@cdarwin@c.imA Russian drone strike damaged part of the Centralized Spent Nuclear Fuel Storage Facilityin the Chornobyl Exclusion Zone overnight on June 7,
Ukraine's state nuclear operator Energoatom reported.
The attack comes amid growing concerns about nuclear safety in Ukraine,
as Russia continues to strike infrastructure tied to the country's energy system and nuclear sector
@memeorandum@universeodon.comAH-64 Apache Crew Rescued By Drone Boat After Going Down Near Strait Of Hormuz (Updated) (The War Zone)
https://www.twz.com/news-features/ah-64-apache-crew-rescued-by-drone-boat-after-going-down-near-strait-of-hormuz
http://www.memeorandum.com/260609/p139#a260609p139
@bibbleco@infosec.exchangeJust did very approximate calculations; with 10g of lithium per drone*, and assuming the Russian and Ukrainian drone efforts consume 5m units a year**, that'd be ~50 tons of lithium deposited into the environment per year, mostly within, let's say, 50km of the grey zone***. It's only about $20,000 / ton****, which means $1m of metal*****.
So to answer my own silly question: no, it won't be economically viable to scalp the top few inches of topsoil and extract the lithiu…
@bibbleco@infosec.exchangeJust did very approximate calculations; with 10g of lithium per drone*, and assuming the Russian and Ukrainian drone efforts consume 5m units a year**, that'd be ~50 tons of lithium deposited into the environment per year, mostly within, let's say, 50km of the grey zone***. It's only about $20,000 / ton****, which means $1m of metal*****.
So to answer my own silly question: no, it won't be economically viable to scalp the top few inches of topsoil and extract the lithium from it.
* Roughly right for quadcopters / small FPV; larger and longer range ones will have more, so this is a bottom bound. (OTOH longer range UAVs will tend to use ICE kerosene rather than batteries
** Changing all the time as both sides try expanding production as fast as they can manage. Ua are scaling much faster at time of writing
*** Handwaving. Contact zone's hardly moved since early 2023; OTOH Ua are pushing range limits on small battery-powered form factor, saw a 60km claim for the Logistics Lockdown operation the other day
**** There was a big spike to the $70-8000 range in 2022; median price is closer to $10k than $20k
***** (IDK the chemistry but presumably it's in an exciting range of different compounds, depending on how many bits the battery was blown into, how hot / pressured the blast wave was a few tens of mm from the boom, what other stuff was in the vicinity that the lithium would combine with, etc etc.
