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Salar de Olaroz, Argentina, 2015

Satellite photograph of a salt flats, which has been cut into massive arc-shaped ponds.

Wikimedia Commons

A lithium mining facility at Salar de Olaroz in Argentina, summer 2015. Extracting lithium requires vast amounts of purified water, and the metal must be refined from concentrated brine left to dry in the sun. This means that lithium mines require huge surface areas to operate, damaging the local environment and contaminating water supplies.