Facebook Follies of Friends and Families

[grumbler]

Its an impossible dream which distracts from the actual needed changes of reducing our reliance on cars overall.

Why is it impossible?

Forget it, he's rolling.

[HVC]

Its an impossible dream which distracts from the actual needed changes of reducing our reliance on cars overall.

Why is it impossible?

Forget it, he's rolling.

But only on a bicycle, because cars are evil

[Razgovory]

Has nobody else figured out the truth about Tyr? Am I  the only one? He's a Centaur.  That's why he hates cars.  He can never drive one.  Jesus, it's fucking obvious.

[Josquius]

I hate cars because I've got a brain and I give a shit about the world.

Its an impossible dream which distracts from the actual needed changes of reducing our reliance on cars overall.

Why is it impossible?

If you're being captain literal then impossible is the wrong word of course. More impractical.
But basically the problem is material shortages. We would need to ramp up mining of key materials to an insane degree which just isn't going to happen, especially in the time scales needed.

To replace all cars in just the UK for example -

There are currently 31.5 million cars on the UK roads, covering 252.5 billion miles per year.

If we wanted to replace all these with electric vehicles today (assuming they use the most resource-frugal next-generation batteries), it would take the following:

207,900 tonnes of cobalt - just under twice the annual global production
264,600 tonnes of lithium carbonate (LCE) - three quarters the world's production
at least 7,200 tonnes of neodymium and dysprosium - nearly the entire world production of neodymium
2,362,500 tonnes of copper - more than half the world's production in 2018
Even if we only wanted to ensure an annual supply of electric vehicles, from 2035 as pledged, the UK would need to annually import the equivalent of the entire annual cobalt needs of European industry

https://www.nhm.ac.uk/discover/news/2019/june/we-need-more-metals-and-elements-reach-uks-greenhouse-goals.html

[The Brain]

Has nobody else figured out the truth about Tyr? Am I  the only one? He's a Centaur.  That's why he hates cars.  He can never drive one.  Jesus, it's fucking obvious.

He inhabits a plane that straddles the line between myth and reality, true, but he is not a Centaur I don't think.

[Admiral Yi]

A reasonable point Squeeze.

[crazy canuck]

I hate cars because I've got a brain and I give a shit about the world.

Its an impossible dream which distracts from the actual needed changes of reducing our reliance on cars overall.

Why is it impossible?

If you're being captain literal then impossible is the wrong word of course. More impractical.
But basically the problem is material shortages. We would need to ramp up mining of key materials to an insane degree which just isn't going to happen, especially in the time scales needed.

To replace all cars in just the UK for example -

There are currently 31.5 million cars on the UK roads, covering 252.5 billion miles per year.

If we wanted to replace all these with electric vehicles today (assuming they use the most resource-frugal next-generation batteries), it would take the following:

207,900 tonnes of cobalt - just under twice the annual global production
264,600 tonnes of lithium carbonate (LCE) - three quarters the world's production
at least 7,200 tonnes of neodymium and dysprosium - nearly the entire world production of neodymium
2,362,500 tonnes of copper - more than half the world's production in 2018
Even if we only wanted to ensure an annual supply of electric vehicles, from 2035 as pledged, the UK would need to annually import the equivalent of the entire annual cobalt needs of European industry

https://www.nhm.ac.uk/discover/news/2019/june/we-need-more-metals-and-elements-reach-uks-greenhouse-goals.html

The problem with the analysis is that all cars will not be replaced today. 

The "annual supply" math also looks dubious.

There will be issues of transition, and particularly the need for many more charging stations, and more electrical generation from none fossil fuel sources.  But still doable.

[Tamas]

One thing that feels like is ignored with EVs is the batteries. Once we have most combustion engine cars replaced with electric ones, one would think there would be a LOT of batteries to constantly mine resources for and build. I don't think that fits into this image of EVs giving you this perfectly green way of travelling, and Josq has a point there.

[Josquius]

]

The problem with the analysis is that all cars will not be replaced today. 

The "annual supply" math also looks dubious.

There will be issues of transition, and particularly the need for many more charging stations, and more electrical generation from none fossil fuel sources.  But still doable.

Obviously it won't all be done overnight. See the last paragraph of my quoted bit there.
If one country mid sized country requires a years worth of the world's supply to replace all its cars (not to mention the future upgrades, need for replacement batteries, etc..) then thats a freaking huge amount no matter the timescale.

Don't get me wrong. EVs are better than ICE. But the idea we can just keep going with life entirely as we know it just swapping petrol for electric is a conservative delusion.

[crazy canuck]

]

The problem with the analysis is that all cars will not be replaced today. 

The "annual supply" math also looks dubious.

There will be issues of transition, and particularly the need for many more charging stations, and more electrical generation from none fossil fuel sources.  But still doable.

Obviously it won't all be done overnight. See the last paragraph of my quoted bit there.
If one country mid sized country requires a years worth of the world's supply to replace all its cars (not to mention the future upgrades, need for replacement batteries, etc..) then thats a freaking huge amount no matter the timescale.

Don't get me wrong. EVs are better than ICE. But the idea we can just keep going with life entirely as we know it just swapping petrol for electric is a conservative delusion.

I addressed the last paragraph, the math is dubious. 

Also, I don't know anybody who is serious about climate change suggesting that we can just keep on going the way we are. You are using electric cars as some kind of proxy for an argument that I don't think anybody is making.

[Berkut]

This analysis doesn't account for changing technology.

Presumably battery and electric motor tech isn't static, and in fact will see raw materials costs decline over time, and possibly be replaced by more sustainable raw materials.

I don't know if we will ever get to complete replacement, but the perfect cannot be the enemy of the better. This is a process, and what matters is that we keep getting better, and do that as quickly as possible.

Not sit here and imagine that the effort cannot work because we cannot imagine anything ever changing from the current bottlenecks.

[Josquius]

This analysis doesn't account for changing technology.

Presumably battery and electric motor tech isn't static, and in fact will see raw materials costs decline over time, and possibly be replaced by more sustainable raw materials.

I don't know if we will ever get to complete replacement, but the perfect cannot be the enemy of the better. This is a process, and what matters is that we keep getting better, and do that as quickly as possible.

Not sit here and imagine that the effort cannot work because we cannot imagine anything ever changing from the current bottlenecks.

Yes... A usual deflection. Don't worry about it as inevitably  super tech will be along to save us.

Climate change is a problem in the here and now. We are already beyond the point where we can stop it completely. We need to do all we can to minimise the damage. Just continuing exactly as we are confident everyone will have an electric car in 20 years then problem solved is just avoiding taking the real action that is required.

]

The problem with the analysis is that all cars will not be replaced today. 

The "annual supply" math also looks dubious.

There will be issues of transition, and particularly the need for many more charging stations, and more electrical generation from none fossil fuel sources.  But still doable.

Obviously it won't all be done overnight. See the last paragraph of my quoted bit there.
If one country mid sized country requires a years worth of the world's supply to replace all its cars (not to mention the future upgrades, need for replacement batteries, etc..) then thats a freaking huge amount no matter the timescale.

Don't get me wrong. EVs are better than ICE. But the idea we can just keep going with life entirely as we know it just swapping petrol for electric is a conservative delusion.

I addressed the last paragraph, the math is dubious. 

Also, I don't know anybody who is serious about climate change suggesting that we can just keep on going the way we are. You are using electric cars as some kind of proxy for an argument that I don't think anybody is making.

The maths are dubious as are all maths when dealing with such insane and imprecise numbers.
Picking fault with the exact numbers misses the point however. That they are on broadly that scale is a fact that just isn't getting through.

Kind of a weird qualifier to set there, people who are serious about climate change. It's not these people who make up the majority of the population and are the issue with this approach. It's those who aren't that interested and will eagrly avoid doing too much to help.
Musk and Co certainly are pushing this strain of thought out there.

[crazy canuck]

I don't understand your argument. The math put forward in the analysis you quoted is not wrong because it is difficult to be precise about the future.  It is clearly wrong because it makes the wrong assumptions. There is no point in calculating how many raw materials it will take to replace all cars in one year. That is never going to happen. Actually the fact that it is a close run thing to replace all cars in one year makes a gradual transition not only feasible but easy.

[Josquius]

I don't understand your argument. The math put forward in the analysis you quoted is not wrong because it is difficult to be precise about the future.  It is clearly wrong because it makes the wrong assumptions. There is no point in calculating how many raw materials it will take to replace all cars in one year. That is never going to happen. Actually the fact that it is a close run thing to replace all cars in one year makes a gradual transition not only feasible but easy.

Its looking just at the UK and amount needed to replace all 31 million cars in one year.

In a typical year globally 70 million+ cars are sold.

It's not rocket science to convert the numbers over to a realistic scenario away from the theoretical. The actual numbers are WORSE than those presented.

[grumbler]

It's not rocket science to understand that numbers based on the assumption that technology will not change over time are presented purely as emotional props, not serious intellectual data.

Replacing ICE vehicles with electric ones is an undeniable good from a climate change perspective.  Claiming that it is not good because it does not solve all of the climate problems (or simply "distracts" us from the problems) is absurd.  As is virtue signalling.