Innovation has a home in communities across the United States, not just on the tech-heavy coasts. That’s the message the Biden administration wanted to send Monday with the designation of 31 Regional Technology and Innovation Hubs. Reno is on the list.
The Nevada Lithium Batteries and Other EV Material Loop is a project spearheaded by a consortium of more than 50 public and private organizations and higher education institutions led by the University of Nevada, Reno. They aim to build “a self-sustaining and globally competitive full lithium lifecycle ecosystem, spanning extraction, processing, manufacturing and recycling.”
The effort combines workforce and economic development with research and innovation—both part of the president’s “Investing in America Agenda.”
“For too long, economic growth and opportunity has clustered in a few cities on the coasts,” White House officials said. “Tech Hubs awardees were selected to represent the full diversity of America, selected from more than 370 applications spanning 49 states and four territories.”
The Tech Hubs designation was authorized by the CHIPS and Science Act, passed into law in August 2022. It focuses on developing globally competitive industries, like clean energy, critical minerals, semiconductors and artificial intelligence, among others, in high-potential regions.
“The U.S. Economic Development Administration’s decision to designate Nevada as a Tech Hub is confirmation of what we already know—Nevada is a global leader in the research and development of advanced energy and industrial efficiency technology,” said UNR’s Frederick Steinmann, director of the University Center for Economic Development. “This designation is required before applying for a future Tech Hub Phase 2 Grant, which will provide funding for implementation of programs designed to supercharge the technology and its commercialization.”
The phase 2 grant opportunity for designated Tech Hubs opened after Monday’s announcement. Those grants would give awardees anywhere from $40 to $70 million each to implement their projects.
A number of the Loop Tech Hub consortium partners are also working together to advance lithium battery development. That effort in May was awarded a National Science Foundation Engines Development Award.
Karsten Heise, a director at the Nevada Governor’s Office of Economic Development, said the Tech Hub designation and NSF Engines award demonstrates the momentum northern Nevada has built to advance lithium technologies.
“The EDA Tech Hub and NSF Engine reinforce each other and represent the greatest opportunities in a decade for Nevada to build genuine regional innovation ecosystems and, in the words of [U.S. Secretary of Commerce Gina] Raimondo, to become a world-class technology leader resulting in rapid economic growth spurring private investment and job creation,” he said.
Nevada’s lithium mining industry has faced challenges. In northwestern Nevada, Paiute and Shoshone communities have protested at Lithium Nevada’s Thacker Pass mine and sued in federal court to stop the mine’s development. Tribal leaders call the area, about 90 miles northwest of Winnemucca, “Peehee mu’huh” or “rotten moon.” The moon-shaped pass is the site of two massacres of Native Americans, including one by the U.S. Cavalry in 1865.
Conservationists are also concerned that lithium mines are being approved near sites where threatened and potentially endangered species are found. At Esmeralda County’s Rhyolite Ridge, lithium deposits have been found in locations that are also home to rare plants and endangered species, including Thiem’s buckwheat. Areas near Thacker Pass are home to a rare Nevada springsnail, which conservationists want listed as endangered. And, a Canadian lithium company wants to drill exploratory boreholes near Ash Meadows National Wildlife Refuge, home to the endangered Amargosa pupfish.
