Tesla Could Be Hogging Batteries and Causing a Global Shortage, Says Report (gizmodo.com) 159
According to a report from the Korea news outlet ETNews, Tesla's solution to fixing a manufacturing bottleneck responsible for a $619 million loss last quarter could be causing a global battery shortage. Panasonic reportedly gave most of its cache of batteries in Japan to Tesla so that the automaker and Gigafactory 1 energy-storage company could keep up with its ambitious production schedule. Gizmodo reports: In early October, Tesla struggled with a "production bottleneck," but by the end of the month, Panasonic stated it would increase battery output at the Gigafactory, now that it understood the issues that led to the bottleneck and could automate some of the processes that had been done by hand. But this likely did not help Tesla fix any immediate shortage issues. ETNews claims that Panasonic is coping with the shortage by shipping batteries in from Japan. And many Japanese companies in need of cylinder batteries have turned to other suppliers like LG, Murata, and Samsung -- but those companies have not been able to meet the demands. Reportedly, companies that had contracts before 2017 aren't affected by the shortage, but several other manufacturers have not been able to place orders for batteries, and won't be able to order more batteries until the middle of next year.
Tesla's Cobalt Conundrum (Score:2)
Re:Tesla's Cobalt Conundrum (Score:4, Informative)
When the very summary is wrong, where does one even start? "Most" cobalt is not in the Congo. The cheapest primary cobalt is found in the Congo, with the caveat that it's not been that heavily explored due to previous levels of demand (there's a new wave of exploration at present). Cobalt, however, is found in significant consequence everywhere that nickel, copper, and many other commonly mined metals are. Some places recover it in the tailings, but most don't bother because, again, historically demand hasn't justified it.
Cobalt isn't a rare metal. In the crust, it's 2-3 times as common as lead, 40% as common as copper, a third as common as zinc, etc. Nor is it "spread out"; as mentioned, it's associated with many commonly mined minerals.
As for mining in Congo itself: at least 80% is mined in big international mines with modern equipment and practices; how much "over 80%" is uncertain. The remaining percentage is so-called "artisinal mining" - improvised mines mined with manual labour and primitive equipment (aka, generally not very safe). Some are villages mining their own land, while others are outsiders exploiting locals. In the past year, there's been a big crackdown on artisinal cobalt, with major buyers taking steps to track the origin of their products better and keep it out of their product streams. Of course, one can always expect artisinal producers to try to do more to hide the origins of their cobalt, and/or sell to less scrupulous buyers (such as in China).
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Fuck you! I want single-source artisinal cobalt hand smelted and machined into a battery to sell to gullible hipsters.
Re:Tesla's Cobalt Conundrum (Score:4, Insightful)
According to this Canadian mining company about to start operation of a primary cobalt mine in the US, 58% of world cobalt production was from DR Congo in 2015.
http://www.ecobalt.com/assets/... [ecobalt.com]
Before offering corrections, it is important to understand what the words mean within their context. In the context of industrial supply, where the mines are is what they are talking about when discussing the locations of a resource.
For example, it doesn't prove them wrong to point out that there is a lot of cobalt on Venus.
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I did not say "most currently mined cobalt", because currently mined cobalt simply will not support battery production scaleup. I said "most cobalt", period. You have to look at where additional cobalt for batteries is going to be coming from. And it's not going to be coming from the Congo. Yes, part of the supply will come from expansions to major Congo mines, but most is going to come from new cobalt projects and from adding cobalt recovery to the tailings of existing mines.
It's nothing at all analogo
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It's nothing at all analogous to "cobalt on Venus". As was explicitly stated: "Cobalt, however, is found in significant consequence everywhere that nickel, copper, and many other commonly mined metals are."
You literally did not in that statement say anything about where the metals are mined. You talked about where the metals are. That they are mined is used at the limiting factor for the set of things being discussed.
Business 101 (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Business 101 (Score:5, Insightful)
Fuck everyone else. It's just good business.
As we shift from fossil fuels to batteries, we will have to ramp up production. Tesla is causing that to happen NOW, rather than in the future when it could be even more disruptive. This is a Good Thing. We need to produce more lithium, and more cobalt. We need to make more batteries, and make them cheaper and more efficiently. By bringing the inevitable supply problems forward, innovators will be incentivized to find solutions.
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Yeah, who would pay $35k for a vehicle that's faster than a BMW 330i, $5k lower MSRP, handles better (according to Motor Trend), and which every former BMW owner I've talked to who's sat in has said is more comfortable. Which can be preheated/precooled remotely (including melting ice off your windshield), no carbon monoxide concerns, with no idling wear, no idling noise, and without draining a tank that you have to go out to a chunk of concrete and stand outside in whatever weather you're wanting to avoid
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Ed: Or instead of the Model 3 SR we could compare the Model 3 LR. Starts at $44k and is as fast as the BMW 340i, same handling advantage, also $5k cheaper. And actually goes *farther* than the BMW in city driving.
Re: Business 101 (Score:1)
You convinced me! Where can I find a model 3 ready to buy and drive off the lot today?
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Never said there wasn't a waiting list. ;)
Re: Business 101 (Score:2)
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Re: Business 101 (Score:1)
You know that Tesla is already planning on the subsidies going away, right? They have the option to turn them off in their online price calculator, because they will hit the cap in 2018, or Congress will cancel it. And you know what? They will still sell every car they make, because people want the cars.
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As soon as someone mentions "hydrogen energy" I know they can be dismissed as uninformed. Hydrogen is a lousy, inefficient way to store or transport energy. The reasons are so numerous and fundamentally intractable that anyone who thinks hydrogen will be an economical way to power anything on a mass scale has to be lacking in basic science and engineering knowledge. Hydrogen will have niche uses, but is very unlikely to be the fuel of choice for cars.
But in about 18 - 24 months we will have a definitive ans
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"Hydrogen is a lousy, inefficient way to store or transport energy."
Yup, and the day it becomes economic to produce bulk hydrogen from water, it's also economic to tack on enough carbon atoms to make it easier to handle.
Synthetic diesel/kerosene/gasoline burns just as well as the stuff outta the ground and it's still the only practical fuel for aircraft (short or longhaul), however I suspect that the most heavily trafficked routes will fall to electric high speed trains or vacuum trains before long.
The iron
Re: Business 101 (Score:2)
Re: Business 101 (Score:5, Insightful)
Monopolistic? Don't be an idiot. It's basic supply and demand. And, Tesla has a monopoly on exactly nothing, except maybe a trade secret on generating fanboy hype. Neither does Panasonic.
There is simply not enough battery manufacturing to meet the current demand. So Tesla is locking up the supply they need by working with their manufacturing partner in a very legal and straightforward way that hundreds of businesses have done to obtain the materials they need, for basically all of history. And guess what? If demand is greater than supply, some other company can either outbid Tesla for the supply, or wait for more manufacturing to be built to increase the available supply. Just like any other product or material in any other market, ever.
Oh, I forgot - we are talking about Tesla, so OMG evil! Bad! Almost as bad as Apple, because reasons!
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Tesla is not locking up the supply! Tesla locked up the supply years ago when they first started with electric cars and told everyone that they would sell thousands of cars is the future so everyone should start contracts with the battery suppliers to expand production for the future.
However, everyone else laughed at them and never started up any contracts.
Tesla did sign a contract with Panasonic that made sure Panasonic would meet their battery needs, but the other companies did not.
So today we not only
"hogging batteries" = booming sales? (Score:2, Interesting)
It will be interesting to see how the usual group of Musk trolls reconciles their desire to paint Tesla as a flop while grappling with data like this. They are selling product fast enough that they are causing battery supply disruptions.
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Re:"hogging batteries" = booming sales? (Score:5, Interesting)
You can sell significant numbers of a product, beyond your wildest dreams, and still be losing money.
Boeing has sold 1287 of its 787 Dreamliner series aircraft, has delivered 625 and was still losing money overall (as in deferred program debt was still rising) until earlier this year (when they managed a slight reduction). Boeing isn't forecast to make any actual profit on its current order book.
In the commercial aviation world, 1000 sales of a large aircraft is a huge success, usually (see 777, 747, 767, A330). But then, usually, these programs have their production and R&D debt paid off in the first few hundred airframes....
Tesla is in the same boat - massive (relatively) up front costs, coupled with significant production issues which means debt is still rising rather than being recouped.
They will get there, but they aren't there yet.
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1970's:
Kid: Daddy, my new radio-controlled car won't run!
Daddy: Batteries not included? What the hell is this?
Kid: Daddy, you shouldn't swear.
2017:
Kid: Batteries not available? What the hell is this?
Kid's kid: Seriously, what the fuck?
Kid: Where'd you learn that kind of language?
Kid's kid: Are you fucking serious?
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Taking all the batteries and still slipping on production schedule actually aligns with painting Tesla a flop. That would be the limiting factor, and even with the world's supply of batteries they cannot produce what they've taken the cash to produce.
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It depends. It's a great problem to have, but it's still a problem. Imagine being subject to a class-action by people who you've been unable to deliver to. Imagine the stock price dropping because production cannot scale.
Or, just think of this. It would be great to design an app that was getting a million downloads a day. It's better than most apps will ever do, and by orders of magnitude, every day. Yet, if it requires server resources, it's entirely possible that your app will implode because the ser
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Yes, I'm sure that all of the institutional investors, whose entire businesses depend on the accuracy of their due diligence, are wrong on the fact that Tesla is earning a 25% margin on S and X and is likely to earn a 25% margin on the 3 when in full production.
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source please
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That 25% margin is just what Tesla claims. It takes no great insight to arrive at.
Tesla computes gross margin differently than other auto makers. I'm not saying one is more correct than the others, but Tesla would barely squeak by on what to others would be a comfortable margin.
Re: "hogging batteries" = booming sales? (Score:1)
Each sale does not lose money, unless you are doing something incredibly stupid with your math, like thinking fixed capital costs to build massive factories are ongoing expenses for all time.
Or, you are spreading FUD. Either way, it doesn't look good on you.
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Supply shortages, in this case, means that more people want batteries than are produced. There are a variety of reasons, including technical difficulties, why the production might be lower than demand. We could examine the figures (I'm too lazy to, myself) and find how battery production is going. It's highly unlikely to have gone down because of technical issues. This means demand is going up.
So? (Score:5, Insightful)
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And many others believing they will enter the EV market significantly in a couple of years are swallowing hard as they realize that this is a BYOB, as in Bring Your Own Battery, enterprise. It takes years to build the factories and the equipment that goes in them and few have started.
The next realization will be that this is a BYOE, as in Energy, enterprise too. They can't depend on utilities to be able to react fast enough to supply exploding fleets of EVs in the mid '20s. Auto companies that can't bring t
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No, as soon at that starts to happen the local authorities will mandate that charging stations serve the general public.
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I don't think you understand. The general public will not need charging stations. People aren't going to be owning most of the cars. Most vehicles will be owned, maintained, powered, and operated by the manufacturers.
The manufacturers are going to be able to drop the per-mile cost of Transportation As A Service (TAAS) to less than the per mile cost of owning your own vehicle, probably significantly less. This will make owning your own vehicle an unnecessary luxury or pain in the @$$ depending on how you wan
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The UK has several different such services. I'm signed up with a not-for-profit one, and have been for about 5 years now. Monthl
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Naw, I probably did understand basic shit.
I probably just don't think most Americans are going to give up personal ownership of transportation. Some will. It will be a popular product, just like buses are popular.
It will totally kill Amtrak.
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Many would agree with you.
Personally, I believe it will happen. We'll give up driving. The younger folks are already doing it. I look forward to it as there are better things to do with my time, and the expense is already a ridiculous portion of income.
In less than a decade, I expect the cost of insurance for drivers who turn the autopilot off or are driving pre-autopilot vehicles to start ramping up on a geometric curve extending over a period of 10-20 years. At the same time, availability of that insuran
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The young tend to have lower income. The conflating variables are going to be a much larger signal than anything you can tease out already.
People who can afford a rental car will use it in preference to a bus, that doesn't mean they won't someday buy a car.
And why would insurance go up? That is just silly! That would push people off the insurance product. Insurance on self-driving cars is going to be much lower, longterm health for the auto insurance industry is iffy. They're going to have a lot of painful
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It is indeed early to tell for sure.
Insurance will go up for the same reason it has become higher for drunk drivers. In the 70s, drunk drivers were common and rarely punished. Their insurance was the same as everyone else's. Public safety perceptions are relative and evolve. When self-driving vehicles become common, the safety difference of driving manually versus letting the car drive itself will be so extreme as to prompt movements against it. Liabilities will be higher because of the lack of responsibili
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The part you miss is that insurance isn't priced randomly. You don't understand why drunk drivers pay more instead of others getting discounts. You think insurance prices are a type of sin tax.
They're not.
Insurance is a competitive industry, you're not going to set rates significantly higher than the competition, you're not going to set rates higher than they are now.
If half the cars on the road are "self driving" then those cars all have less accidents. That means less liabilities for everybody. You can't
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Insurance prices are based on risk to the provider. They have to walk away with profit after accounting for all payouts. If they can't do that on average in a region, they'll walk away from the region's business. There are many states where major insurance providers have left the market because the state's courts are friendly to those hurt.
There won't be less liability for everybody. There will be less liability for self-driven vehicles.
Our difference is in the assessment of the liabilities for those manual
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OK cluestick, if half the cars are self-driving, and they cause less liabilities, that lowers liability for everybody! That means less crashes for everybody, including less crashes for manually driven cars. Self-driving cars don't crash just because it would be your fault, they actually don't care whose fault it is; if they can stop in time, they will.
Really supper-sloppy thinking all around. And I called you out on viewing it as a "sin tax," and all you did is try to shuffle your sin tax around; you didn't
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No. They'll use the bus to get from home to the rental station (or the car's delivery driver will use the bus to get back to the office, and her (minimum wage?) pay for that time will go onto the rental charge. And the same after drop off of the rental vehicle. So each car rental will generate two bus trips on average. Slight lowering for people or rent-drivers who car pool.
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lol no
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People who live way out in suburbia are not going to be using it at all; they're already on the bus, they're going to take public transit to their destination.
In cities there are already reserved parking spots for shared vehicles in high density neighborhoods.
People in between will either drive their own car, or else use a bicycle or electric personal mobility device to get to a rental car. If it is a manual drive.
Once they are self-driving, they will simply show up outside the house a few minutes after you
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It was far beyond that point when I got my driving license in 1989. It still is. Which is why I've owned a car for barely half the years that I've had a driving license. Bus, bike and train are much easier.
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I agree that the cities will be first. But, I disagree with high revenue-generating utilization being the sole reason for the low per-mile costs and thus believe that the much of the lower population areas will eventually follow.
People talking TaaS are currently writing optimistic predictions of $1 per mile cost. I believe they'll be able to hit $0.50 per mile for on-demand vehicles in the cities and still make a tidy profit. The reasons are in the reduction in costs that the providers will be able to achie
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"This is a BYOB, as in Bring Your Own Battery, enterprise."
Tesla has been described for many years as a battery company which happens to build cars.
The powerwall and renewables battery farms should underscore that point - they're where the money is.
Cars are merely a way to sell more batteries, which in turn generates enough demand to justify the gigafactory. once it's online, tesla/panasonic will be producing more cells than the rest of the world combined.
Regarding utility capacity: Electricity accounts for
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At least it's not partner company gearing up for a single massive order, then going bust a couple of years later due to overcapacity and no orders.
Apart from these kinds of blips, the market for batteries is limited by price, not by availability - meaning that if you raise the price then sales drop off in a non-linear fashion, and the same thing happens to the increase when you lower the price - the balancing act is to set the price high enough to make money but not cause a glut which would lower the price,
Causing? (Score:5, Insightful)
Wait, so the claim is that Tesla could be CAUSING a shortage?
How are they causing a shortage? By buying up all the batteries they can get.
Why are they buying up batteries? To eliminate their manufacturing problems.
What were the manufacturing problems they were having? They couldn't get enough batteries.
Oh yeah, that makes total sense. It's not a battery shortage causing Tesla to buy up batteries....it's Tesla buying up batteries that is causing a shortage.
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FIFY.
Re: Causing? (Score:2)
So? Not like they are buying all the batteries and just sitting on them in a giant warehouse to deny competitors, or shooting them into space or something. They are buying them to put into cars for resale.
Oh no, Tesla out-maneuvered their competition by having a business partner (Panasonic) who did what was necessary to fulfill orders! For shame!
Why does anyone give a shit?
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Nope. They were already using Panasonic for their batteries. Yes, they've had manufacturing problems. No, they didn't switch their orders.
Their battery production problems relating to cars was simply in the assembly of the cells into batteries! None of that has changed, they must have actually only had "problems" not a failure.
Re: Causing? (Score:2)
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You forgot to post the link. Or is it in TFA?
"Could be" means "Is not" (Score:3)
Journalists use language like that when they don't have any facts to back it up.
The facts are Tesla no longer use the same sized batteries as other products, like laptops do, in their new models.
I don't see how draining stockpiles of 18650 cells would help them manufacture their cars that require 2170 cells.
A more likely story is that Panasonic has halted production of 18650 cells to manufacture 2170 cells instead, while keeping enough capacity to honor existing customer contracts.
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My understanding is that currently it is only the Tesla Model 3 that's using the larger 2170 cells. The M
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Number of cells doesn't determine peak power output.
It's the number of cells multiplied by the power output of each cell.
Larger cells typically have a higher output power, as one of the determining factors is the surface area of the electrodes inside the cell. It's a balance between power density (watts a cell can deliver) and energy density (watt-hours a cell can store).
2170 cells are allowing them to increase the energy density of the pack as a whole, which in theory allows them to increase the power dens
Not True (Score:1)
Look, I have news for you, there are about 20 decent battery technologies that are cutting edge right now. We had a battery technology research conference here this past summer at the UW. There are many flavors of battery types, and I'll be honest with you, they all work fairly well.
A shortage of a specific type of battery materials in a specific country does NOT mean that you have shortages worldwide, nor does it mean that you can't use any of the other very good battery tech instead.
Stop panicking. We nee
In other news... (Score:2)
There is evidence that Apple is hogging the world's supply of overpriced bullshit.
Seriously, when Apple ties up these exclusive contracts for its 4k displays, it's considered great business. If Elon is really hogging the world's supply of batteries, then one would expect to see the price of batteries to go up instead of down.
Seeing these comments, I have just one observation (Score:2)
So, I'm reading all these Slashdot comments, and just am amazed at one thing that wasn't even close to true even ten years ago.
Not only do Republicans appear to hate the environment, they clearly hate basic capitalism too.
I would make a Russian communist joke starting with "Da comrade..." but given what's in the news, am worried it might be confused with a real critique.
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So, I'm reading all these Slashdot comments, and just am amazed at one thing that wasn't even close to true even ten years ago.
Not only do Republicans appear to hate the environment, they clearly hate basic capitalism too.
Republicans have always, repeat always been against free market capitalism. They say they want small government, and for it to stay out of businesses' affairs, and then they pass assloads of laws designed specifically to give the advantage to one business or another. When they say they are against the Democrats interfering in the way businesses are operated, they mean that it's affecting their ability to do the same, not that they are opposed to it.
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Lots of people don't seem to notice the difference between an economic and regulatory environment that is friendly to business in general and one that is friendly to certain specific businesses.
Hahaha (Score:2)
>but several other manufacturers have not been able to place orders for batteries, and won't be able to order more batteries until the middle of next year.
Chinese factory owners must be happy
Carmageddon For Tesla (Score:1)
Dec 3, 2017
Yesterday was the monthly moment of truth for automakers in the US. They reported the number of new vehicles that their dealers delivered to their customers and that the automakers delivered directly to large fleet customers. These are unit sales, not dollar sales, and they’re religiously followed by the industry.
Total sales in November rose 0.9% from a year ago to 1,393,010 new vehicles, according to Autodata, which tracks these sales as they’re reported by the automakers. Sales of c
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They use giant sailboats to transport them from Japan to Seattle WA, and then they are carried by barrens of mules down to Fremont, CA
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they are carried by barrens of mules down to Fremont, CA
Tesla employees deserve more respect than that!
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They use giant sailboats to transport them from Japan to Seattle WA, and then they are carried by barrens of mules down to Fremont, CA
You mean high speed trains of mules. They go at least 20 mph.
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Mules are often CO2-neutral, depending on where their food comes from. I'm more worried about methane production.
Re:Environmental impact of this manufacturing (Score:5, Informative)
What's the environmental impact of this battery manufacturing?
Compared to extracting oil from the Alberta tar sands, the impact is modest. Lithium is extracted from salt flats and underground brine, which are not ecological hotspots. Cobalt is mostly a byproduct of open pit copper and nickel mining, and little mining is done specifically to extract cobalt.
If they're being shipped from Japan to the US, then they'll have a higher carbon footprint due to being shipped across an ocean than batteries manufactured locally, no?
Not really. Ocean transport is very efficient, and adds little to the carbon footprint of these vehicles.
Are vehicles that use batteries like this truly more environmentally friendly
Yes, by a big margin.
Re:Environmental impact of this manufacturing (Score:5, Interesting)
Cobalt is mostly a byproduct of open pit copper and nickel mining, and little mining is done specifically to extract cobalt.
While true, there is more to the story. 15% of US cobalt production is already from recycling. Also there is the Idaho Cobalt Project (ICP) that already has permits for a primary-source cobalt mine in Idaho, which should go online imminently. It is owned by a Canadian mining company. They're expecting 1500 tons/yr for 12.5 years.
The most important thing though is that cobalt is totally recoverable, in the future most of it will come from recycling.
Re:Environmental impact of this manufacturing (Score:5, Informative)
Ocean shipping is dirty as hell!
Container ships burn high sulfur bunker fuel, which produces lots and lots of sulfates, which are nasty pollutants ... ON LAND. But at sea, the sulfates settle onto the surface of the sea, where they have a negligible effect since the ocean already contains quadrillions of tons of sulfur.
Sulfur is a pollutant in the same way that salt is a pollutant: It depends on where you put it.
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Ocean shipping is dirty as hell!
But still negligible compared to the environmental value of the electric car.
The stupid "it takes carbon to make it" argument is a cookie-cutter way of trashing any manufactured product. That's why Greens always use it against some technology when they have run out of other arguments.
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I'd suspect that the environmental impact is mostly from the continuing harm, in which EVs are far and away the more environmentally friendly. Both EVs and ICE vehicles have to be manufactured, and this is going to cause some harm, but there's no obvious thing that would make the manufacture of EVs a lot worse than manufacture of ICE vehicles.
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Ahh.. the Daily Mail - a source so reliable Wikipedia have stopped using them.
You wouldn't want to breathe the exhaust from a container ship, but as others note, at sea it's not much of a concern. If you happen to be on a cruise ship though, things are rather different.
Re: Environmental impact of this manufacturing (Score:5, Insightful)
The Daily Mail caring about the environment?
They don't care. The whole point of the article is to promote environmental nihilism and apathy. If 16 ships pollute more than a billion cars, and wind turbines kill birds, and bicyclists run over endangered insects, then clearly everything is equally bad and nothing matters and readers can continue to drive their SUVs guilt free.
Re:Environmental impact of this manufacturing (Score:4, Informative)
The environmental impact of shipping a tonne of batteries from east Asia is the same as the impact of shipping a tonne of steel from east Asia.
And for the record: Model 3 SR is pretty much the same weight as the similar-sized, similar-accelerating BMW 330i. Model 3 LR isn't much heavier (and is faster).
Lastly: life cycle assessments aren't conducted by guesswork and speculation. They're done in peer reviewed studies. For example [acs.org].
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The environmental impact of shipping a tonne of batteries from east Asia is the same as the impact of shipping a tonne of steel from east Asia.
If we tax carbon output in the USA, and China does not, then we'll see more steel being shipped from east Asia. We get to see more carbon emissions, both from production and transportation, and higher steel prices on top.
YAY!
Maybe, instead of taxing carbon and mandating the use of expensive and unreliable wind and solar, we allow industry the freedom to find their own ways to reduce carbon and the cost of energy. That means less CO2 output, cleaner air, higher wages, more jobs, and perhaps those ships sta
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Carbon taxes are an efficient way of applying market forces to reducing CO2 increases. I'm not sure about the legalities, but imposing the appropriate taxes as customs duties for imported material is probably kosher.
I know you're a nuke monomaniac, but mandating one form of power plant is not a good idea. Use taxes to represent externalities, and let the market figure out how it wants to handle CO2 reduction. The market is VERY good at doing this sort of optimization.
Carbon taxes can be combined wit
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I know you're a nuke monomaniac, but mandating one form of power plant is not a good idea.
Where did I say anything about mandating anything? I want people to have a choice. That's the whole point, choice. Unless I've missed something we will see ships propelled by one of three things right now, wind, fuel oil, and nuclear. I'm sure someone will show an experimental solar powered ship but if someone is going to cross the ocean with cargo there's really only three choices. We've mandated that people cannot choose nuclear. Fuel oil dominates, not because we want to pollute the environment but
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The idea behind the carbon tax is to internalize an externality and let the market decide what to do. If nuclear power plants are then the cheapest, we get nukes. If solar power and wind are the cheapest, we get solar and wind. The market is far better at optimizing than you or I are.
The reason we're in this situation is that burning fossil fuel is a cheap way of generating energy, and fossil fuels are a very convenient way to create mobile energy sources for use on vehicles. The government is not in
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China has actually been working pretty hard to bring down carbon emissions. They're uniquely susceptable to sea level rise thanks to the large population on the very low lying coastal plains and the leadership plays a long game when planning.
This is why so much renewables R&D is going on there and also why the chinese are investing so much into nuclear energy research (both fusion and fussion). They're not betting the farm on one technology, they're hedging by trying _everything_.
Bear in mind that the e
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Are you contending that, left to its own devices, industry will to become cleaner and cheaper out of the goodness of their hearts?
No, I believe that industry will become cheaper and cleaner because people don't like doing business with businesses that offer expensive and polluting products when they have the freedom to choose cheaper and cleaner ones.
The government is the "commons" in this tragedy. Did you even read the web page you linked to?
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No difference?
If the raw materials are being mined in China, it;s not really going to make much difference if they're manufactured in Japan or USA, at the end of the day there is still a ship going across the Pacific Ocean.
It could even have less impact, if the end product is lighter and/or smaller than the raw materials.
Re: Environmental impact of this manufacturing (Score:2)
The carbon cost of this car is still far less than a vehicle that spews carbon out through the process of normal operation. If recharged with renewable energy, it is essentially a fixed value except tires and moving part lubricant. Even if charged with "fossil energy" the generation of that energy will be more efficient in extracting the energy from the fuel than a car engine would be, making the carbon footprint less.
A car with a petrol / diesel engine will use more lubricant (more moving parts), the sam
Re: (Score:1)
Correct. They are very environmentally friendly if made in China, S Korea, and tons of places with cheap solar and wind energy. They are very environmentally friendly almost anywhere in the West or Texas or the NE.
Now, if you made them in the South, they're not quite as good. Which is why nobody does that. But if you build a Dark Factory that operates 24/7/365 in the dark with full automation, even with coal as an input, they are much more environmentally friendly. Which is most of the new factories in t
Re: (Score:1)
Long answer, yes [thecorrespondent.com]
Re:This sucks! (Score:5, Informative)
As Electrec notes, it's almost impossible [electrek.co] that this report is correct. Model 3 uses 2170 cells, not the standard 18650s, while Model X and Model S have always used imported cells, so nothing has changed there.
Re:This sucks! (Score:5, Insightful)
But the truth wouldn't generate a click bait headline
Re: This sucks! (Score:2)
anti-media
That is not, nor has it ever been - nor will it ever be - an insult. Perhaps think before you type?
Re: (Score:2)
Wait, what? I thought electric vehicles didn't have a transmission.
Re: (Score:2)
If they used NiCd a Model S would weigh 8 tonnes.
On the plus side, it could qualify as a moving Superfund site.
Re: Elon Musk (Score:1, Insightful)
Yeah, buying batteries available on the open market, gassing 6 million Jews and starting a war that killed over 50 million other people... basically the same thing.
FYI you are a moron.
Re: (Score:1)
Auschwitz concentration camp Poland, years 1948-1989 the official camp plague said- "four million people suffered and died here at the hands of the nazi murderers between the years 1940 and 1945"
Unfortunately a lot of people have only heard about Auschwitz. It wasn't the only concentration camp.
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
I'm going to point out two things. First, Auschwitz was only one (although the most murderous) of the Nazi death camps, and Nazi murder was not limited to just the death camps. Second, people process wood and cloth into flat and flexible sheets, put them into packages that allow perusal of both sides of all sheets, and make small dark marks on the sheets (typically before the creation of the package), and these packages can be used to learn things from. Some of these will show all the details you want a