5 ms·

Digging up millions of tons of earth to get a few pounds of rare earth metals to make batteries in order to charge those batteries using coal -- how environment

by _red 9y ago

Digging up millions of tons of earth to get a few pounds of rare earth metals to make batteries in order to charge those batteries using coal -- how environmentally thoughtful.

rcMgD2BwE72F 9y ago
What kind of rare earth metals exactly? And can you give some indication as to why an EV using electricity generated from coal is worse for the environment than a ICE?
- jacquesm 9y ago
  https://www.greentechmedia.com/articles/read/Is-There-Enough-Lithium-to-Maintain-the-Growth-of-the-Lithium-Ion-Battery-M https://www.greentechmedia.com/articles/read/Is-There-Enough...
  - wongarsu 9y ago
    So in short, if we change half the worldwide vehicle production to electric (with similar batteries as Tesla's current lineup), we have enough lithium deposits on earth for about 20 years (give or take a few). That is a problem to keep in mind, but I am optimistic that before we reach even half that production capacity, the massive amounts of money that will be poured into battery research will produce good alternatives that don't rely on lithium. As production scales up so do R&D budgets, and there is a lot of promising alternatives.
    - greglindahl 9y ago
      Note that if the lithium price rises, we'll have more reserves -- reserves only count if they're economically-extractable at the current price.
      - gcb0 9y ago
        said everyone of oil 100 years ago. Can't wait for our fluvial polution with all those tesla batteries in a dumb, waiting to be recycled after a huge lithium reserve is found and make recycling unattractive. its a lose-lose scenario. Either no new reserves or recycling not economically viable.
        Dylan16807 9y ago
        We can have both. Aluminum is recycling-friendly and also has vast reserves. The more important factor is the difficulty of recycling, and it's possible to overcome that with fees on production/sale that get paid out to recyclers.
  - keenerd 9y ago
    That isn't really a great analysis. It is only counting at the known deposits. When demand increases, price will rise and it will kick off more discovery. (It will also make us use the lithium more efficiently, but that is tangential.) Take a look at this: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abundance_of_elements_in_Earth%27s_crust https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abundance_of_elements_in_Earth... Lithium is #33, estimated at 20 ppm of the crust. We presently mine 64000 tons per year. It is more common that lead, which is #37 and only 14 ppm. Yet we mine 4.8 million tons of lead per year. Now examine boron. #41, 10 ppm and 9.4 million tons per year. Are these unsustainable? Are we on the verge of peak boron and peak lead? Probably not. We have twice as much lithium so we probably aren't going to run out of lithium even if demand increases by a hundred-fold. I am not a geologist, so maybe much of this lithium is more inaccessible than I'm assuming. But thinking that the known deposits are the entire world supply is silly.
mistercow 9y ago
It's actually complicated, and how efficient it ends up being depends on how power is produced where you live: http://shrinkthatfootprint.com/electric-cars-green http://shrinkthatfootprint.com/electric-cars-green
- rgbrenner 9y ago
  a us version of that map: http://www.ucsusa.org/publications/catalyst/winter16-electric-vehicles-just-how-green-are-they http://www.ucsusa.org/publications/catalyst/winter16-electri...

by _red 9y ago

Digging up millions of tons of earth to get a few pounds of rare earth metals to make batteries in order to charge those batteries using coal -- how environmentally thoughtful.

rcMgD2BwE72F 9y ago

What kind of rare earth metals exactly? And can you give some indication as to why an EV using electricity generated from coal is worse for the environment than a ICE?

jacquesm 9y ago
https://www.greentechmedia.com/articles/read/Is-There-Enough-Lithium-to-Maintain-the-Growth-of-the-Lithium-Ion-Battery-M https://www.greentechmedia.com/articles/read/Is-There-Enough...
- wongarsu 9y ago
  So in short, if we change half the worldwide vehicle production to electric (with similar batteries as Tesla's current lineup), we have enough lithium deposits on earth for about 20 years (give or take a few). That is a problem to keep in mind, but I am optimistic that before we reach even half that production capacity, the massive amounts of money that will be poured into battery research will produce good alternatives that don't rely on lithium. As production scales up so do R&D budgets, and there is a lot of promising alternatives.
  - greglindahl 9y ago
    Note that if the lithium price rises, we'll have more reserves -- reserves only count if they're economically-extractable at the current price.
    - gcb0 9y ago
      said everyone of oil 100 years ago. Can't wait for our fluvial polution with all those tesla batteries in a dumb, waiting to be recycled after a huge lithium reserve is found and make recycling unattractive. its a lose-lose scenario. Either no new reserves or recycling not economically viable.
      - Dylan16807 9y ago
        We can have both. Aluminum is recycling-friendly and also has vast reserves. The more important factor is the difficulty of recycling, and it's possible to overcome that with fees on production/sale that get paid out to recyclers.
- keenerd 9y ago
  That isn't really a great analysis. It is only counting at the known deposits. When demand increases, price will rise and it will kick off more discovery. (It will also make us use the lithium more efficiently, but that is tangential.) Take a look at this: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abundance_of_elements_in_Earth%27s_crust https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abundance_of_elements_in_Earth... Lithium is #33, estimated at 20 ppm of the crust. We presently mine 64000 tons per year. It is more common that lead, which is #37 and only 14 ppm. Yet we mine 4.8 million tons of lead per year. Now examine boron. #41, 10 ppm and 9.4 million tons per year. Are these unsustainable? Are we on the verge of peak boron and peak lead? Probably not. We have twice as much lithium so we probably aren't going to run out of lithium even if demand increases by a hundred-fold. I am not a geologist, so maybe much of this lithium is more inaccessible than I'm assuming. But thinking that the known deposits are the entire world supply is silly.

mistercow 9y ago

It's actually complicated, and how efficient it ends up being depends on how power is produced where you live: http://shrinkthatfootprint.com/electric-cars-green http://shrinkthatfootprint.com/electric-cars-green

rgbrenner 9y ago
a us version of that map: http://www.ucsusa.org/publications/catalyst/winter16-electric-vehicles-just-how-green-are-they http://www.ucsusa.org/publications/catalyst/winter16-electri...