I need to credit BelgianBert who posted this in another thread...

I need to credit BelgianBert who posted this in another thread where it didn't get enough attention, but I recommend people watch this in-depth dive into the lithium supply/demand.   It's very good and well sourced.  The key takeaway for me is that there will be a longer-term structural deficit in lithium purely because mines take way too long to get up and running to dynamically tackled supply shortages and too little investment is going into the sector now.  This is contrasted against converters which should be able to handle demand (they can be built in 2-3 years as demand evolves) but these will lack raw materials since mines take on the upper end of 5-10 years from greenfield to output.  There are just too few large, brand-new mines advanced enough to cover the future, especially in the global lithium capital of Australia.  
I'm suspecting a tight market into 2024 without crazy prices is possible, which might scare of further investment into mines, before the big deficit kicks in.  Of course, this assumes demand growth (mainly EV but also in ESS these days) remains at historical levels baring some cataclysm.