RENO, Nev. (AP) — A mining company has announced a $168,000 grant to the University of Nevada, Reno to extend a five-year research contract to study a rare desert wildflower that critics say could be harmed by plans to build a lithium mine in Nevada.
ioneer Ltd. recently spent $60,000 on a yearlong study at UNR to grow hundreds of Tiehm's buckwheat seedlings to determine whether it's feasible to transplant them in the wild.
ioneer has spent millions exploring the site 200 miles southeast of Reno. It's one of the world's biggest undeveloped lithium-boron deposits. It's also the only place the plant is known to exist on earth.