a reply to:
Grambler
It really annoys me how this argument is often boiled down to "we need more electric vehicles instead of machines powered by fossil fuels", because if
the electricity is generated primarily by burning fossil fuels then it makes no difference what so ever. What they really need to be debating is the
methods used to generate power, I watched an interesting
video a few days ago which attempted
to debunk the myth that electric vehicles are worse for the environment, but I think what it really does is highlight how important it is to consider
the way the electricity was generated. Electric vehicles release more emissions during manufacturing due to the batteries, in the video they show that
it takes 2 to 5 years before that difference is offset by the reduced emissions of the electric vehicle. However in a state such as West Virginia
where 93% of the electricity is generated from coal plants, it can take up to 17 years before that difference is offset, meaning it wont be beneficial
to the environment unless you drive the same EV for more than 17 years in that state.
This is highly relevant to the current energy debates in Australia because environmentalists constantly complain about coal power, since around 63% of
our electricity comes from coal plants and only 16% of it comes from renewables (see
this report), but at the same time they fear monger about
nuclear energy and refuse to acknowledge it as a solution. The U.S. has a nuclear reactor in almost every state, over 20% of electricity in the U.S.
comes from nuclear plants and only 30% comes from coal, meaning if you calculated the offset time for EV's in Australia it would be much longer than
2-5 years. Despite the fact Australia only emitts just over 1% of the worlds CO2 emissions, compared to the U.S. which emits around 15%, and China
which contributes 30% of all emissions, we have people constantly demonizing coal power and shutting down our coal plants, with no real backup plan
because they refuse nuclear solutions, when in fact the amount of CO2 we release as a nation is perfectly sustainable. We've seen quite rapid rises in
our electricity prices over the last few years and it's directly correlated to an effort to make the grid entirely green despite the consequences.
The more we replace reliable sources of power generation with less reliable sources like wind and solar, the less reliable the grid becomes, as we've
seen with rising blackouts and brownouts. It also increases the cost of electricity for the simple fact that solar and wind are not very efficient
ways of generating power, the amount of money you must spend compared to the power you get out isn't anywhere close to the efficiency of fossils fuels
so the prices increase to make up the difference. This may slowly change over time but for now it's mostly true except for maybe those advanced modern
solar farms which use an array of mirrors to focus light into a point in order to heat a steam turbine, although I've never really looked at the
numbers on those and I don't think many exist in the world. Hydro energy is another very effective way of generating reliable clean energy but that
depends on a reliable flow of water, such as the generators built at Niagara Falls by Nikola Tesla, at one point around a quarter of all electricity
in the U.S. was generated from hydro sources.
The point is I'm not against green solutions if they produce reliable and cheap energy, but I am against fear mongering and moralizing at the expense
of consumers, especially when clean cheap sources of energy like nuclear energy are dismissed as a solution. It's also very important to realize that
wind and solar solutions also have an environmental cost just like EV's, you need massive fields full of solar panels and wind mills to generate the
same amount of power a small coal plant could provide. Granted, there are places like the desert where no one will care if we cover the land in such
devices, but we still have the emissions created during the production of these countless devices made mostly from plastic and glass materials. It
sounds very nice to talk about free energy which comes from the sun, but if people really cared they would realize nuclear energy is the cleanest and
most reliable option we have, assuming we have a good way to dispose of the nuclear waste of course. Australia has the flattest and most stable
continent on Earth, the 2nd largest uranium reserves of any nation, yet not a single nuclear reactor but we store nuclear waste for the rest of the
world.
edit on 6/12/2018 by ChaoticOrder because: (no reason given)