Along with the massive recent manufacturing investments in electric vehicle (EV) technology and talks of a greener, decarbonized future, there are some not-so-green problems.
In its latest New Energy Finance report, Bloomberg News predicts there will be some 730 million EVs on the road by 2040. The year before, Bloomberg predicted half of all U.S. vehicle sales would be battery electric by 2030.
In Canada, too, there's talk of a big economic boost with the transition to EVs — including 250,000 jobs and $48 billion a year added to the nation's economy through the creation of a domestic supply chain.
Governments have already invested tens of billions into two EV battery manufacturing plants in southwestern Ontario. However, they come with the environmental dilemma of what to do with the millions of EV batteries when they reach the end of their life.
"The rules are non-existent," said Mark Winfield, a professor at York University in Toronto and co-chair of the school's Sustainable Energy Initiative. "There is nothing as we talk to agencies on both sides of the border, the federal, provincial, state levels.
"In the case of Ontario, the answer was actually that we have no intention of doing anything about this."
There is an environmental cost to nearly everything — but the cost for virtually everything related to EVs is significantly less than those of ICE vehicles, especially in a country like Canada where over 80% of our electricity is from hydroelectric sources, and over 90% of it is from non-carbon-emitting sources.
Yes, the batteries (today) need lithium. That’s not likely to be true moving into the future — China is already releasing an 2024 model based on a sulphur battery. However, what many people (and this article) conveniently ignore is that ICE vehicles use rare-earth metals as well. For example, very ICE vehicle uses palladium (one of the rarest metals on earth) for the catalytic converter — a rare earth metal not required in EV production. And Russia produces 40% of the global supply of palladium.
And oil refining uses cobalt as part of the de-sulphuring process. A lot of cobalt. Over its lifetime the average ICE vehicle will use more cobalt than any EV being manufactured today.
EV batteries are recyclable — up to 95% recyclable. But even before disposal is needed, used EV batteries can be repurposed — Nissan in Japan already resells Leaf batteries with >80% capacity as home backup and camping power packs, and elsewhere in the world used EV batteries are finding a new life as solar power generation storage. Sourcing lithium from used EV batteries cells is vastly more economical than mining for new lithium, so we’ll likely hit a steady-state where only minimal mining is required for new EVs. EV battery recycling is somewhat nascent right now as the oldest EVs are barely 12 years old, and many of those are still on the road.
The worries about the environmental cost of EVs is vastly overstated — especially when you set them side-by-side with ICE vehicles. Anyone who unabashedly drives an ICE vehicle but then complains about how polluting EVs are is being completely disingenuous.
Nissan in Japan already resells Leaf batteries with >80% capacity as home backup and camping power packs
A buddy of mine is desperately working with grid-scale green energy companies to integrate second-life batteries into their production, to smooth out demand on the grid.
It’s not an either-or situation; we’ll always need a mix of transit capabilities.
Besides which, transit has many of the same issues, and benefits from the same technologies. We need to remove diesel and gas busses, trams, and trains from the roads as well, often using much the same technologies the anti-EV crowd puts down passenger EVs for.
Everything I stated for why EVs are better for the environment goes for electric driven public transit too.
what to do with the millions of EV batteries when they reach the end of their life.
4 seconds of googling will show you they're recyclable. They go back into the food chain right after "mineral refinement", which they already tout as a risky thing we should source alternatively if we can. It's like oil cowboys can be So Close to a solution and not figure it out.
Recycling lithium batteries is cheaper than mining then refining lithium ore. That's true of most metals, it's less true for glass because the material is so readily available, and plastic recycling is a scam top to bottom.
I want to see a better world and less pollution, but this is a discussion that has to happen. It needs to happen now. The clock is ticking. We are going to start seeing a ton of batteries that we need to somehow dispose of.
EVs are not a climate solution. You still get most of the negatives of ICE cars. However, the development of the technology is still needed. We need better battery tech. We need to figure out how to recharge batteries and how to manage their wastes.
When it comes to transport, the greenest solutions are centralized, as they substantially reduce demand of materials.the problem with centralized transportation, is that until you get it to the point where you have 24/7 coverage with small wait windows, people will still prefer a car. Why wait for a bus, when I can turn the key and go? Bonus, I don't have to deal with people or transfer.
The negatives of ICE cars and EVs are not comparable. EVs are an important solution against climate change, ICE pollutes much more. One lithium battery is not the same as literally 10 years of directly burning oil, the rest of the car takes the same ressources to build in both cases.
Daily reminder that "batteries are the devil and EVs pollute just as much as ICE" is pure oil industry propaganda.
You're missing my point. EVs do provide some value in their immediate offset of Carbon. No question. My point is that on a broader scale, unless we REDUCE OUR DEMAND for individual transportation, and have systems in place that can replace that need, any solution we offer is going to be hugely environmentally detrimental. if 100 people need 100 cars to live, that's still 100 cars we have to produce. If 100 people can get by on 3 busses and 15 EV scooters, we are better off.
EVs only really fix the tail pipe emissions and replace that problem with battery disposal.
Just focusing on EVs still require car centric design which wastes urban space on parking lots, promotes urban sprawl instead of density, creates toxic dust from the tires, requires energy to clear roads of snow (often includes salting the earth), and will wear out roads at a faster rate than ICE cars due to the EVs higher weight.
Yes some people will need EVs and we should develop them for those people, but building walkable cities and reliable public transit would do far more for reducing carbon/energy usage.
It's funny how governments rush to help private corporations when it comes to veggies, but absolutely DON'T want to spend a penny when it's about public transit infrastructure.
Quebec, for example, just gave over $7 BILLION of our tax dollars to a foreign company for building an EV lithium ion battery manufacture on a piece of land they said was protected wetlands a couple years prior.
Meanwhile, Quebec city is asking for less than half of that to build a much needed electric tramway.
We don't even know if future EVs will still use these kinds of batterie as we have solid sodium or aluminum ion batteries with better performance and range coming soon.
If anyone's worried about the environment, start by banning large pickup trucks for private individuals or big ass SUVs or old diesels.
Is it really accurate to say we spend nothing on transit? Maybe it isn’t as much as you’d want, but there are definitely billions going into Transit funding.
If anything, the government of Quebec is cutting funding for public transportation. Montréal was forced to reduce their employees, reduced bus services, and even talked about reducing metro operation hours to save money due to the cuts.
This is something you can google. It's been talked about to death. Even in the worst energy mix countries EVs still beats gas on emissions during the cars lifetime
It's about 95% recyclable (and that is expected to continue improving). It is truely recyclable (it can be done infinitely with no downcycling) and most importantly (unfortunately) is it highly profitable to recycle them.
As the battery components are valuable the recycling is pretty effective. The problem with household recycling is that there is no economic value for most of our waste.
They don't talk about it because until a few years back petrol and diesel were the only options.
Batteries are better than oil hands-down. The impact of any extraction is going to be non zero, until such time our research finds reliable, renewable, and non-polluting source of energy. You think we should stick to oil because the other options are only marginally better?
Along with the massive recent manufacturing investments in electric vehicle (EV) technology and talks of a greener, decarbonized future, there are some not-so-green problems.
In Canada, too, there's talk of a big economic boost with the transition to EVs — including 250,000 jobs and $48 billion a year added to the nation's economy through the creation of a domestic supply chain.
"You would think given the nature of these products and also the scale of the potential looming problem, as you know, when the EV sales move into the tens of millions and every one of those ultimately is going to result in an end-of-life battery.
If the country carries through on its plan to build a home-grown supply chain for the critical minerals needed to make EV batteries, it could mean the development of a vast tract of unspoiled nature in Ontario's north.
For years, Scott has studied the social, environmental and legal implications of bringing development to the Hudson's Bay Lowlands and its effect on the rights and interests of remote Indigenous communities there.
While it's impossible to tell who's right, Scott said governments need buy-in from every First Nation in the Treaty 9 area or any development would be open to litigation — some rarely mentioned at news conferences or funding announcements about the upcoming switch to Canadian-made EV batteries.
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