Critical Minerals and Metals Just Transition Listening Project

Sloan Foundation

PI: J. Mijin Cha, Co-PIs: Dimitris Stevis, Todd Vachon, and Vivian Price

Lithium is the critical mineral that has attracted the greatest attention in contemporary CMM policy debates. As the push to develop a domestic lithium industry grows, there are likely to be impacts on many different stakeholder groups, especially workers that are employed at various sites and facilities situated along this supply chain. Much attention has been placed on how companies will respond to the growing demand for critical minerals, but less focus has been paid to how this transition will impact workers involved in CMM extraction, component manufacturing, and eventual installation.

This place-based, qualitative research proposal looks to fill this gap by undertaking a Critical Minerals and Metals Just Transition Listening Project (CMM JTLP). This CMM JTLP project will examine different phases of the lithium lifecycle by conducting in-depth interviews with workers and community members in at least four different case study sites. These include mining in the Salton Sea/Imperial Valley area of California, lithium battery component manufacturing sites in California and Ohio, and a battery installation site where batteries are being used as back-up power for the grid in California. Central to this research is working closely with representatives from the United Autoworkers union and the Labor Network for Sustainability in California. The main output will be a comprehensive report, along with associated journal articles, blog posts, webinars to disseminate findings, and the development of an interactive visualization tool that will allow the researchers to share data, maps, and other digital content from their research.