BimboBob
Well-Known Member
I'd love to live in your world Bob... Everything seems so simple.... Get a job nearer home, cycle everywhere, don't travel.... Have you ever seriously looked into a warts 'n all comparison between an EV and an ICE vehicle?
The new electric Golf has cheaper running costs over it's 160000k/ 8 year warranty life than the petrol version. Less parts, less service costs, faster, decent range...etc etc
Price is comparable as well.
Thumbs up all round.
Fuck the mining, the excessive travel to get the parts to assembly lines, the generation of the extra electricity, the wonder of what happens after the 8 years or so battery life is up, the lack of charger access for a lot of people...
We are supposedly trying to save this planet we live on not add to the pile of crap that won't degrade for hundreds of years.
Then there's the local cost. 50-60% of all cobalt comes from the Congo. Where they use kids to get it out.
In China they pour ammonium sulfate into an ever expanding hole before acid bathing the lot. 0.2% of the end process is kept the other 99.8% of toxic waste is chucked back into the earth.
I agree that fossil fuel is not the way forward, but neither is the electric vehicle. Not with current battery technology. It's just another rape of the planet.
The same does have to be said about modern electronics. Replacing phones every 2 years, buying a new TV every year just because, filling your house with them...it all adds up.
I understand that, as with most things in life, man wants new shiny thing. It's in our nature. But there are huge cons with buying an ev and as far as the planet goes they outweigh the pros.
Battery technology is moving on quickly though, very quickly, so in a few years this all might change.
Until then I'll continue to run my old car. It starts, it stops. No need for new shiny thing.