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00:00Beneath Bolivia's surreal salt flats sits the largest deposit of lithium in the world.
00:06The lightweight metal is known as white gold because it's essential for making rechargeable
00:11batteries that power things like computers, mobile phones and electric cars.
00:16The lithium here in Chile is locked away in underground salt water, or brine.
00:21Billions of gallons are pumped to the surface every year, where it is left to evaporate
00:25and concentrate.
00:27It can take around 18 months for the brine to move through the series of ponds.
00:32The concentrated lithium brine is then processed into lithium carbonate, which is then taken
00:37to another factory near the coast where it is purified into battery grade lithium.
00:43It can take more than a thousand gallons of brine to produce enough lithium for just one
00:47electric car battery.