General Motors CEO virtue signaling how “clean” the new Chevy Volt is.
Then a reporter asks where the charging electricity comes from.
Oh my…. Wait for it.
Awkward. pic.twitter.com/wcMNhHVSK9
— Benny Johnson (@bennyjohnson) June 8, 2022
The video is from 2010. I don’t believe the spokeswoman was the GM CEO. The saving grace of the Green Religion is the fact that many of its devotees render only lip service to it. Buffoonery and hypocrisy, those two much maligned saving vices from fanaticism.
As for electric cars, the technology and infrastructure for them to be a realistic option outside of dense urban areas are probably a quarter century away. A recent road trip report by a journalist in one may be read here.
To convert all fossil fuel land vehicles to battery ones would require doubling the electric grid and electrical power plants to supply the new load. This cannot be done. Think also of all the lithium that would have to be mined for the car batteries – there’s not enough readily available lithium to do this. And without nuclear power, all the fossil fuel plants needed for the new electrical load on the grid would emit MORE CO2 than saved by going to electric cars. And solar and wind are useless and worthless. 30% capacity factor. Massive land area requirements. Massive metal pollution from solar cells. Wind turbine transmission oil leakage. More concrete required for a 1000 MW wind farm that works only 30% of the time than a 1000 MW nuke that works 92% of the time.
Electric cars – unicorns, fairies, pixie dust and money grown on trees.
What to reduce pollution? Go nuclear. Period. And use nuclear steam heat to manufacture oil from coal. Then tell the Muslims to go drown in their oil.
There’s a YouTube video somewhere about using nuclear to generate enough electricity to charge battery cars. Obviously made by a pro-nuke advocate. You have NO idea what’s required. Most Americans who don’t work in the electric power industry have NO idea what it takes to turn your lights on at the flick of a switch. I’ll find the video and post it later. Time for morning chores before the heat of the day.
PS, for those who don’t know, I am a 40 plus year nuclear energy professional and was operating a submarine nuclear reactor under the North Atlantic before some of you were born (am however about the same age as the author of this post). Just saying.
Thanks, LQC. I am sure I am not alone among the regulars here in having true appreciation for the expertise you share with us. It has taught me a great deal as well as inspiring me to go and learn more.
Things may get even more interesting for Europe (but it will likely impact us as well).
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https://www.mining.com/web/albemarle-risks-shutting-german-plant-if-eu-declares-lithium-a-hazard/
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Years ago, First Things had an article on how much public discussion seems to be the province of people who think like Harold Skimpole from Dickens’ Bleak House. They think bread comes from the bread delivery truck.
I worked with Briggs once on calculating land space needed for renewables.
https://wmbriggs.com/post/36910/
Not even for electric vehicles, just the USA electric needs, NOW.
You can see a preview of this thanks to China.
https://twitter.com/ScienceIsNew/status/1458512267150966786
Electric cars also run into the leftist problem of assuming that conditions will stagnate even as they advocate for policies that would change them. If everyone were to drive an electric car the demand for electricity would of course skyrocket, driving up costs. But what’s even more obvious is how much time would become an issue. At the moment it often takes hours to recharge an electric car, depending on the charging station. But what if there are five times the number of people than chargers, and they all want to recharge? Then you have two options:
1.) Wait for literally hours, possibly a whole day, for a station to open up. This isn’t like charging and coming back where you can do something else because if you aren’t there when the charger opens up someone else is taking it.
2.) Abandon your electric car and walk/use public transportation.
RH:
“2.) Abandon your electric car and walk/use public transportation.”
This is, I believe, exactly what the “green new deal” types actually want, not limited to EV’s. The people who don’t live in massive urban centers can either die or move to the city, as far as they are concerned. The fact that cities depend on the rest of the country for nearly everything does not enter into their thinking at all.
The entire climate scam revolves around one motivation: money.
And, they actually don’t care that swelter, freeze and starve to death.
To provide the electricity needs of NYC needed solar farms would aggregate the size of Connecticut. [Maybe they’ll send them Connecticut people to Mexico.] Vote Democrat!
One nephew is a PhD in Chemistry. He says the inefficiency of solar is such that an acre of land planted with bio-diesel crops provides as much energy. Still won’t be any farms or food.
It don’t mean nothing. China and its US billionaire fifth column are raking in $$$ billions.
All [absolutely all] they got is fear mongering and nonsense..
You can take this to the bank. Dyslexic, Norwegian HS serial truant Greta Thunberg is the brains of the climate scam, which aggregate IQ is single digits.
Attend to T. Shaw’s comment, Folks! 40 plus years of electric industry experience, albeit all nuclear, says he’s right.