Lithium Laterals is an interactive card deck that reframes lithium as a material, spatial, and geopolitical force of the energy transition. Developed as a critical design and educational tool, it translates global lithium supply chains into cards mapping extraction landscapes, material behaviors, and socio-ecological dynamics. The deck is organized into four categories—Materials, Landforms, Technical Lands, and Processes—each functioning as an analytical lens. Materials cards define substances such as dust, overburden, and waste. Landform cards situate extraction within geological and hydrological systems including salars, calderas, and the abyssal seafloor. Technical Lands map infrastructures such as mines, processing plants, and battery fabrication. Process cards trace relationships like metabolic rift or point towards something more promising like mutualism. Each card pairs rich imagery with definitions and prompts that shift understanding from “clean energy” narratives toward systemic awareness of trade-offs, uneven geographies, and embedded environmental costs. A notched edge system enables physical assembly into 3D structures. Through composition, users generate spatial relationships between concepts, producing meaning through configuration and sequence. Used in college courses, high school workshops, and professional sessions, Lithium Laterals cultivates poetic and critical discussions around land use, systemic change, and the energy transition.