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Thanks for pointing out that batteries are not a renewable energy source. I thought you mined batteries like coal...
Whatever your point was, the technologies associated with electrical power usage in mobile platforms are rapidly evolving. Coal is DEAD. As well it SHOULD BE. No matter what state it's used to generate electricity, at any cost, it's filthy as all hell. A nightmare.
The transition to self-driving electric vehicles is coming. And it's coming fast. Heads in sand notwithstanding.
The Zero-Emission Grid needs to come first for EV's to be the "Planet Savers" that Elon Musk and others have claimed them to be, but another approach which an enterprising company should jump on is a low cost hydrogen / oxygen electrolytic fuel cell to power the electric motor(s). As has been pointed out, Li-Ion batteries are pretty nasty and are not recyclable. They also have the big disadvantage of having 1/8th the energy density of gasoline so EV's will always be short on range / time between charges. They may be OK as urban vehicles but for long-distance trips - not so much. They also will get increasingly expensive as the rare earth elements they depend on get rarer.
Not sure where low cost fuel cell technology is, but I can tell you long duration spaceflight is critically dependent on these things, and the Gemini spacecraft program led the development of the fuel cells that the Apollo program and the Space Shuttle took into space for long-duration spaceflight. Of course, they have their issues too - Apollo 13 illustrating one of them. That said a fuel cell the size of your IC vehicle gas tank could provide more EV range than your gas tank can, and the process just creates water as an exhaust. Sounds like a winner to me. I can tell you the first guy who can sell them as reliable and affordable energy sources will put the battery-powered EV guys out of business.
Last edited by dcbingaman; 12-17-2018 at 07:19 PM.
Reason: spelling
LOL - someone's completely missing the details here - actually, when it comes to the batteries used in EV's, yes - you quite literally MINE for the materials that make them work, they're not renewable - they're base elements contained in only finite quantities in the earth & are mined in their own right and/or result as a by-product from the mining/refining of other related base metals/elements - the most commonly used: LI, NI, CO - 2 of which are essentially non-recyclable & the batteries themselves once assembled really cannot be recycled either (at least not in any way that is efficient/economic/non-hazardous). Also as others mentioned - coal certainly is not dead, it's use as a traditional energy provider is being reduced - but it is still a huge part of our current energy grid.
Lead acid batteries though? The ones used in ALL traditional vehicles........those are 100% recyclable, as are the entire drivetrains of internal combustion engines - both the drivetrain & battery are INFINITELY recyclable.
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Of interest, our ASME Section toured the Johnson Control's lead acid battery recomplation plant in town. It's relatively new and impressive. We had to wear hooded environmental protection garb and quality respirators! They smash ~1600 batteries/hour in hammer mills. As you mention 98+% of the battery is recycled. They collect the acid, pelletize the plastic from the case, melt and refine the lead into two types. One is 99.9+% pure lead for plates and the other contains alloys for added strength that go into battery posts. All of what is produced is shipped to their battery plants to be made into new batteries!
PS:From an environmental state point the monitor lead not only throughout the plant but also in the surrounding several hundred acers of wooded area (which they own.) They report the daily readings on their website. What I found interesting, is although all workers wore respirators similar to those used by automotive painters, the allowed maximum lead fume exposure level is 2.5 time the new maximum allowed for manganese in welding fumes. Very few welders are wearing respirators. Manganese is a common strengthening alloy element on all steel and welding materials! For those welding stainless steel the allowed hexavalent chrome in the fumes is 10 times lower than lead.
Regarding electrics...
I worked in a food processing plant as a maintenance mechanic and we used exclusively electric fork lifts so as to not taint product with combustion byproducts. As has been stated in earlier posts, the batteries are the greatest shortcoming of electric powered vehicles and the lithium ions are far more of an issue than the huge lead acid type we used that were near 100% recycle-able. Second is the issue that many mechanics are not skilled enough to troubleshoot and repair these types of drive systems outside the dealership and without the whiz bang computers that tell the average shmoe what is wrong with the electronics. Have a break down away from a major population center and plan on a very long tow to get repairs completed.
There is also the mentality of zero emmission regarding electric vehicles. It is not zero emission, it is remote emission. Yes there are no pollutants coming from a tail pipe, but there are pollutants at the power generation point. It might be nuclear waste that has to be dealt with for thousands of years or maybe even the oil in the gear boxes for the wind turbines, but there are pollutants none the less. The holier than thou attitude of the Prius and Tesla drivers may make them feel good but they are also part of the same problem and their pompousness is unjustified. Until such time as further developments are made regarding power source density or maybe even cheaply available fuel cell technology (or other yet unknown power) elctric vehicles will be the exception rather than the rule.
My own feeling is that the best interim power for a vehicle may be similar to a railway locomotive where an engine is run at its' peak efficiency point to drive a generator and then power individual motors at the wheels. These locomotives are extremely efficient at moving massive amounts of freight for a very low cost but have very high power capability when needed.
This is a great chart - it illustrates the conundrum we face WRT C02 emissions. Most "renewable energy" sources still BURN stuff. Only nuclear, wind, solar and hydropower do not BURN stuff to make heat. These constitute less than 36% of our electrical power production, and over half of these watts are produced by nuclear fission. The real focus should be on these ZERO EMISSION sources. EV's just play the game of rearranging the deck chairs on the Titanic. Driving an EV powered (ultimately) by burning coal, wood or swamp gas does little to curb global warming which is the real threat - in fact a "coal-fired" EV probably creates MORE environmental harm than driving an IC engine car, due to the impact of coal aerosol particulates on human lungs, which can dramatically shorten your life.
There needs to be a sea change in production of energy in this country and around the world, or we are in a heap of deep doo-doo. Nuclear power is a clear winner but it has been (unfairly) downplayed in the debate for a zero-emission solution. Burning swamp gas does't really help at all. That said, construction of a couple hundred new safe, modern, modular nuclear reactors could get us to ZERO EMISSION power in a matter of a couple decades. I think that is the only alternative which makes sense in the near-term. A lot of $$$ has been spent to bring solar and wind energy to the rescue, but they still only constitute about 1/5th of zero emission energy production in this country and less than 1/10th of all power generation. We still have a long way to go.
12-17-2018, 06:58 PM
Of interest, our ASME Section toured the Johnson Control's lead acid battery recomplation plant in town. It's relatively new and impressive. We had to wear hooded environmental protection garb and quality respirators! They smash ~1600 batteries/hour in hammer mills. As you mention 98+% of the battery is recycled. They collect the acid, pelletize the plastic from the case, melt and refine the lead into two types. One is 99.9+% pure lead for plates and the other contains alloys for added strength that go into battery posts. All of what is produced is shipped to their battery plants to be made into new batteries!
