The environmental costs of EV batteries that politicians don't tend to talk about
The environmental costs of EV batteries that politicians don't tend to talk about
Along with the massive recent manufacturing investments in electric vehicle (EV) technology and talks of a greener, decarbonized future, there are some not-so-green problems.
In its latest New Energy Finance report, Bloomberg News predicts there will be some 730 million EVs on the road by 2040. The year before, Bloomberg predicted half of all U.S. vehicle sales would be battery electric by 2030.
In Canada, too, there's talk of a big economic boost with the transition to EVs — including 250,000 jobs and $48 billion a year added to the nation's economy through the creation of a domestic supply chain.
Governments have already invested tens of billions into two EV battery manufacturing plants in southwestern Ontario. However, they come with the environmental dilemma of what to do with the millions of EV batteries when they reach the end of their life.
"The rules are non-existent," said Mark Winfield, a professor at York University in Toronto and co-chair of the school's Sustainable Energy Initiative. "There is nothing as we talk to agencies on both sides of the border, the federal, provincial, state levels.
"In the case of Ontario, the answer was actually that we have no intention of doing anything about this."
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It's funny how governments rush to help private corporations when it comes to veggies, but absolutely DON'T want to spend a penny when it's about public transit infrastructure.
Quebec, for example, just gave over $7 BILLION of our tax dollars to a foreign company for building an EV lithium ion battery manufacture on a piece of land they said was protected wetlands a couple years prior.
Meanwhile, Quebec city is asking for less than half of that to build a much needed electric tramway.
We don't even know if future EVs will still use these kinds of batterie as we have solid sodium or aluminum ion batteries with better performance and range coming soon.
If anyone's worried about the environment, start by banning large pickup trucks for private individuals or big ass SUVs or old diesels.
Is it really accurate to say we spend nothing on transit? Maybe it isn’t as much as you’d want, but there are definitely billions going into Transit funding.
If anything, the government of Quebec is cutting funding for public transportation. Montréal was forced to reduce their employees, reduced bus services, and even talked about reducing metro operation hours to save money due to the cuts.