“The plant learned to grow there and, as far as anyone knew, only there. There were no competitors for that toxic soil. Until, that is, the lithium mine.”
–
Wired staff writer
Gregory Barber, on
Eriogonum tiehmii, or Tiehm’s buckwheat, a wildflower endemic to the lithium deposits of Rhyolite Ridge, Nevada, that the
Ioneer mining company estimates could power 400,000 electric car batteries. The current dispute between miners and conservationists forces a moral equation, writes Barber: “What is the value of the mine versus the value of the plant?”
