No matter who you are, or where you are on life's journey, you are welcome here at University Congregational United Church of Christ. Young, old, sure of your path, or still searching --- we invite you to join us in imagining love and justice - as Jesus did - in acting to change the world.
Our in-person worship service starts at 10 am and includes hymns, prayers, scripture reading and a sermon. It usually lasts about an hour and fifteen minute.. During the 10 am service we also offer live-streaming to a nearby room that offers those with compromised immune systems to be more isolated. We also offer a separate space for children, with supervised play and crafts during the 10 am service. Sections of the 10 am service are programed into the 5 pm digital service, which is offered as a "vespers."
We are an inter-generational church and strive to be family-friendly, with an active ministry for children and youth. All ages are welcome in worship. We also offer nursery and child-care, Younger children begin the 10 am service with us and usually leave after about 15 minutes. Older children have the option of leaving for a special sermon time. Junior high and high school youth meet at 9 am and then often sit together in worship. Give us a call at 206-524-2322 for more specifics or email 
Wheelchair Access: The front entry is wheelchair accessible as are the rest rooms. Please don't hesitate to ask for assistance.
Greenhouse gas emissions will be reduced as we transition to electric vehicles. That’s exciting. But EVs require lithium-ion batteries, and the US alone needs more lithium than is produced worldwide.
Open pit mines in North Carolina provided most of the world’s lithium in the mid-20th century. They shut down in the 1980s as Americans rejected mining as a dirty, unsavory industry. Now Australia has most of the lithium extracted from ‘hard rock’ ore mines. Chile, Bolivia, and Argentina are the leaders for mining lithium-containing salts through evaporating brine from underground resources. These four countries export their lithium to China where it’s refined and processed.
Nevada’s Silver Peak Mine is our only existing source, and its lithium carbonate produced by evaporating salty groundwater is shipped to China for processing, too. Since China is also one of the top countries with lithium resources, it has a near-monopoly on both lithium availability and battery production.
President Biden signed a Defense Production Act determination in March which ensures our lithium and other battery minerals come from US sources. It has bipartisan support just as the Chips & Science Act which Congress adopted will help us be a viable producer of microchips.
Mining startup Piedmont Lithium hopes to re-start open pit, dynamite-blasting mining operations northwest of Charlotte. It’ll require 2.3 million gallons of water daily. The company is still waiting for a state mining permit. It also needs rezoning approval from Gaston County where the commissioners and NIMBY residents are cool to the project.
Another major prospect is Thacker Pass Mine (open pit) in Nevada. It’s being built on an extinct volcano site with the largest known lithium deposit in North America and perhaps the world. Native American tribes, ranchers, and environmental groups say it will desecrate a sacred tribal burial ground, deplete a drought-dried water table, and burn 26,000 gallons of diesel fuel every day. The US Bureau of Land Management has approved the project, however, and the state has issued permits.
Some of the other prospective Nevada mines moving forward are more environmentally friendly; Utah and California prospects are even more so.
Before it dried up 12,000 years ago, Lake Bonneville swept lithium from surrounding rocks and concentrated it in its sediment. Utah’s Great Salt Lake retains many of those remnants. Compass Minerals is piloting a technology which binds chemical compounds to lithium, allowing it to be more easily removed from the brine. Compass already has the infrastructure in place. It also uses wind and solar power (vs. natural gas) for the evaporation processes.
Salton Sea is a shallow, landlocked, and highly saline lake in southern California. Berkshire Hathaway has ten geothermal power plants there which pump 500,000 gallons of brine per minute and generate clean electricity. It has state and federal grants for lithium demonstration projects, and another firm expects to drill into the lakebed and produce lithium, too. The California Energy Commission says Salton Sea has enough lithium to meet all of the US’s projected future demand plus 40% of the world demand.
We’re definitely living in challenging and exciting times.
The Earth is Sacred – Not Ours to Wreck