newsletter. Enter your email below to receive more stories like these right to your inbox.Snider said mineral extraction companies have known lithium “was off the table” without a royalty agreement since at least last year. He added that years-old existing leases didn’t contemplate using a material like lithium at the scale Compass has asserted, especially with the lake dropping to dangerously low levels.
House Majority Leader Mike Schultz, R-Hooper, presents a bill during the General Session earlier this year, Jan. 31, 2023. “The damage ... current operations are doing to the lake,” Schultz said, “is something many of us are just starting to wrap our heads around.” “Under current statute and current law,” Schultz said, “they have the right to deplete and use that water until it’s the last drop left in the lake.”
“The amount of brine we’d be extracting,” said Chris Yandell, the company’s head of lithium, “is the same amount of brine in our water rights today.”