The house is on fire.

[DaveP]

Yes, that is a good article and it makes obvious sense to charge batteries from solar or wind rather than coal fired stations.

Recycling spent batteries will have to be organised on a large scale and this will make jobs in a greener future.  The same goes for LED lighting, these contain Rare Earth elements that mostly come from China which can become a strategic issue very quickly.

In the 1990's I ran the develpment programme in the UK, for the phosphors used in LED lights, for HP at Palo Alto.  Once they had the product and the technology they sold it on  (they said they were an invention company).  So it all ended up in China, which was a mistake imho.  For all his faults, Trump seems to have recognised the folly of giving everything to China.

DaveP

 

[Tubetec]

Again leds have at least the potential to wreak havok long after their usefull life is over , Gallium Arsenide is extremely dangerous stuff , the politicians who ushered in this energy saving idea didnt bother their bollocks checking behind the spin , its the usual disaster in the making scenario . Its all sounding like snake oil or new lamps for old to me , Im not suggesting do nothing , but alot of whats  being offered as 'Green' is very far from it .
The whole led tv/light thing needed China to do it cause insurance already made it virtually impossible to work with those chemicals here .So the thing about this populist movement on the environment is watch out dont get sold a lie .

End of day ,suppose someone uses a drop of petrol in a chainsaw to chop fire wood to heat their home ,if its done in as sustainable manner as possible it probably works out much better for the environment in the longer term than some of the so called 'Green technology ' . I think the incentives offered for these technologies by governments need much more carefull consideration , its almost impossible to disentangle fact from fiction  in relation to wind, wave, solar, ground based heat pump etc 

 

[DaveP]

You make a good point Tubetec.

I was once approached by a company wanting to make  solar panels.  They wanted to coat them with a selenium based compound because it was more efficient.  We always approached these proposals from the other end..........how will you dispose of them at end of their lifetime.  No project can be assumed to be financially viable until the entire lifecycle has been costed out.

They were totally astonished when I refused to make these compounds because they were so toxic.  It is not generally known that hydrogen selenide is 10x more toxic than hydrogen cyanide gas and it would have placed great risks to the staff making the stuff.  This kind of problem exists because the research guys just contact the venture capitalists and none of them have any experience of manufacture.

DaveP

 

[Tubetec]

Wow ,
Interesting story Dave,
Problem is in other parts of the world with different work place standards ,or none at all , they dont give a hoot about human or product  'end of life' scenarios , now developing economies are starting to refuse waste from the west ,were lumped with our own garbage from here on in .

Of course theres many other examples where very bad environmental disasters happened to fulfill a financial or military imperative.

 

[Matador]

Found this.

https://www.weforum.org/agenda/2017/11/battery-batteries-electric-cars-carbon-sustainable-power-energy/

The only way to formulate a fair comparison is to take into account all of the opportunity costs of each technology.  To say an electric vehicle takes 100,000 km to 'catch up' to the production impact of a traditional combustion engine vehicle, means they've priced the greenhouse and pollution contribution(s) of operating the petrol car over its lifetime at zero.

 

[fazer]

The only way to formulate a fair comparison is to take into account all of the opportunity costs of each technology.  To say an electric vehicle takes 100,000 km to 'catch up' to the production impact of a traditional combustion engine vehicle, means they've priced the greenhouse and pollution contribution(s) of operating the petrol car over its lifetime at zero.

Meaning 10 years is not enough?  Just looking at a new set of battery’s to add about every 10 years. Hopefully they take less energy to make with an improvement in production cost/energy use.

 

[cyrano]

About methane:

https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2021/12/211205212436.htm
It seems trees are far more important methane emitters than cows. Now, who's able to find data about the thawing permafrost as an emitter?