By Walt Hickey Lithium The price of lithium carbonate hit a new record on Friday at 500,500 yuan ($71,315) per ton in China, up more than 1,150 percent from the pandemic-era low in July 2020. The price spikes in lithium, as a critical component of batteries and electric vehicles, may soon present problems in pricing downstream for the electronics and cars that rely on it. Most lithium-ion cells and battery components are made in China, and electricity outages and a coming winter where energy may be in short supply are giving the lithium refiners pause, especially after Sichuan electricity outages in August slammed output in a place that has a fifth of the country’s lithium refinery capacity.
The dead satellite stuff is a problem. I was working at a radio station for Y2K. This thing actually died because of the Y2K issue, and is still up there. http://www.infosatellites.com/satcomc5-satellite-information-norad-13631.html
(I was on the air with CBS Radio on a phone coupler....but things were fine with the network on the replacement bird...)