this post was submitted on 22 Aug 2024
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What EVs will do is save us from an ever-approaching energy crisis, by making an alternative to motor fuel, and reducing global dependence on places like Venezuela and Saudi Arabia for fuel, which limits those nations' ability to suppress their own populations or export fuckery outside their borders.
Yeah but it seems like public transport is always the skeleton at the ocean floor meme in these discussions. Good public transport would make cities more livable and reduce pollution dramatically and reduce our dependence on petrostates.
Sure, it’s not feasible everywhere but at least here in Germany it’s pretty good for regional transport in towns and cities but always feels kinda disregarded and forgotten by politicians.
Public infrastructure. Public transportation, but also bike infrastructure. Not just thrown in as an afterthought, but as the primary concern. As long as people living in cities still think it's somewhat reasonable to own a car we're failing.
We keep saving us from more crises by manufacturing more shit and consuming more resources for „just a stepping stone” solution. Making more shit sacs rich in the process.
Interesting how that works.
Truth is that humanity will have to face degrowth at some point. It could be gradual and planned now or it will be sudden and chaotic in a rather near future. All those EVs we keep pumping out to keep our 1960’s dream of personal transportation afloat consume a lot of materials and resources we could’ve placed elsewhere or just leave fucking untouched.
What do you envision when you say degrowth?
Because for good or bad, I don't see a future anytime soon where personal vehicles are gone. People need to get around to live and in most places public transit isn't up to the task. To my mind best case we get governments to start building more public transit and as those systems get better it creates a virtuous cycle where more and more people can practically make the change.
In the meantime if we switch from gas to electric cars that is a net positive, even though switching to public transit would be much more of a net positive.
Your life in a solarpunk commune. It's July and a sunny day and you're happy. Today you got allocated a four tomatoes as an extra ration. You were looking forward to this moment since you traded 50 g of hard parmesan cheese from a traveling salesman three months ago. Now you finally have the ingredients cook an italian dish for a romantic dinner with one of your polyamorous lovers. You wait for your shared bed to free up once your bunkmate's sleep shift ends. You have enough time to drink your ration of recycled and filtered pisswater. Ah, the taste of degrowth and making the world a better place. Today you feel luxurious and spend some of the water to wash your face and genitals. The soap made from corpse fat stings in your blisters and scabs. The cough that has been bothering your for a while has gotten worse. You cry yourself to sleep in a bed still moist from someone else's sweat.
Sure, we just need to be able to finf an ethically and ecologically responsible source for lithium.
Top 10 largest lithium mines are in Australia, Chile, Argentina and China.
The kicker is CO² emissions for extraction.
Approximately 15 tonnes of CO2 are emitted for every tonne of lithium extracted.
And then the actual production.
Tesla Model 3 holds an 80 kWh lithium-ion battery. CO2 emissions for manufacturing that battery would range between 3120 kg (about 3 tons) and 15,680 kg (about 16 tons). I'm pretty sure this figure includes the extraction emissions.
Is this less than the life cycle emissions for manufacturing fuel and ICE vehicles?
Of course! Does that mean we should just look at that as job done?
No, not in the least. We absolutely have to get clean energy into every step of the process, especially refining.
Yes, far more. ICE vehicles are terrible for the environment all around. They also use toxic materials and mined minerals in their production.