Lithium has only ever been envisioned as a transitory technology, however. It's the minidisc of materials - we needed more juice than alkaline, we needed more durability than nickel metal hydride, we know we need hydrogen fuel cells or something like it, but they're too expensive now so fuckin' hell let's string together a million cell phone batteries. "but what about the lithiummmmmmmmmmmm" has been the libertarian rallying cry for 20 fuckin' years. "It's all in Chyyyyyyynaahhhhhhhhhhhhh" as if we didn't build an entire Cold War defense program around Russian and South African titanium. A jeweler's adage: 95% of all the gold in the world has been recycled at least once. Copper recycles like a dream; that's why rural Russia is missing power lines. All of these papers are some form of "let's freak out about this one narrow and specific set of externalities because then my entire worldview doesn't look farcical."