Mine games: Photo shows extraction site for copper, not lithium

A recent Facebook post shows two scenes: a deep sand-colored pit dotted with vehicles and structures, and a bucolic pasture with cattle grazing around an oil rig. 

"Lithium for electric cars," reads text on the first image. On the second: "Oil for cars."

But this comparison that looks askance at electric vehicles misses the mark. The first image doesn’t show the site of "lithium for electric cars." 

An April 14 Facebook post sharing the images was flagged as part of Meta’s efforts to combat false news and misinformation on its News Feed. (Read more about our partnership with Meta, which owns Facebook and Instagram.)

A reverse-image search led us to a 2022 YouTube video posted by Montesinos Drone World, the account of aerial videographer Francisco Montesinos. Montesinos didn’t immediately respond to PolitiFact’s questions about the post.

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stated on April 14, 2024 in Facebook posts

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The Facebook post’s image appears about a minute into the video, titled "Bingham (Kennecott) Copper Mine — World’s largest open pit excavation)."

Kennecott Utah Copper, a subsidiary of mine owner Rio Tinto Group, has been mining copper from the Bingham Canyon Mine in Utah since 1903. Kennecott Utah Copper also extracts gold, silver, molybdenum and tellurium. The Salt Lake Tribune reported in 2019 that production of copper and other metals would continue there through at least 2032.

Lithium typically is mined in South America and Australia.

Rio Tinto didn’t respond to PolitiFact’s questions about the Facebook post, but other company and news photos of the mine resemble the image in the post.

We’ve previously fact-checked posts that purport to show lithium mines that are actually copper mines. 

We rate claims the image in this Facebook post shows a lithium mine False.