Henk van Alphen - Grubstaking and Lithium Mining

Henk van Alphen was born and raised in Holland. After serving in the army, he sought adventure and travelled to Canada where he and his girlfriend took a float plane into the wilderness, built a cabin, hunted and fished, and lived off the land for a year. It took them seven days to walk back into civilization. Henk then went to college in Canada and began to work part time for a mining operation. His wilderness experience was a perfect match for the needs of mining developers who relied on "grubstakers" to trek into the wild, searching for mineral deposits to develop mines.Henk's career in mining began in Canada, and then led him to extensive works in Argentina, Chile, and other South American countries. He was agnostic about what minerals he sought to develop... working with coal, iron ore, gold, silver, copper, zinc, uranium, and ultimately lithium. He discusses the process of developing mine sites... noting his style and business model of working collaboratively with indigenous populations, making them part of the process which ultimately led to longer term successes.The conversation then shifts to lithium mining. Henk discusses where lithium is found - in brine, clay, and pegmatites - and how it is mined. His work involved extracting lithium from brine in "salars" or drying lakes. This was not well received because in arid countries, solar evaporation of the brine wastes precious water... so he and his colleagues have focused on DLE or Direct Lithium Extraction.Ted and Henk discuss the value of lithium, a mineral at the core of the clean energy revolution. Henk is articulate about the role of lithium in electric vehicles, and in laptops and cellphones. He notes China's preeminence in this field. While other battery chemistries are being examined, Henk notes that advances in lithium batteries are extending EV's range, making EVs clear winners in the automotive future. And he posits that lithium will be with us for some time even if other chemistries are promising and may ultimately replace lithium. That will be, he jokes, when he is six feet under!