- [Reporter, woman] The Biden administration is pushing for homegrown lithium production, for national security and green energy.

- Could there be a new California gold rush?

We're talking about lithium, a crucial metal set to be extracted from underneath California's Salton Sea.

- [Manuel] And, it became clear to us that what is happening in the Lithium Valley will not stay in the Lithium Valley.

- [Chris] It's enough lithium to replace all automobiles in the U.S. and still have a hundred million extra batteries left over.

- [Manuel] You've got companies eager for profits and promising good jobs.

- [Reporter, woman] CTR is a lithium production company that has for five months now, been producing lithium.

- [Jim] We expect that we'll probably have 95% of our workforce will be local.

- [Manuel] You've got impoverished and disempowered communities.

- [Luis] We're educating the public and letting them know, don't cave in.

'Cause they're gonna exploit you like they've exploited you the last hundred years.

- [Manuel] You've got government trying to figure out what the guardrails are.

- [Newsom] We see this as one of the greatest economic opportunities of our lifetime.

- [Noemí] Silicon Valley was a way that California changed the world.

I think Lithium Valley is a way for California to be able to change the world again.

- [Daniela] There is not a lot of motivation or hope to believe that change is possible.

- [Ryan] We got a shot to go and fight the champion, and we're gonna take it.

- [Manuel] It all comes together in Imperial Valley.

(light upbeat music) ♪ - [Chris] I am Chris Benner.

I'm a faculty member at the University of California Santa Cruz.

I run something called the Institute for Social Transformation.

- [Manuel] I am Manuel Pastor.

I'm at the University of Southern California.

I run the Equity Research Institute.

- [Chris] We wrote a book which is both about a very specific place and about a global set of issues in our transition to a carbon-free economy.

♪ - [Manuel] Show time.

(audience clapping) - [Manuel, mic] This book was inspired by community-based organizations in the Salton Sea region, saying how do we grapple with this opportunity of lithium?

- [Chris] Part of the question is, is that just gonna be a site of extracting wealth for the benefit of the corporations who have the capital resources to build the extraction technology?

Or, can it actually become a dynamic source for a new type of economy, in what is one of the poorest counties in California?

(light upbeat music) - [Daniela] There's a lot of beauty in Imperial County.

The people are beautiful.

It's a community that has had to be very resilient, so we rely pretty heavily on our networks for survival.

Everyone's been told for the last few decades that if you wanna make it, you need to leave this county.

♪ (office employees speaking Spanish) (they laugh) - [Woman] I need to sort.

- [Man] We need a dump!

(all laughing) - [Daniela] IV Equity was born out of the pandemic in 2020.

And so, it was really two-ish years of very heavy COVID response and recovery work.

But, it was around 2022 where SB 125 and the lithium tax came about that we started to really step into a space to fill some gaps around advocacy to ensure that our community's needs were really at the forefront as it relates to a new industry.

It's a big role to play and it comes at a personal expense.

I don't get to think of myself, but this is a critical year for lithium.

So, I am, in many ways, like, pushing through while trying to little by little chip at the things I need to do for myself to be well.

But, the negotiations on community benefits, I feel like they're gonna happen.

If they're gonna happen at all, they're gonna happen potentially before any of those lithium plants for commercial scale get built.

- [Daniela, mic] It's my pleasure to welcome you today and just a lot of gratitude to everybody that put this together, and hope that you find today to be a meaningful discussion and information.

- [Manuel] I have a voice condition that's called spasmodic dysphonia, spasms around the voice box.

It's treated once a month with Botox, which is why I look so damn good!

(audience laughing) - [Manuel] I'm a working class Latino who grew up in La Puente, a town that's east of East LA, with lots of pollution around me.

So, these kind of issues of communities where there's lots of potential but that potential doesn't get seen, boy, that deeply resonates.

- [Manuel, mic] Instead, if you take the counties of California and you rank them by median household income, Imperial County is almost dead last.

- [Audience] Oh, my goodness.

- [Manuel] The county that's way at the top is the other valley, Silicon Valley.

Will Lithium Valley be able to catch up to Silicon Valley?

- [Ryan] My name is Ryan Kelley.

I'm Imperial County supervisor.

I represent District Four, the northwest corner of Imperial County.

Our economy is based off of the agribusiness and the availability of the commodities that we produce, but the largest employer is public service, either federal, state, local, or special district.

We have the highest unemployment in California, sometimes in the nation.

We do not have industry of any significance here.

We need to add new elements into our economy.

- [Jim] My name is Jim Turner and I'm the president of Controlled Thermal Resources, which we commonly refer to as CTR.

These first five plants, the product will be a compound called lithium hydroxide monohydrate, and it looks like a dry crystalline-type salt at the end.

And, we'll bag that.

It'll be very high purity; it'll be battery grade.

The National Renewable Energy Lab did a study and I think they estimated close to 600,000 metric tons of lithium product that could come out of this area on an annual basis.

Way back, 1950s, folks were starting to develop cities around the Salton Sea.

It was supposed to be the next big mecca past Palm Springs, but it didn't last by the 19-?

Or, probably around 1960 or early '60s.

Basically those plans evaporated.

I'm gonna be 75 this year.

This is the neatest project, all the years I've been out here, that I've been a part of.

Right now we have 110,000 metric tons a year of lithium hydroxide under contract.

We gotta deliver.

Alright?

These guys want it...now.

- [Manuel] Here in the Lithium Valley, you've got an element, lithium, which is absolutely critical to the evolution of electric vehicles and the passage to clean energy, 'cause lithium can also be stored, used for storing energy, which allows us to go more reliably to solar and wind.

- [Chris] So, the most dominant way we get lithium in the world today is from mines.

It's stored in hard rock.

The other major way we get it at the moment, which is predominantly in Chile and Argentina, is from large evaporation ponds where you have brine that's very heavy with all sorts of salt; sodium, potassium, as well as lithium.

And then, over the period of 12 to 18 months, you evaporate the water, which is again a tremendous waste of the water, to concentrate the brine, so then it makes it easier to extract the lithium.

In Imperial County, the lithium is contained in geothermal brine.

- [Jim] The brine down there in the reservoir is 600 to 700 degrees Fahrenheit.

It's hot!

And so, in order to be able to effectively extract the lithium, we need to cool that brine a little bit.

And, one of the most effective ways to cool the brine is to produce electricity.

You take the steam out.

You can put the steam through a turbine, turn a generator, make electricity.

That's good.

But, every time you take steam out, the result-- the leftover liquid is a little bit cooler.

We will use that renewable electricity to operate our lithium production, and because we've designed ours with only using the first flash of steam to produce the electricity, we still have steam leftover that we can use as a heat source on the lithium production for evaporating water and doing different operations that require heat.

So, our lithium product, at the end of the day, is produced with a hundred percent renewable energy.

- [Manuel] So, there's a lot of environmental enthusiasm.

Obviously companies, cha-ching, are seeing dollar bills.

They are very excited about this.

But, all of this is occurring in a place that's been an environmental disaster zone because of the shrinkage of the Salton Sea.

The way that that's exposing what's called playa, the sand on the shore of the sea, that's kicking up dust, causing asthma rates that are at least twice the national average.

It's a place of a tremendous racial disparity.

If you take a look at who is close to poverty and far from power, that's the overwhelmingly Latino community.

- [Chris] There's actually a very realistic scenario that none of the lithium comes out commercially.

It's never been developed at this scale with geothermal brine.

The other end of the spectrum and some of the companies that are at the forefront of leading the lithium extraction, they have this vision of having a battery manufacturing facility co-located with the lithium extraction.

And, that allows you to avoid some of the environmental costs of shipping lithium across the ocean to China.

- [Jim] If we can get a battery manufacturer to put their CAM facility right here, [Cathode Active Materials] their number of jobs goes into the thousands, 3,000 to 4,000 jobs per facility.

And, my guess is those people will live right here.

- [Ryan] It's all doing from step A to step D, exactly what you can do in one location.

And then, hopefully you could get automobile manufacturing.

I'm not gonna reach for the stars.

I'm gonna feign my arm in that direction.

- [Wallace] I came here in 1969.

I started working in the fields when I was 12 and that's basically what it was gonna be here in Imperial Valley.

You was gonna work in the fields and the government didn't care as long as you was loading lettuce, and helping feed the country.

They cared nothing about us.

They never did.

- [Corban] I'm in high hopes that the lithium takes this into consideration and be the forefront, the forefathers of bringing in this higher paying job.

So, that we are able to open up eyes and cause the rest of the industry and other people around to actually higher their wages in order for us to have better living.

Not just ourselves, but everybody around us.

- [Wallace] My kids didn't stay.

They left.

You know, 'cause there was no opportunity.

It was minimal.

Minimal opportunity.

- [Corban] My thing is this is.

If we were to live in San Diego on the wages that we're making right now, we would not make it.

- [Wallace] I'm hopeful, but that thing of all the time that we've been on the receiving end, you know, it is still there, too.

I'm just hoping that they could come around the table and everybody be honest.

- [Daniela] We have seen with a reality or the outcome of the solar industry, which was pretty much close to no community benefits.

- [Woman, mic] How do these communities become investment ready?

And, there is urgency because the Salton Sea region is on the cusp of significant changes.

And, I'm not just talking about the lithium industry.

- [Woman 2] All eyes are certainly on this region right now because of lithium.

But, I wanted to just start out by saying, this region has experienced decades of extraction, frankly, a lack of engagement from the state and philanthropy.

- This is our opportunity too, as state leaders to direct more investment here to help ensure that we're being creative about solutions that can work here, and that we're collaborating and partnering with the locals.

- [Luis, mic] Welcome to the beautiful Imperial Valley.

We are where the sun spends the winter.

The sun reminds us that, hey, don't get too comfortable because I'm still here!

My name is Jose Luis Olmedo Velez, and I'm the executive director of Comite Civico del Valle.

Been here for a little over 25 years, organization founded by my father over 35 years ago.

- [Luis, mic] They're not just advocates for the sake of being advocates.

They're trying to make sure that we don't create more landfills with toxic (indistinct).

- [Luis] The minerals are in public lands.

They belong to our public utility.

So, essentially they belong to the people.

Right?

Everybody who's in this district, who lives in this district is a shareholder of those minerals.

We're a hundred percent in support of this transitional mineral.

We want to transition into electric vehicles.

We wanna be able to create battery storage.

We wanna be able to create consumer products to move away from dirty energy and fossil fuel.

We just wanna make sure that we're laying out the facts on the table and that there aren't decisions being made that ignore those facts because somebody somewhere is profiting off that exploitation.

- [Ryan] We're not leaving anything out there.

Everything is completely on the table.

And, those that would be expressing reservations, we're part of that conversation.

And, the reason that we went in this fashion was to give business a surety that they would be able to go forward and that the community would know that they were also going to be a direct benefit.

- [Daniela] Supervisor Kelley tells us that we just need to be like, we need to not kill this industry and we just need to be grateful if it even happens, because it'll bring jobs and that all the other things are not productive towards this conversation.

I'm oversimplifying, of course, but that's how we've been made to feel with the comments that they share when we raise concerns.

- [Chris, mic] We know you're hearing a lot about lithium and the opportunities of lithium and there are people that are very excited because we'd love to see a shift to an economy that's not dependent on fossil fuel and destroying our planet, but that's rooted in renewable energy.

But, at the same time, we wanna make sure that that renewable energy and renewable transportation systems doesn't come on the back of sacrifice zones.

(car tires whining) - [Jacob] So, we're out here at the shore of the Salton Sea, pretty close to it.

And, not too far away from here, less than five minutes is the plant site of the Elmore North, currently the Elmore site and not too far away from those are also the other sites that BHE is considering building up.

- [Héctor] There's still a lot of uncertainty around how that process and-- What else is it that's making it into the water table?

And, how is it that, like, the water table sort of interacting with, like, the Salton Sea and its sea level, as well?

- [Jacob] 'Cause, it's not only human life that's impacted.

There's also, this is, you know, also a very active ecological area.

There's birds that rely on this ecosystem.

It's kind of, "Just trust us.

Trust that all will be well."

And, unfortunately, like the community, this community doesn't have the luxury of taking that gamble again.

I would wanna flag Bombay, Calipat and Niland, and all the other unincorporated communities immediately around it.

- [Guide, mic] We'll be heading over to Niland for a walking tour, so you better have put on your walking shoes today!

- [Guide 2] We used to grow tomatoes here, but when the exploitation happened with México, a lot of these small time farmers lost their jobs, lost their businesses.

We didn't have the support to bring in other options, so people started leaving.

So, you'll see that Niland has a lot of abandoned homes.

Almost seven years ago, it was about close to 3,000 people.

Right now, we're at 400.

Lack of infrastructure, lack of housing, lack of assistance.

We're dedicating this day today to hopefully change your minds and see how much we need your help.

- [Manuel] There's a lot of hurt.

And, that leads to challenges about how to be effective without being permanently angry.

How to strategize when there's very few resources that allow you to figure out what the right strategies are, particularly when you're dealing with some of the biggest companies in the world, including eventually Berkshire Hathaway, which owns 10 geothermal plants here and could be a very, very important actor.

- [Luis] What you're selling me is that I'm investing water, I'm investing air, I'm investing land, I'm investing minerals and our tax dollars to make it easy for you, right?

And, our system that continues to roll over to remove regulation.

So, we're giving you all this investment and then you come back to me with a big smile saying, "We got hours of work for you."

You know?

So, I'll be honest, it is insulting.

- [Chris] Well?

Going back to 1900, 40% of all vehicles on the road at that time were electric vehicles.

People thought electric vehicles were the future!

But, in southeast Texas, oil was discovered in a place called Spindletop, and that set the stage for now, 125 years later, our fossil fuel driven industry.

- [Jim] If you look at oil and how it got started, you know, somebody went out there and took a risk, right?

And, it worked out pretty good.

So, we feel like we're in the same kind of situation.

We've made that, that analogy a few times already that, hey, we're like oil was 120, 130 years ago.

So, Mr. Investor, here's your chance!

That's kind of the pitch.

- [Manuel] From what seemed like something very small came an entire landscape of opportunity, but also segregation and exclusion in fenceline communities that were near the refineries, but far from the good jobs that were being generated.

When oil first began to be extracted in the United States at a significant commercial scale, in Texas and eventually in Oklahoma as well, people were not fully cognizant of what the transformations were that were gonna take place.

That the cheapness and ubiquity of oil would lower gasoline cost so much that internal combustion engines, nice vehicles, would become the norm; that Henry Ford would step in and perfect mass manufacturing; that the cheapness of oil and the way in which cars became the default would lead to suburban sprawl and the remaking of the urban landscape.

What you do at the beginning sets the terms for what's gonna come after.

- [Ryan] You know how many times the doors just got shut in my face in the past 12 years to talk about this stuff?

The doors are open wide now.

- [Jim] If we don't move fast enough, these same car companies will source the material for their next 10 or 15 years from China, South Korea, Japan, wherever.

But, it'll be overseas, because they're building EVs.

- [Luis] "Buy it right now 'cause, you know, this is, right now you got the deal."

"You know?

"If you come back an hour later, that deal won't be at the table anymore."

Classic car salesman tactics.

Alright?

We're smarter than that.

A hundred years of education, of being exploited.

Yeah, we're not easily fooled anymore.

- [Daniela] Because there's so much need and there's such scarcity and our community has been forced to be thinking in a scarcity mindset, many organizations have been given checks directly by industry.

They'll buy the backpacks for the back-to-school drive.

They'll buy the shoes; they'll buy little things here and there.

But, what I'm saying to these leaders in this organizations, I'm like, don't take the bait.

And if you take the bait, I won't judge, but expect more and hold them accountable towards the community benefits agreements.

- [Manuel] This is a community that has seen broken promise after broken promise; that agriculture would deliver a boom, not just for the owners, but for the workers.

Broken promise that solar energy would generate lots of employment.

It generated just a little bit of employment installing the panels, but there's not much there in terms of permanent employment.

And, also a set of promises from state officials that people would pay attention to this region.

And now, people are paying attention because there's lithium, not because of the people.

So, from the point of view of communities, there's a lot of scars.

- [Chris] What I think might be different in this case is it's in California, which has had a long history of leading the country in environmental regulations, pushing for electric vehicles, and trying to do production in a more environmentally friendly way.

It's also a state where there have been community and labor leaders in social movements who are now in positions of authority and power in the state legislature, and state official positions.

So, I think that's a sign of progress.

- [Jim] California is gonna be a winner big time.

Just a tremendous boon for Imperial County, but then the ripple effect as it goes through California with materials coming in, materials going out; that's the transportation industry.

- [Luis, mic] We're here to make sure if the next best thing isn't the next best thing, then we'll make sure the next 20 things can also utilize and recycle that infrastructure.

- [Daniela] This is an opportunity for government officials and industry to realize that the community concerns are just as important as their tax breaks that they get from the government, as their plants being grown to scale, as their construction to begin as soon as they need it to be.

- [Ryan] If this doesn't materialize, we still have every bad outcome that we've already got today.

If we do, do this then we have the chance to be able to offer something different for the next generation.

- [Manuel] We're gonna mess this up, but we've got more of a chance of getting it closer to right from the get-go.

(hopeful uplifting music) ♪ - [Corban] By hoping and bringing in opportunities for my children that come up, maybe they'll have that option to actually stay instead of having no option but to leave.

♪ (car tires whining) (whining sound fades)