Comment by audunw
1 year ago
> but often people only think one level deep about these things.
In my experiences the ones who care about zero-carbon and renewable energy have thought very deeply about these things.
> Fossil fuels are often used to generate electricity for batteries
Yeah, but renewables are already cheaper that fossil fuels in most cases. And charging batteries is one of the most flexible loads for a renewable grid. I don't care if I charge my car on monday or friday.
> For example, you may be charging your EV with energy generated by a Coal plant.
This example is just completely irrelevant by now. Coal is dead.
Even then, it's much better to move the pollution away from where people live, and where you have an opportunity to clean the exhaust gases. (if your country cares about those kinds of things). It's also more CO2-efficient, even when not counting future battery recycling.
> If a country heavily consumes goods imported from somewhere like China, they are part of the cause of those greenhouse gases.
Fair point, but in the context of batteries I'm not too worried. Both USA and EU are now pretty damn serious about on-shoring on near-shoring both material production and battery production.
Also, we now have battery recycling at a commercial scale, which is far more energy and resource efficient.
We WILL have a couple of decades where the green transition will be quite resource and carbon intensive. But as the first big waves of EVs and grid energy batteries start to get recycled that resource use will fall off a cliff.
I made no indication that renewables weren't a desirable goal, or that we shouldn't pursue them. I made no arguments against renewables.
Simply stating facts that are often overlooked. Very often policy focuses on the visible wins while ignoring the "shuffling" of externalities.
If a policy passes that lowers emissions in the USA but increases them in China as a result (due to offshoring or other means), you'll only hear about the first part