% of Tiehm’s buckwheat will be destroyed.

So of course, there is controversy. In that context, the mine developer, politicians, land management agencies, the governor’s office, field ecologists, and environmental groups are all closely watching the creature. And they’re all arguing fiercely over what, exactly, happened in summer 2020 that led to the plant’s death and destruction.

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I’d been following this controversy, but it wasn’t until I read a recent article that I was able to see the comments of multiple biologists brought together in one place. Daniel Rothberg, writing for The Nevada Independent, synthesized a lot of the ongoing controversy and research in an enlightening article from 10 January 2021, where he cites plenty of biologists with, at times, conflicting ideas about what was responsible for the destruction. (Most of the quotes here can be found/verified in that article. Basically, all I’m doing here is summarizing Rothberg’s reporting, so I’d recommend just checking out his article.)

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In 2019, after the Center for Biological Diversity petitioned state and federal agencies to list the plant as endangered, the Australian mining company basically said (here, in Rothberg’s words) “that a mitigation proposal for Tiehm’s buckwheat,” rather than full-blown legal protections, ‘would maintain the species” adequately, with the company apparently preemptively deflecting criticism by “emphasizing the need for more lithium in supply chains for batteries and electric vehicles.”

So, in September 2020, it was announced that thousands of the plants had recently been found dead, with thousands more damaged.

In October 2020, a supervisory biologist (Jim Morefield) with the Nevada Department of Natural Heritage submitted a report stating that “of about 44,000 individuals, one could estimate that 16,000 plants were killed [in summer 2020] and another 11,000 damaged, leaving about 17,000 plants undamaged as of September 17 [2020].”

Some botanists -- working for environmental groups, universities, and land management agencies -- are saying that the “staggering” number of damaged plants and the extremely sudden occurrence of the damage suggest that the plants might’ve been targeted purposely by humans. (A field survey sponsored by the Center for Biological Diversity submitted: “The buckwheats appear to have been dug up by small shovels or spades.”)

Other scientists -- including some working for land management agencies, universities, or otherwise contracted by the lithium mine company -- say that rodents were responsible. This claim (about rodents) raises more questions: If rodents did engage in herbivory (which hadn’t previously seemed to affect this buckwheat species, especially at such scale and pace), then what would’ve driven the rodents to do suddenly harvest buckwheat?

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Settler-colonial land management agencies can’t find a consensus about what happened.

Rodents? The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service visited the site to assess evidence of rodent herbivory on the buckwheat. They claimed that white-tailed antelope ground squirrels might’ve been the most likely responsible vandal.  The study’s lead author, a botanist from the region, acknowledged the tension: “Many biologists wrote into the Fish and Wildlife Service with their opinions that this could not possibly have been caused by rodents [...].”

The Nevada Department of Wildlife also investigated the site and instead reported that, if rodents had indeed been responsible, the damage looks more consistent with foraging behavior of pocket gophers. But even the department’s director also added: “the scale over which the disturbance occurred by far exceeds known home range size for an individual pocket gopher” and also doubted that multiple pocket gophers would simultaneously shift to targeting the buckwheat, especially at such a scale.

Meanwhile, the Nevada Department of Natural Heritage report on the damage estimated that, as summarized by Rothberg’s article: “if 27,000 buckwheat plants were damaged or killed, 900 individual rodents would have had to have consumed one plant per day for the course of a month.”

To be fair, some other ecologists in the region, some cited in Rothberg’s article, do reference how 2020 was the driest year on record for the Great Basin, and these ecologists acknowledge that they’ve seen some evidence of rodents’ herbivory in times of drought. Part of the implication: Anthropogenic climate change and associated sudden drought/heat might drive rodents to rapidly change their habits and target unusual foraging items, like the buckwheat.

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Of course, James Calaway, executive chariman for the mining company ioneer, referencing the USFWS study (the one that name-drops white-tailed antelope ground squirrels as the culprit), said that the study “conclusively shows that the destruction of Tiehm’s buckwheat at Rhyolite Ridge discovered in mid-September was exclusively animal caused.”

“Conclusively.” OK.

Patrick Donnelly, director of the Center for Biological Diversity, speaking about the origin of the destruction, said recently about the source of the destruction (quoted in the Las Vegas Sun): “It does not matter if it was a squirrel or a kangaroo or aliens or James Calaway himself. The plant needs to be listed under the Endangered Species Act. It should have been listed when we discovered the damage."

Ben Grady is president of the Eriogonum Society (Eriogonum being the genus/family name for buckwheat) and a botanist at Ripon College. As quoted in Rothberg’s article: “I study buckwheat, and normally there is not a lot of herbivory on buckwheat.”

Naomi Fraga is the director of conservation at the California Botanic Garden. Working with the Center for Biological Diversity, she visited the buckwheat site to perform an assessment of the damage. As quoted in Rothberg’s article, speaking about the USFWS’s study: “I just don’t think it’s a case-closed.” Fraga, referencing the possibility that rodents were responsible: “It would be extraordinary.” Also Fraga: “That is one of the largest puzzles that is hard to reconcile with a natural event: the targeted nature, how specific it was and that it occurred across a whole range of the species.”

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See photos of the desert wildflower, and read more: Daniel Rothberg. “The curious case of a rare plant’s destruction raises further questions about the extinction crisis, climate change and the role of humans.” The Nevada Independent. 10 January 2021.

Interesting plant, interesting tale.