Lithium enrichment threatens to curb fusion deployment

In this paper, we broaden the current discussion of lithium availability. In the
economic analysis, we compare the cost of capital and lithium enrichment to consumption. We also examine lithium in a wider context to discuss its impact on the fusion value proposition. With energy independence often regarded as a key asset, fusion energy must not depend on monopolized materials, and estimates of lithium availability must account for an increasingly varied geopolitical domain. Likewise, supply chains must be considered wholly when assessing fusion energy’s credentials as a clean and safe source of power—this includes environmental and climate impacts of lithium mining and processing. This also applies to scalability: if the processing of lithium requires scarce substances, then lithium itself must be considered scarce even if its unprocessed reserves are large. In all of these considerations, we distinguish the short-term (is there enough to build a few demonstration-scale device [DEMO] reactors?) from large-scale deployment, which calls for more than a hundred fusion power plants constructed per year. We base our analysis on literature, especially the recent overview papers on the enrichment of lithium