Seymour Flops
Diamond Member
Janet Yellen did not "admit," but rather proudly stated that this is indeed the reason for the Team Biden's attacks on the U.S. fossil fuel industry.
The problem with pushing gasoline prices up to force average Americans to buy far more expensive electric cars is that switching to electric cars does not eliminate the use of fossil fuels. There are two reasons why that plan will not work:
First of all, electric cars are produced at enormous costs to the environment and using large amounts of fossil fuels. The reason electric cars are more expensive than gasoline powered cars it the greater amount of energy it takes to produce them. Not to mention the negative impact on the environment of mining the lithium for the huge EV batteries (see bottom of post).
Second, electric cars still use energy. Electricity is energy. Electricity has to be generated to be useful. Perhaps Team Biden envisions every American having an electric car parked under their home windmill or solar panel array. Won't happen in our lifetimes. Electricity for EV's will continue to be generated by diesel and coal fired electric plants, to be sent to the homes of those with EV's in their garages. Even in the distant future if Americans do all have renewable energy at home, again, resources will have to be spent and the environment damaged by producing the equipment to capture that renewable energy.
Someday, perhaps hundreds of years from now, we will move away from fossil fuels, simply because they are finite. Also because alternative technology advances will make wind, solar or perhaps some other form of energy practical. It will be a gradual move driven by those two factors, similar to letting out the clutch and applying the gas. It is not helpful to either jam the gas pedal or pop the clutch. That produces a bumpy start and a likely stall (see bottom of post).
As almost always, the free market would be the best way to determine when we should start making that switch. The idea that industry, left to make its own decisions, would wait until the last drop of oil is out of the ground to start looking at alternative sources is absurd.
Processing of Lithium Ore
The lithium extraction process uses a lot of water—approximately 500,000 gallons per metric ton of lithium. To extract lithium, miners drill a hole in salt flats and pump salty, mineral-rich brine to the surface. After several months the water evaporates, leaving a mixture of manganese, potassium, borax and lithium salts which is then filtered and placed into another evaporation pool. After between 12 and 18 months of this process, the mixture is filtered sufficiently that lithium carbonate can be extracted.
South America’s Lithium Triangle, which covers parts of Argentina, Bolivia and Chile, holds more than half the world’s supply of the metal beneath its salt flats. But it is also one of the driest places on earth. In Chile’s Salar de Atacama, mining activities consumed 65 percent of the region’s water, which is having a large impact on local farmers to the point that some communities have to get water elsewhere.
As in Tibet, there is the potential for toxic chemicals to leak from the evaporation pools into the water supply including hydrochloric acid, which is used in the processing of lithium, and waste products that are filtered out of the brine. In Australia and North America, lithium is mined from rock using chemicals to extract it into a useful form. In Nevada, researchers found impacts on fish as far as 150 miles downstream from a lithium processing operation.
Lithium extraction harms the soil and causes air contamination. In Argentina’s Salar de Hombre Muerto, residents believe that lithium operations contaminated streams used by humans and livestock and for crop irrigation. In Chile, the landscape is marred by mountains of discarded salt and canals filled with contaminated water with an unnatural blue hue. According to Guillermo Gonzalez, a lithium battery expert from the University of Chile, “This isn’t a green solution – it’s not a solution at all.”
www.instituteforenergyresearch.org
As soon as I typed that about clutch and gas, I knew the analogy would be lost on most of those I intend this post for.
The problem with pushing gasoline prices up to force average Americans to buy far more expensive electric cars is that switching to electric cars does not eliminate the use of fossil fuels. There are two reasons why that plan will not work:
First of all, electric cars are produced at enormous costs to the environment and using large amounts of fossil fuels. The reason electric cars are more expensive than gasoline powered cars it the greater amount of energy it takes to produce them. Not to mention the negative impact on the environment of mining the lithium for the huge EV batteries (see bottom of post).
Second, electric cars still use energy. Electricity is energy. Electricity has to be generated to be useful. Perhaps Team Biden envisions every American having an electric car parked under their home windmill or solar panel array. Won't happen in our lifetimes. Electricity for EV's will continue to be generated by diesel and coal fired electric plants, to be sent to the homes of those with EV's in their garages. Even in the distant future if Americans do all have renewable energy at home, again, resources will have to be spent and the environment damaged by producing the equipment to capture that renewable energy.
Someday, perhaps hundreds of years from now, we will move away from fossil fuels, simply because they are finite. Also because alternative technology advances will make wind, solar or perhaps some other form of energy practical. It will be a gradual move driven by those two factors, similar to letting out the clutch and applying the gas. It is not helpful to either jam the gas pedal or pop the clutch. That produces a bumpy start and a likely stall (see bottom of post).
As almost always, the free market would be the best way to determine when we should start making that switch. The idea that industry, left to make its own decisions, would wait until the last drop of oil is out of the ground to start looking at alternative sources is absurd.
Processing of Lithium Ore
The lithium extraction process uses a lot of water—approximately 500,000 gallons per metric ton of lithium. To extract lithium, miners drill a hole in salt flats and pump salty, mineral-rich brine to the surface. After several months the water evaporates, leaving a mixture of manganese, potassium, borax and lithium salts which is then filtered and placed into another evaporation pool. After between 12 and 18 months of this process, the mixture is filtered sufficiently that lithium carbonate can be extracted.
South America’s Lithium Triangle, which covers parts of Argentina, Bolivia and Chile, holds more than half the world’s supply of the metal beneath its salt flats. But it is also one of the driest places on earth. In Chile’s Salar de Atacama, mining activities consumed 65 percent of the region’s water, which is having a large impact on local farmers to the point that some communities have to get water elsewhere.
As in Tibet, there is the potential for toxic chemicals to leak from the evaporation pools into the water supply including hydrochloric acid, which is used in the processing of lithium, and waste products that are filtered out of the brine. In Australia and North America, lithium is mined from rock using chemicals to extract it into a useful form. In Nevada, researchers found impacts on fish as far as 150 miles downstream from a lithium processing operation.
Lithium extraction harms the soil and causes air contamination. In Argentina’s Salar de Hombre Muerto, residents believe that lithium operations contaminated streams used by humans and livestock and for crop irrigation. In Chile, the landscape is marred by mountains of discarded salt and canals filled with contaminated water with an unnatural blue hue. According to Guillermo Gonzalez, a lithium battery expert from the University of Chile, “This isn’t a green solution – it’s not a solution at all.”
The Environmental Impact of Lithium Batteries
During the Obama-Biden administration, hydraulic fracturing was accused of causing a number of environmental problems—faucets on fire, contamination of drinking…
www.instituteforenergyresearch.org
As soon as I typed that about clutch and gas, I knew the analogy would be lost on most of those I intend this post for.
