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The author seemed to assume there is no ecological costs to extracting, processing, and shipping massive amounts of rare earth around the oceans, and, as you po

The author seemed to assume there is no ecological costs to extracting, processing, and shipping massive amounts of rare earth around the oceans, and, as you point out, that they never suffer mishaps

piannucci 4y ago
> ...massive amounts... The entire world production of neodymium was on the order of 80k ton/yr the last I checked (though that was quite a few years ago).
- fancy_hammer 4y ago
  How many tons of earth need to be processed to end up with 80k tons of neodymium?
thematrixturtle 4y ago
There are massive ecological costs to extracting, processing and shipping even more massive quantities of dinosaur juice around the oceans, and they suffer "mishaps" quite frequently.
dymk 4y ago
Frankly, we're in much deeper shit if we continue to add carbon to the carbon cycle, and while strip mining the earth for precious metals isn't ideal, we don't have many other choices. Still waiting on at-scale biofuels.
ZeroGravitas 4y ago
Electrification reduces the amount of mining and extraction and transport so if that's your focus you should be excited for this. The key difference being that once you extract it, you can first re-use it for decades, then recycle it. Whereas with fossil fuels you need to continually dig up more to replace the ones you burned and vented into the atmosphere then ship it to where it is used. https://www.transportenvironment.org/discover/electric-car-batteries-need-far-less-raw-materials-fossil-fuel-cars-study/ https://www.transportenvironment.org/discover/electric-car-b...
qw 4y ago
Moat of the discussion is based on storing enough power to last the whole journey. What about providing floating supply stations where they could charge or exchange batteries?
- alfor 4y ago
  The ocean is a harsh and very variable place. I have see a video of a ship refueling while underway with a tanker, you could do something similar but you need a way to recharge the electric tanker.
alfor 4y ago
Those materials are not consumable that’s what make the most difference. For sure, there is some pollution involved in extraction of the elements, but you do it once. Contrast that with oil where you burn it and it’s done, you start over. Electrification start with cars, then planes, then ships unless there is major breakthrough that reduce the cost of batteries.

The author seemed to assume there is no ecological costs to extracting, processing, and shipping massive amounts of rare earth around the oceans, and, as you point out, that they never suffer mishaps

piannucci 4y ago

> ...massive amounts... The entire world production of neodymium was on the order of 80k ton/yr the last I checked (though that was quite a few years ago).

fancy_hammer 4y ago
How many tons of earth need to be processed to end up with 80k tons of neodymium?

thematrixturtle 4y ago

There are massive ecological costs to extracting, processing and shipping even more massive quantities of dinosaur juice around the oceans, and they suffer "mishaps" quite frequently.

dymk 4y ago

Frankly, we're in much deeper shit if we continue to add carbon to the carbon cycle, and while strip mining the earth for precious metals isn't ideal, we don't have many other choices. Still waiting on at-scale biofuels.

ZeroGravitas 4y ago

Electrification reduces the amount of mining and extraction and transport so if that's your focus you should be excited for this. The key difference being that once you extract it, you can first re-use it for decades, then recycle it. Whereas with fossil fuels you need to continually dig up more to replace the ones you burned and vented into the atmosphere then ship it to where it is used. https://www.transportenvironment.org/discover/electric-car-batteries-need-far-less-raw-materials-fossil-fuel-cars-study/ https://www.transportenvironment.org/discover/electric-car-b...

qw 4y ago

Moat of the discussion is based on storing enough power to last the whole journey. What about providing floating supply stations where they could charge or exchange batteries?

alfor 4y ago
The ocean is a harsh and very variable place. I have see a video of a ship refueling while underway with a tanker, you could do something similar but you need a way to recharge the electric tanker.

alfor 4y ago

Those materials are not consumable that’s what make the most difference. For sure, there is some pollution involved in extraction of the elements, but you do it once. Contrast that with oil where you burn it and it’s done, you start over. Electrification start with cars, then planes, then ships unless there is major breakthrough that reduce the cost of batteries.