The next Powder River Basin type mineral deposit?

Interesting, 60 miles North of the UP mainline in Nevada.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ick3i3w4yOg

The video says that mining, processing, etc., will all be done on-site. That would pretty much keep the railroads out of it.

I read that as well. However, not everything is moving to Nevada. I would presume that something would ship at some point.

  1. New lumber for home development, cement or asphalt for roads, etc.

  2. Whatever the finished end product state of the Lithium is.

Winnemucca is on I-80, already a ton to trucks roll through there, I cant imagine they would commit to the railroad.

I suspect that it will depend a lot on the volume of material leaving the site. If it’s a few truckloads worth a day, there’s no reason to go by rail.

Another factor is the destination(s) and whether rail is a viable link between the two locations.

Then we can get Brightline to serve Burning Man :slight_smile:

Since lithium is a major component of batteries, perhaps Elon Musk will come up with some absurd idea on how to move the stuff.

How many millions of tons of final product are to be moved from the location monthly when thing are fully operational?

Not necessarily… The processed lithium still needs movement to a battery plant… UP or BNSF could build a transload near Winnemucca.

How much tonnage will need to be moved? Enough to justify the required level of capital investment?

I came across this on another site. Maybe UP is thinking about being in the battery loop in some fashion.

UP: Is the EV Battery Supply Chain Ready for the Approaching Demand?

Jeff

Reason I started this thread is I saw Union Pacific do something roughly analogous. The Houston and Texas Central line (ex SP, ex T&NO) that ran from Galveston to the Red River Border City of Dennison. They retained the part South of Dallas and I think it is a switch off their mainline called SP JCT or something to that effect and goes to Houston. They still use that part. North of Dallas to Plano they have short segments in use that they spun off but mostly DART light rail is parallel or on the roadbed. North of Plano to Sherman is owned by DART but no longer in service. They ripped up or just left the track between Plano and McKinney. McKinney North to Sherman they spun off to a shortline. Sherman to Dennison I think the track is still in place but out of service and reclaimed by brush and trees. The Union Pacific uses BNSF trackage rights between Sherman and Dennison or at least runs on those rails for the rock train below. I think former MKT and MP lines, junction in Dennison, which still has it’s large MKT train station (Google).

Anyhoo, the relevant part here is the line from Sherman to Melissa, UP still runs a rock train over to a Cement Plant. I am not sure the frequency but below is a youtube video, someone caught it on video. Also on the line the shortline that has operating rights runs a freight train to and from McKinney (stub end of line) which used to be a long ago former rail junction with KCS and still has some decent frieght business. Pretty confident the cement plant’s whole reason for existence is the booming construction of roads, buildings and houses in North Texas