The Environmental Price of Clean Energy Is Still Too High: Report
by Erin Marquis (Jalopnik) Calculating the cost of clean energy is a dirty job, but Ars Technica is here to do it — … This excellent deep dive published by Ars Technica Monday into what it really costs to go green is a stirring reminder that, while they produce less in terms of emissions, clean vehicles aren’t really all that clean.
It all comes down to mining and sourcing the rare metals used in building electric motors and batteries. The U.S. is currently racing to develop its domestic supply of lithium, cobalt and other rare earth metals but the mining of such metals is so dirty, so toxic, that it’s hard to imagine any American wanting it in their backyard as Shel Evergreen explains in their story “Elephant in the room”: Clean energy’s need for unsustainable minerals
“In South America’s Atacama Desert, salt flats are dotted with shallow, turquoise-colored lithium brine pools. In the Democratic Republic of Congo, children chip at the ground for cobalt. In China, toxic chemicals leach neodymium from the earth.
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For example, producing these minerals is generally a more energy-intensive process than with other commodities. Production emissions for 1 metric ton of lithium carbonate, for example, are three times higher than that of steel, the IEA report says. Compounding this issue is that ore quality has been in steady decline for some minerals, which means more energy is needed to produce technology-grade materials. From 2001 to 2017, as the grade of copper ore declined, the electricity needed for refining increased by 32 percent, and fuel usage increased by 130 percent.
While the majority of mineral emissions are related to the rise of battery technology, wind power may also struggle to reduce its upstream impact. A recent study published in the journal Science of the Total Environment found that when green energy production grows by 1 percent, it leads to a 0.90 percent growth in greenhouse gas emissions. According to the study, from 2010-2020, the use of permanent magnets in renewable tech resulted in emissions amounting to 32 billion metric tons of carbon-equivalent emissions.”
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You can (and should) read the whole thing here. READ MORE
Global environmental cost of using rare earth elements in green energy technologies (Science of the Total Environment)
Rising Lithium Prices Could Stop The EV Revolution – Or Could They? (Forbes)
Reconciling With Unsustainable Lithium Mining In Chile (World War Zero; includes VIDEOS)
The green revolution sweeping Sweden (Washington Post)
Home on the range (Politico’s Power Switch)
Excerpt from Washington Post: Shifting a fossil economy to one powered by renewables requires lots of land. If all steel production in the world was to run on wind power-produced hydrogen under Swedish standards, the turbines would have to cover an area at least the size of Italy. Just to supply the two new steel plants in Norrland, six more projects the size of Markbygden have to be built. This is a highly unlikely scenario. For many years, wind power has been the only realistic form of new power generation in Sweden, especially since a 1980 referendum set a moratorium on nuclear power. However, skyrocketing electricity prices and a growing local opinion that wind turbines endanger landscapes and a once-stable electricity system have led to fierce resistance. Lobby organization Svensk Vindenergi says that last year, 78 percent of all plans for new wind farms were stopped, largely because of local protests. READ MORE
Excerpt from Politico’s Power Switch: Solar capacity in Western states is booming, but the large fenced-in installations are disrupting wildlife migration patterns, writes Jason Plautz.
“It’s sort of shocking the level of impact solar facilities have compared to other generation facilities,” said Jon Holst, wildlife and senior energy adviser for the Theodore Roosevelt Conservation Partnership. “You’re talking about complete habitat removal.” Here’s the story READ MORE
