Thanks Elonore, can’t wait for hyperloop

We have no fucking clue whatsoever how to control the risks of nuclear power production, there is zero secure and working concept how to handle the waste that is already there, and fusion is just a concept that has never worked on a more than pure experimental level. So the nuclear "concept" is merely chanting a mantra: "engineers gonna solve the problems for sure" - hell yeah, while we already fucked up the climate, why not threaten any generation to come with nuclear waste, too?

Wait, what? Look up pebble core reactors and fast reactors. They both manage the waste problem beautifully. Fission reactors produce no waste and are viable and safe, these days.

It would be a bit foolish to switch over to a method of powering our daily needs which produces tons of highly dangerous waste we have no methods to really dispose of. Who’s waste, transport, and incidentals of use and accidents- as well as mining and construction releases compounds toxic to most life- and especially human life- into the environment, that will last until- as far as we know- effectively the end of time.

Of course, I am talking about the heavy metals and byproducts of batteries- with thousands of cells required for a single vehicle and a service life roughly that of the average automobile before needing replacement. We simply do not know long term what those effects will be, but we can take an educated guess based on what we can see already when electric cars are relatively new and a relatively small portion of global vehicles. Scale that up.

Am I saying we shouldn’t use electric cars or that we shouldn’t use nuclear power or that we should all go live in the forest and die at 35? Not exactly. That’s probably the “greenest” solution. But being more pragmatic- there is no “magic bullet.” Electric cars or nuclear power or whatever- we’re just creating the next environmental crisis because... go look up images of battery strip mines- often worked by the small hands of child labor. To “ethically” and responsibly work with these materials is possible but cost prohibitive. We won’t bother to take the care to do it until (and maybe not even when) we are facing a catastrophe from the effects.

But fossil fuels and nuclear, solar, wind, etc- all have their uses. Cutting back, wasting less, being less excessive in our demands on resources, and using a sensible mix where and how they make sense is key. Electric cars still use plastics and oils and petroleum products including artificial rubber. Getting rid of gasoline vehicles doesn’t end or even really seriously diminish our need for petroleum for use in everything from life saving medicine to basically everything in our lives.

Plastic bag bans and straw bans and such get eye rolls all over- but we are out here trying to reinvent the wheel at great cost and social change- but we haven’t started to take seriously the millions of small ways that would make big impacts in how we could lessen petroleum use while helping the environment. The only “cost” to these is that we each have to be more thoughtful, careful, and less lazy in our daily lives and live less “disposable” lives where we keep things longer and use less, waste less. But... electric cars are “hot.” If it isn’t trendy and cool, why would we bother right?

If nuclear energy is mainly reliant on steam, then doesn't that mean a Steampunk universe is the most efficient world of energy?

@guest_, I agree with you mostly on most things. I just want to point out that climate change is at this point the world's biggest problem, and will be for at least the next 100-150 years. That's why nuclear power and electric vehicles are some of the best alternatives to fossil fuels. Yes, nuclear waste is extremely dangerous, but it can be safely stored, if treated with care.

Lithium-ion batteries are not recycled at big scale... Yet, we have the talent, information and technology to provide good solutions, we just need a market. When it becomes profitable to recycle them, the industry will boom quickly.

The key phrase there- is “when it becomes profitable...” if we wait long enough, theoretically any trash becomes profitable to recycle. As long is it is more profitable to not recycle- so it shall be. But the other question being- is recycling enough? We recycle plastic, steel, wood, etc. it helps. But- here we are facing multiple shortages and ecological disasters. For recycling to be profitable without artificially loading the market- the cost of sorting and reclaiming must exceed the cost of virgin materials. But once a mine is sunk (especially when essentially slave labor is used) the costs to mine it out become fairly low until it needs dug again.

But wether it is by legal incentives or coercement, or by naturally increasing prices- the end result is the same. Namely that the cost of raw materials would increase overall making people strive to use less, waste less, and making their usage available to less. And so is it the electric car that will save the planet- or is it just that by the time we are responsible with the technology that most people on earth wont be able to afford cars due to the increased prices of future automobiles and increasingly complex systems?

I won’t go too far on that side note- but 1985 a top trim Toyota Corolla was $10k and the worlds fastest sports sedan was $50k or so. The capabilities and costs of these same vehicles have increased several fold since then, but back then- the corolla was about half the household income of a median family and the top end sports sedan was about half the income of a doctor or similar target customer. Today- the corolla tops out at about $30k and don’t look up the worlds fastest sports sedan. The wages have stagnated or regressed while cars become more expensive and advanced. When/if self driving becomes the norm- it won’t likely be long before it becomes more or less law. The costs and effort to keep such a machine running safely start to look more like owning an aircraft.

So if a smaller percentage of people are driving, and driving less miles- it really matters much less what they drive. The same is true for most things. As an extreme- if only 5 people on earth owned cars- there’s almost no practical way they could make a serious global negative impact if they tried. Given that we already have internal combustion vehicles capable of producing “zero emissions” the electric car fascination becomes less shiny and more suspicious.

It opens new markets, it puts money back in the pockets of big energy- which has seen falling stocks and value for decades. It gives those with personal, political, or economic motivations leverage against entrenched and powerful rivals who are essentially untouchable in the current game. It moves jobs around and provides at least short term economic stimulus. It does a lot of things besides altruistic ones- a healthy dose of skepticism is advised.

And of course it taxes an already taxed power grid of America suddenly has hundreds of millions of cars plugging in. We could say they have 15+ years to get things together (in places like CA where law makers are pledging to outlaw new gasoline vehicles in coming decades) but... speaking of CA- paradise CA burned down because the power company didn’t clear lines for decades. The east coast still routinely sees summer black outs and bad weather black outs.

And no. There’s solar. I know. My dear friend, practically my blood brother- was the head engineer for a prominent solar company. He has cancer now. It happens when you spend all day playing with Cadmium and all the other heavy metals and nasty chemicals that go in to solar panels. Short of finally cracking Alchemy- we have yet found ways to transmute base elements like lead into fertilizer and rainbows. Batteries, solar, nuclear- all are viable technologies but all are VERY nasty and due to life span and other questions- it’s still debatable if they pay for their sons in good or not over the long haul.

So I do agree that the current major global crisis- asides from the ongoing scourges of stupidity, greed, and other things we could sum up as “people”, is climate change. But- wether climate change is reversible or not (I believe it is to some degree- or can at least be slowed drastically), turning our streets and mountains and ground water into toxic waste sinks is a much bigger problem with much worse consequences for life long term.

We shouldn’t abandon electric cars or nuclear power or solar. But we should learn from the past. We have seen it before. Many times. A new technology comes out and we use it to solve every problem, even when it makes things worse. Radium toothpaste and lead paint and glass. Asbestos baby blankets and on and on.

Nuclear power, electric cars, etc. they aren’t magic. They aren’t a hammer to beat climate change and every other environmental problem we have into submission. They have costs and consequences. In nature everything has a place, a use. Nothing is wasted. A storm isn’t evil- it’s a necessary and inevitable part of a functioning world even if it does destroy your home. But if man could push a button and create a tornado- you wouldn’t create a tornado to vacuum your living room would you? We need to apply these technologies prudently. Rushing in, vacuuming with the tornado- that’s how we got to where we are. If we don’t want to be here again or worse in a century or two- we have to learn from past mistakes.

@jasonmon - nope, pebble bed reactors are pretty much dead since german engineer Rainer Moormann blew the whistle 12 years ago, showing they can't be run safely. Fusion reactors are still but a concept. Actual proof of the concept has been limited to a literally microscopic scale. This is science fiction