Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
I actually don't worry too much about the supply of rare earth minerals like lithium. As money pours into this sector technology is being developed to take advantage of more elements for battery production, and it looks like it might develop to the point of making battery production cheap enough that it can be scaled up. The worry here only works on the assumption that what's on the market now is all that will be there, but that's not a logical way of looking at it, especially when you look to see what's coming down the pipeline. Hell, MIT has even designed a genetically engineered virus that can self assemble hybrid car batteries as good as those used today at potentially a fraction of the production cost. What's more, bio fuel is inefficient if you grow just for biofuel, but turning old corn husks and other cellulose by products into ethanol just ups the energy efficiency of the whole process because that had to get grown anyhow. Which isn't to say modern agriculture magically becomes sustainable when we start doing that, but it's one piece of a big puzzle.
I'd personally be more worried about the electricity grid. We need to totally transform it and bring vastly more capacity online. I vote it be in the form of breeder reactors and then thorium reactors, but people are too afraid of nuclear power now because of the cold war, despite it being the best GHG free source of energy we've got. Really a waste, we could make this thing work if we took advantage of what we have. Personally, I'm betting things will get alot worse, but we'll eventually get civilization back on track again, stronger than ever, after a ton of pain, maybe in thirty years or so.
I actually don't worry too much about the supply of rare earth minerals like lithium. As money pours into this sector technology is being developed to take advantage of more elements for battery production, and it looks like it might develop to the point of making battery production cheap enough that it can be scaled up.
In the article, lithium is not one of the minerals that is in short supply.
So you shouldn't worry about lithium. Most alternative energy and electric drive technologies can’t be implemented without large quantities of scarce metals. They're scarce not because industry has not ramped up to mine them. As the article stated, the metals that are most important to alternative energy and electric drive are very difficult and expensive to mine or recycle. So with the exception of lithium, which is a plentiful resource that only represents 5% or 6% of the metal content in Li-ion batteries, the world cannot produce enough technology metals to permit a widespread transition to alternative energy or electric drive. Any alternative that can't be deployed at relevant scale isn’t an alternative at all.
If China can't make the numbers work in a command economy that produces over 95% of the world's rare earth metals, nobody can. The inescapable conclusion... is that resource dependent alternative energy and vehicle electrification schemes must fail.
Electric vehicles and electric bicycles are also expected to strongly drive cobalt demand, as approximately 4 kg of cobalt would be required for a hybrid electric vehicle battery and 6 kg for a fully electric vehicle. With between 12- and 13-million hybrid electric vehicles expected to be on the road by 2020, this would necessitate between 20 000 t and 30 000 t of cobalt, said Smith. Increased manufacture of electric bicycles and continued demand for aircraft would add further upward pressure on the metal.
In the USA alone, there are over 240 million vehicles. If only 13 million EV cars are on the road WORLDWIDE by 2020, we're still in DEEP trouble.
----With China having reduced their export quota of rare earth metals by 40% in 2010 there is continued concern for the supply of these metals. Smith noted particularly that deficits of selected rare earth metals could affect a number of industries including those producing solar panels, fluorescent bulbs, wind turbines and electric car batteries. (! EEK !)
“Considering all the rare earth (metals) then we project a surplus market by 2014, however if we consider only . . . critical rare earths then even on those optimistic projections it leads us to the conclusion that the market will be in deficit by some 20 000 t as early as 2015.”
Translation, in 3 years, there won't be enough specific metals to meet demand. What do you think will happen to the price for these SCARCE metals that CHINA has reduced the export of?
Still believe we can "ramp up" production?
Switch to green energy could lead to rare metal shortage - RareMetalBlog (http://www.raremetalblog.com/2012/03/switch-to-green-energy-could-lead-to-rare-metal-shortage.html - broken link)
Kirchain’s team analyzed the supply of lanthanum, cerium, praseodymium, neodymium, samarium, europium, gadolinium, terbium, dysprosium and yttrium under various scenarios.
They projected the demand for these 10 rare earth elements through to 2035.
In one scenario, demand for dysprosium and neodymium could be higher than 2,600 and 700 percent respectively. To meet that need, production of dysprosium would have to grow each year at nearly twice the historic growth rate for rare earth supplies.
Quote:
Originally Posted by BIMBAM
The worry here only works on the assumption that what's on the market now is all that will be there, but that's not a logical way of looking at it, especially when you look to see what's coming down the pipeline. Hell, MIT has even designed a genetically engineered virus that can self assemble hybrid car batteries as good as those used today at potentially a fraction of the production cost.
The claim was made in 2009. Any news on progress? Any plans to build production to meet the needs of millions of cars?
2015? 2020? 2040?
It's not logical to sit on one's hands and do nothing because someday something MIGHT appear.
Quote:
Originally Posted by BIMBAM
What's more, bio fuel is inefficient if you grow just for biofuel, but turning old corn husks and other cellulose by products into ethanol just ups the energy efficiency of the whole process because that had to get grown anyhow. Which isn't to say modern agriculture magically becomes sustainable when we start doing that, but it's one piece of a big puzzle.
Diverting farm waste from being recycled onto the land to being transformed into fuel is questionable, as well as not widely applicable.
Not unlike biogas, where one family's biogas consumption requires the waste of 50 to 75 families to transform, the solution is limited.
Quote:
Originally Posted by BIMBAM
I'd personally be more worried about the electricity grid. We need to totally transform it and bring vastly more capacity online. I vote it be in the form of breeder reactors and then thorium reactors, but people are too afraid of nuclear power now because of the cold war, despite it being the best GHG free source of energy we've got. Really a waste, we could make this thing work if we took advantage of what we have. Personally, I'm betting things will get alot worse, but we'll eventually get civilization back on track again, stronger than ever, after a ton of pain, maybe in thirty years or so.
Since the #1 GHG is water vapor and the anthropogenic climate change folks have been discredited, let us not dwell on carbon counting nor methane.
As to electrical generation, the easiest solution is to reduce consumption by increased efficiency.
For example, the fact that hot spells drive up the consumption of electricity to power air conditioners leads one to consider that if the houses and buildings had been built with superinsulation and other conservation techniques, their energy demands for climate control would be far less. This has been well known since the 1970s. (See: Saskatchewan Conservation House, 1979)
But codes and designs are still mired in the past, when energy was cheap. The "official recommendation" is still only R19 in walls!
(Saskatchewan Conservation House featured R48 walls, and R60 ceiling)
When it comes to the construction industry, far sightedness is in short supply. Look at the Gulf coast and NOLA where people are rebuilding homes with WOOD FRAMING - despite the risk from water, vermin, termites, fire, flood, wind, and flying debris.
As to an immediate and lasting reduction in fuel consumption - the one thing that would cut costs by 95% is a transition to electric traction rail.
[] Electrify mainline railroads
[] Build / re-build urban rail mass transit
[] Build / re-build interurban rail transportation
According to this article, electrification of 80% of mainline track would only increase load by less than 3%. The Oil Drum | Multiple Birds
Energy and Environmental Benefits
Transferring freight from truck to electrified rail trades 17 to 21 BTUs of diesel for one BTU of electricity. Simply electrifying existing rail freight would trade 2.6 to 3 BTUs of diesel for one BTU of electricity.
Transferring 100% of inter-city truck traffic (impractical) to electrified railroads, plus electrifying all (not 80%) of the existing rail traffic, would take about 100 TWh/year or 2.3% of total US electrical demand.
Electrifying 80% of railroad ton-miles and transferring half of current truck freight to rail would take about 1% of US electricity. 1% is an amount that could be easily conserved, or, with less ease, provided by new renewable generation and/or new nuclear plants.
Adding a network of electrified urban rail might bump that consumption to 2 or 3%.
In other words, if America had begun to transition to electric traction rail back in the 1970s, we would be far better off. But instead, the government kept subsidizing the automobile, petroleum, and road construction.
And the current subsidy of biofuels is equally unwise and prone to cause more problems in the future.
Remember, when something needs to be really, really fouled up - get FEDERAL EXCESS.
Last edited by jetgraphics; 03-15-2012 at 12:33 AM..
Jetgraphics, although I agree with you, you did hear that a huge rare earth deposit - supposedly bigger than China's - was found last year in Nebraska by a Canadian mining company?
This may skew the numbers and availability temporarily, but the end result will be the same...
The government's focus on gas mileage is misguided, too. The real issue should be passenger - miles / gallon. A fully loaded 19 MPG SUV, with 6 or more passengers, has better passenger - miles / gallon than a 50 MPG hybrid with only one occupant.
( 114 versus 50 )
Real efficiency comes from moving more passengers per unit fuel, not some political decree that only forces manufacturers to make what no one really wants.
But the politicians can't justify their mismanagement by using common sense, especially since they've been backing the "wrong solution". Someday their meddling will end.
Oh dear. Is this a purely philosophical discussion?
The issue at hand is the fact that Americans will not give up their cars, they have designed their cities and suburbs around cars, not the car around the city and suburb. People are perfectly willing to spend 2 hours in traffic to get to work and dog gone it, if they will sit in a car for 2 hours, it may as well be a nice one, regardless of the consumption.
Mandating higher MPG on any vehicle is a good thing, regardless of size. Anyone sane knows that people will never ride 6 in an SUV just like anyone sane knows that more food is thrown away in this country than is actually consumed.
I have no problem going to live in a small town in the middle of nowhere and ride my horse, be off the grid, use a clothesline etc. How many Americans do you see doing that? Truth is - people are people, the have gotten lazy, ignorant and cozy in the fossil fuel powered world. They are willing to be in debt and toil for the Bank until the day they die to support that dependence. How do you regulate THAT? You see what the "free market" has achieved... (and please, don't tell me the market wasn't free...).
The government's focus on gas mileage is misguided, too. The real issue should be passenger - miles / gallon. A fully loaded 19 MPG SUV, with 6 or more passengers, has better passenger - miles / gallon than a 50 MPG hybrid with only one occupant.
( 114 versus 50 )
This? after you go poking holes (tiny ones) in my carpool idea?
Jetgraphics, although I agree with you, you did hear that a huge rare earth deposit - supposedly bigger than China's - was found last year in Nebraska by a Canadian mining company?
This may skew the numbers and availability temporarily, but the end result will be the same...
The issue at hand is the fact that Americans will not give up their cars, they have designed their cities and suburbs around cars, not the car around the city and suburb.
People are perfectly willing to spend 2 hours in traffic to get to work and dog gone it, if they will sit in a car for 2 hours, it may as well be a nice one, regardless of the consumption.
Mandating higher MPG on any vehicle is a good thing, regardless of size.
Ah, but SIZE is exactly what must suffer. There is only so much one can squeeze from an internal combustion engine.
The only other way to reduce fuel consumption is by reducing weight / size.
Are we heading for the equivalent of the Fiat Multipla?
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fiat_600#The_Multipla_
The Fiat Multipla got 32 MPG, seated six (w/ optional 3rd seat), and ran on a tiny engine (0.7 liter). Topped out at 57 MPH - wheeee !
Will Americans embrace the equivalent of an all-weather tuna can?
They certainly didn't like being forced out of big cars and station wagons by CAFE!
Quote:
Originally Posted by ognend
Anyone sane knows that people will never ride 6 in an SUV just like anyone sane knows that more food is thrown away in this country than is actually consumed.
I sense sarcasm...
In our insane family, we don't throw away more food than we consume.
Quote:
Originally Posted by ognend
I have no problem going to live in a small town in the middle of nowhere and ride my horse, be off the grid, use a clothesline etc. How many Americans do you see doing that? Truth is - people are people, the have gotten lazy, ignorant and cozy in the fossil fuel powered world. They are willing to be in debt and toil for the Bank until the day they die to support that dependence. How do you regulate THAT? You see what the "free market" has achieved... (and please, don't tell me the market wasn't free...).
OD
Okay, I won't tell you that there hasn't been a "free market" since 1933.
Fuel consumption has dropped from a high of 20 million gallons / day (pre 2008) to 19 million gallons / day - thanks to the recession.
Who knows how much less folks will travel, when fuel prices hit $4, $5, $6 / gallon?
But ultimately, we NEED to be capable of moving cargo and passengers or the economy will collapse.
Folks might scale back their personal and discretionary use, but supermarkets and retail outlets need to be supplied. And that can't be scaled back, nor can the price increase for transportation be ignored.
The only way to INCREASE capacity while dealing with the finite supply of fuel is to transition to the MOST EFFICIENT form.
If you know of a more economical, durable, and efficient form of land transportation than electric traction rail, I'm open to consider it.
Change is coming. Adapting to that change may be uncomfortable. We know that there is growing demand, yet a finite supply of fossil fuels. We can rush to consume every resource available - and then bequeath the drained husk to our grandchildren's grandchildren. That should be well appreciated.
Or we can maintain our standard of living via more frugal and efficient means.
Subsidizing waste and penalizing efficiency is unwise. But who ever said governments and politicians are wise?
It's up to the people to change their minds, and tell their public servants what to do.
Jetgraphics, although I agree with you, you did hear that a huge rare earth deposit - supposedly bigger than China's - was found last year in Nebraska by a Canadian mining company?
This may skew the numbers and availability temporarily, but the end result will be the same...
Quote:
Originally Posted by jetgraphics
Which elements?
Wrong mineral. Wow Niobium! Maybe someone will invent a battery that uses Niobium.
China has 94% of the worlds reserves of the minerals actually used for lithium manganese oxide batteries. But, I am sure they will be much more reasonable than Saudi Arabia in pricing their minerals to the US.
Please register to post and access all features of our very popular forum. It is free and quick. Over $68,000 in prizes has already been given out to active posters on our forum. Additional giveaways are planned.
Detailed information about all U.S. cities, counties, and zip codes on our site: City-data.com.
Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
