Political Cartoon thread

Additional question people ask is the process of making battery for EVs
"The IVL conducted a study in 2017 which revealed that the emissions from the production of lithium-ion batteries was responsible for a large amount of CO2, making the purchase of an electric car practically pointless in an environmental sense. The 2017 study claimed that the production of EV batteries emits around 150 and 200 kg of CO2 per kWh. However, a new study, summarized in a recent press release from IVL, showed the amount of CO2 emissions from battery production has been reduced to between 61 and 106 kg of CO2 equivalent per kWh.

Erik Emilsson, a researcher for the IVL stated that “emissions are lower now is mainly due to the fact that battery factories have been scaled up and are running at full capacity, which makes them more efficient per unit produced. We have also taken into account the possibility of using electricity that is virtually fossil-free in several of the production stages.”"

 

People like Elon Musk need to stop talking about carbon emissions, as it doesn't do any good in pulling people over to their side.

They should be making the argument that:

1. There is a limited amount of supply of carbon energy, and when demand exceeds supply, prices will shoot up dramatically.
2. Russia, China, and others will take advantage if we lose our energy independence which is a national security threat.

First, we should phase out coal, and then we will be left with Nuclear, natural gas, and wind/solar. From there, we see what is most efficient and go with that.

China has a $4000 Electric car that is only for city driving. No reason why we couldn't build that in the U.S.

 

Depends greatly of the type of fossil plant, how it is setup, and I’d argue - how one approaches the argument, but a modern advanced power plant would provident greatly improved environmental economies of scale. Part of the challenge though is the huge variation, even within types of coal plants. We have horrendously high polluting coal plants from the 1920s still in operation, that meet their annual pollution (emission) limits in a matter of days… and incredibly super efficient and environmentally responsible ultra-supercritical coal plants with scrubbers and near 100% ash recycling. It’s even more convoluted though, in that no new (utility scale) coal plants have essentially been built in a generation, which means we have very few with modern environmental controls. Lots of scrubber retrofits though.

 

Toyota has been making the same argument for awhile.

 

I think phasing out coal would be a mistake at this stage.
More electricity is produced from coal than from any other energy source, but burning coal comes with significant costs to humanity and the climate.
Yet, without realistic energy alternatives, many countries will likely rely on coal for years to come.
Thanks to shale gas, which made natural gas cheaper than coal for generating electricity we significantly reduced the reliance on coal, almost by 50%.
Coal is cheap so many dev countries rely on it.
industrial powers benefit from the use of coal. Now EU is struggling to get natural gas so reliance on other sources will increase.

 

"It's a lot like the blood from a spotted owl. Glad to do my part." -- Anderson Cooper

 

Here in Ontario, Canada, pop. 15,500,000 + we haven't used ANY coal for electrical power production since Dec 31, 2014. We were the FIRST North American Government to do away with it. The lights are still on. What does that tell you?

https://www.ontario.ca/page/end-coal#:~:

 

That Ontario has lots of nuclear and hydroelectric power production (though nuclear and even hydroelectric production can have their own environmental downsides).

 

Right - we do. Lots of places in the US don't. Yet. I think a lot of US would like it to stay that way.

Part of the problem - the US coal industry donates a LOT of money to fund US politicians' campaigns. Much more to the Republicans -much less to the Dems. So the politicos give the Coal companies a pass on many things. I remember a Peabody spokesman on TV saying "Donald Trump is a friend to coal." This was early in his Presidency - some bill or other had been passed to help the coal industry. https://www.opensecrets.org/industries/indus?ind=E1210

BTW - I noticed Peabody Coal has been renamed Peabody Energy. Cosmetic. Same old same old.

"We're gonna build a coal-fired (power) plant a week..." George W. Bush
Yep. For a few hundred years at least, it looks like. Nothing I can do. I've said my piece. smh