Topic: 'Green Cars' - page 4. (Read 4667 times)
Well, given that electricity can be generated in ways that do not harm the environment (check out LFTR), yes, I think electric cars have a great potential for benefiting the environment, especially if sustainable rare earth minerals mining is more widely used.
What are your views towards electric cars? They are advertised as 'green' due to a much lower consumption of fossil fuels. However, in order to create the batteries for these cars, there has been a massive spike in rare earth mining in more recent years. The processes that yield these rare earth elements are not green at all. They utilize diesel machinery, a plethora of chemical agents for refining, and do it in such a way that it is non-sustainable. Mind you, the majority of REEs come from China as well, where they are even more lax in regards to both protecting the environment and protecting the workers.
I personally believe that the concept of these vehicles is an excellent one, but the current processes taken to create them do not really help the environment at all. Instead the extent of damage to the environment is just shifting hands, from the car owners to the people mining these resources.
Of course, rare earth elements go into many other devices, such as phones, tablets, surgical equipments, but a large amount of demand recently has been due to this notion that green cars are actually green.
Share your thoughts.
I personally believe that the concept of these vehicles is an excellent one, but the current processes taken to create them do not really help the environment at all. Instead the extent of damage to the environment is just shifting hands, from the car owners to the people mining these resources.
Of course, rare earth elements go into many other devices, such as phones, tablets, surgical equipments, but a large amount of demand recently has been due to this notion that green cars are actually green.
Share your thoughts.
Jump to: