Two US federal agencies are blocking full development of a Nevada lithium project being advanced by 3 Proton Lithium Inc., a privately held company with headquarters in British Columbia, Kallanish reports.

The Bureau of Land Management and the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) are withdrawing nearly 23,000 acres in Nevada’s Railroad Valley from new entry and use for 20 years. That is being done to calibrate satellite activity with ground-based light reflection studies, the federal agencies say in a Federal Register notice.

“The purpose of the withdrawal and reservation is to maintain the physical integrity of the surface and subsurface environment to ensure NASA satellite calibration are not invalidated or otherwise adversely affected,” they explain.

About half of the NASA’s acreage withdrawn is within 3PL’s current mining claims. The land withdrawal of the 22,684 acres does not kill the 3PL project but it does increase the difficulty for the company to continue to explore and to fully develop its mining claims, it says.

“We’re surprised and incredibly disappointed in the federal government’s decision to ignore 3PL’s ongoing development in one of the largest lithium resources in the world, right here in the United States,” says ceo Vince Ramirez.

The company says the planned mine and NASA could co-exist, but NASA is unwilling to discuss that option. The company says it plans to proceed with federal permitting and to challenge the decision.

The project covers 36,000 acres in Nye County. The layered salt deposits are 2,000 feet thick and contain an estimated 23 billion barrels of recoverable brine. The company says the Railroad Valley Super-Brine Complex contains over 25 million short tons of recoverable lithium, tripling the US’ supply of lithium. The complex would also produce sodium carbonate, boron, tungsten, molybdenum and rare earths.