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This is kind of mind blowing. People think they are “saving the planet” !!
To manufacture each EV battery, you must process 25,000 pounds of brine for the lithium 30,000 pounds of ore for the cobalt 5,000 pounds of ore for the nickel, 25,000 pounds of ore for copper Diging up 500,000 pounds of the earth's crust For just - one - battery.
Just as disgusting as,
How many whales, and other marine animals, have to die in order to create an offshore wind turbine field.
Green energy is anything but.
What kind of math is this? What comprises the unaccounted for 440,000 lbs?
An Instagram post shared an image of large machinery and said it’s "required to move 500,000 pounds of earth in order to get the minerals needed for one single Tesla car battery."
The only way a truck hauling 500,000 pounds of earth would contain minerals for just a single car battery is if the ore’s lithium content was 0.1%. The ores from the hard-rock mine Tesla uses contain up to 2.1% lithium.
It takes less than 10,000 pounds of material to produce 2,000 pounds of spodumene — a mineral filled with lithium aluminum inosilicate. The maximum amount of lithium a Tesla car battery contains is around 165 pounds.
Quick....someone get the ebike guy in this thread....#435? Surely he is the expert on this.
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I apologize, I didn’t get the whole article.
The rest is the overburden to get down to the minerals.
I see. Thanks for the clarification.
Well, I guess you gotta crack a few Earths if you want to make a battery.
Here is a pic of the hole for 1 battery
Just kidding, I took this a few weeks ago flying in to Salt Lake City. This is a few miles southwest of the airport
I don’t have any idea what the are mining, but thought I’d post it as an example
pretty sure thats a new mx track being built
That would be cool.
I find it hilarious no one cares about how much cobalt is required to refine gasoline. Also, cobalt used in gasoline refining isn’t recyclable unlike in electric vehicles. Ironically, over 50% of Teslas made now have zero cobalt in them.
But hey, it sounds good in a meme!!! 🙄
Thats the Bingham Canyon mine. They're mining copper. It's the largest man made excavation in the world.
Tcannon521, Found this online. Not posting as a gotcha or anything similar, just thought it was relevant info. Obviously I was ignorant of this so I did learn something today (damn it!!)
It takes about 1 pound of cobalt to remove the sulfur from 80,000 gallons of petroleum products, like gasoline. 80,000 gallons would power a car for about 2.4 million miles, but 98.8% of that cobalt is recoverable, meaning we permanently lose only a pound of cobalt for every 6.6 million gallons we refine.
LOL, what world do you live in that 30MPG is the net average?
The better calculation is, the world consumes ~100 million barrels each day and each barrel produces 30 gallons (oil and gas) or 3 billion gallons a day. So using your comment above, we consume 37,500 pounds of cobalt each day or 13.7 million pounds a year!
I edited my post while you were posting. The main thing that piqued my interest was the statement the cobalt used in gasoline production was not recyclable, but seems that it is for the most part.
I also was curious about daily use and found the number you posted was pretty accurate (about 100 million barrels a day). I came across a website with a countdown based on current reserves and if it's reasonable then we have about 47 years of crude oil left. Yo me that's the most important reason we should be working on alternative energies.
That’s fair, but the comment you shared is tailored to make it seem like a low amount. The reality is, a lot of gasoline and diesel is refined daily and simple math says the oil industry consumes ~13.7 million pounds of cobalt yearly, which is quite substantial!
Glad to hear I helped you learn something new today!
And I did it again! Maybe I can learn to run this forum machinery some day
I agree that even when considering it can be recycled, that is still a lot of cobalt "lost" every day.
The other part of the question is how many peasant miners have to die to create one EV battery?
Unfortunately, the same amount that dig it out of the ground for any portable electronic device or gasoline vehicle.
If you’re interested in learning about EV’s and their environmental impact, Tesla does an excellent report yearly. Here is their latest one: https://www.tesla.com/ns_videos/2022-tesla-impact-report.pdf
Pit Row
I can just imagine, all the people who bash EVs,
How they would have bashed gas cars when they were first released.
You want me to get rid of my horse! How dare you, I will not drive a huge block of steel to a shop, to put what? Gas into it so I can drive it? Ha, my horse eats my grass for free!
Why would I want to drive myself all the way to another town when I can climb on a steam train and get taken there?
🤣🤣🤣🤣 Ahhh people. 🙄
I found this a good read:
https://blog.greenenergyconsumers.org/blog/cobalt
Also found from the Washington Post:
Demand for cobalt is projected to increase 20-fold by 2040, according to the International Energy Agency.
Bingham Canyon mine, aka Kennecott Copper mine.
They primarily mine copper from this mine, and as a consequence, they also end up with small amounts of silver, gold, molybdenum, platinum, lead, and palladium.
It's the world's largest open pit mine. My older brother was a mining engineer based out of there for about 15 years or so. Been to the bottom, top, and all over that place. The scale in person is insane...
A guy down the street works there, he told me they get enough bi-product (silver and gold, etc.) to cover their operating costs...so all the copper they pull out is pure profit.
Top Gear(the original British version) did an episode several years back comparing a BMW to a Prius and the Prius turned out to be way worse for the environment. Not only the mining of the metals for the battery, but then shipping it via cargo ship all around the world to be refined and produced into batteries. I can’t find the episode, but if you do it’s a good watch.
Thanks, I was too busy (lazy) to research it. I’ve flown into SLC several times and I don’t remember noticing it before this time.
it’s pretty impressive from the air, too.
Do you happen to know how deep it is?
Let's not talk about the invisible fracking. If you haven't been involved...you have no idea.
I just Bing’d it. .74 mi deep.
3900 ft.
The folks working there are also working under very strict mining rules.
There are no barefoot children or pregnant women in that hole.
Well, perhaps a pregnant woman or 2 ....
What does turning everything electric ultimately do ? To track everything you do, this pair's in with digital Id and personal carbon footprint that will dictate when you're allowed to travel and what you can buy when you can buy etc.
Somebody did the same thing recently with Porsche EV.
Time, and energy used looking for a place to charge.
Not being comfortable running down to near empty, like we all do with a ICE.
Heavier vehicle wore tyres down quicker, this leaving more rubber waste per mile, out on the roadways.
Also noted tge extra weight took away from the snappy feel.
Though acceleration was incredible.
All in all, I'll be sticking to my V6, and V8's
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