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MOSS LANDING, Calif. — A major fire burning at one of the world's largest battery storage plants in California is sending up flames of toxic smoke, leading to the evacuation of 1,700 people.

Battery prices are set to fall for a third straight year — though not nearly as much as in the past, due to rising trade tensions and metals prices, according to analysts at BloombergNEF.

Volkswagen Group will spend C$69 million ($48.1 million) on a 9.9% stake in lithium miner Patriot Battery Metals to secure raw materials for electric vehicles.

Europe’s bid to build a homegrown battery industry to break China’s dominance in electric vehicles is failing.

Ascend Elements said it will start to market lithium carbonate, a key component in EV batteries, that it has been able to recycle and refine at its Covington, Ga., facility.

Exxon has signed a preliminary agreement to provide battery metal lithium to an LG Chem plant in the U.S., strengthening the oil major’s role in the domestic critical minerals supply chain.

Ioneer Ltd.’s Rhyolite Ridge Lithium-Boron Project in Nevada has received its federal permit from the Bureau of Land Management, according to a company statement Oct. 24.

Several terminals at the ports of Los Angeles and Long Beach are closed Sept. 27 after a big rig overturned on a vital roadway and the lithium batteries it was carrying caught fire.

The race for lithium, the lifeblood of modern batteries, is on. Spurred by the adoption of electric vehicles, the use of lithium has extended to the trucking industry.

Redwood Materials, started by Tesla co-founder J.B. Straubel, is attempting to create a domestic loop using recycled critical metals for lithium-ion batteries.