By Don Keelan
Some time ago, while talking with the late Sen. Jim Jeffords (1934-2014) about what it took to develop legislation in Congress, he said I didn’t want to know. He compared it with making sausage: you would not eat it if you saw how it was done.
His comment can apply to other uncomfortable issues: homelessness, drug addiction and the mental health crisis. If we don’t personally witness it, we don’t need to concern ourselves. For decades, Vermont has been in denial. Not anymore.
Don Keelan
When it came to what was needed to make an electric vehicle, the car itself and its propulsion source (batteries), I was also in denial.
EVs require the precious metals of cobalt, lithium, manganese, nickel, and bauxite that go into car manufacturing. The Washington Post recently stated, “The breathtaking demand for EVs … typically require six times the mineral input of weight of their fossil-fuel-burning counterparts … just to make them go.”
So where do all of these critical minerals come from?
For starters, bauxite comes from northwest Guinea. If you need to get up to date on international affairs, Guinea is one of the poorest countries in the world, according to the Washington Post. As I write this column, Guinea and its 13 million residents are going through a nightmare: their country’s rivers, lakes, farmland, and villages are being devastated as tens of thousands of tons of Bauxite are mined daily, primarily by Chinese government-owned companies.
It is not much better for cobalt extraction. About 70% of the world’s cobalt comes from the Democratic Republic of Congo, mainly from state and Chinese government companies. The Washington Post noted in its April 30 report that over 200,000 folks work in the unregulated sector (15%), including 5,000 to 35,000 children, some as young as six.
I could go on, but it is depressing, especially when it is well-known in the EV industry that China processes (refines) over 50% of the minerals noted above and controls over 75% of the world’s battery production. And how are the smelting plants generated? By coal-fired furnaces?
But we don’t have to travel halfway around the world to maintain our denial status. All we need to do is look north to Canada, specifically the Province of Quebec and the province-owned company, Hydro-Quebec.
H-Q is a significant electricity supplier to Vermont and will continue until its contract ends in 2038. However, the company is running out of power and needs to create more hydro dams. To do so, it will again devastate lands owned by First Nation Canadians where the reservoirs for future dams will be made. Meanwhile, Vermont needs more renewable power.
Do we care what it takes to get us an electric vehicle or a kilowatt of electricity?
When I was a visiting history teacher at Arlington Memorial High School’s 11th grade, I surveyed where the class of 22 students had their sneakers manufactured. Except for one student’s, all sneakers were made in Southeast Asia. A front-row student had a ghastly blue pair that he acquired at the local Walmart. The sneakers were made in Bangladesh and cost him $18.
When the class traced back the sneaker’s cost to sell and its 10,000-mile transportation, it was determined that the labor cost was only a few dollars and most likely paid to a youngster in a not-so-well-kept plant. The wearer didn’t care as long as he didn’t have to pay more than $20.
And so it is with the advent of transitioning to EVs and all-electric. We don’t care what the cost is to the environment and to individuals as long as we can claim that we reduce the carbon footprint here in Vermont. If we don’t have to witness what it takes, we really don’t care.
Don Keelan writes a bi-weekly column and lives in Arlington, Vermont.
The authors of the electric vehicle legislation seem to have deliberately forgotten that they, and we, live in a highly rural State.
The current electric vehicle fleet averages between 250 and 500 miles on a full charge. That means the Legislative delegation for Bennington can barely make it from home to Montpelier, and back, unless they have access to a charging station somewhere on their route. If they don’t, driving from their Washington County room(s) to the Capitol, or other errands, means they can’t make it home at the end of the week. If they decide to take a vacation on Cape Cod, forget it! The trip out to the Cape will flatten their vehicle’s battery, and the only alternative traveleans is an air trip, both more expensive and more environmentally impactive.
Believe it or not, i actually support EVs. However, other than local trips running errands around one of Vermont’s 10 chartered cities, EVs currently don’t have the range to be effective. And the recharging station infrastructure does not yet exist to support long distance travel. If the Legislature is serious about conversion to an all-rlectric fleet, first develop an economical and rapid system of recharging stations, then consider the mandatory conversion to all EVs!
If one could reason with a liberal, they would not be a liberal. Its a mental disorder.
I’m a liberal and I think ev’s are a big mistake!
Where ever there is money to be made humans will be there no matter who suffers. I was never fond of the idea of globalization. Maybe because I don’t like change but now I especially don’t like it. If we spent the money, we’re giving away to other countries, on the U.S. where might we be now? Would we still have a large manufacturing base? Would there be more U.S. based companies making the items we love to buy from Walmart and Dollar Tree. I’d like to think so. I’m sure they would be more than a $1.25 though. But, maybe our lives and economy would be so much more robust. I’ll probably get slammed for suggesting the U.S. becomes an isolationist country. We’ll never be able to grow our economy if we don’t buy and sell globally. Well, how’s that working for us right now?
Good to see this info consolidated –
Liberalism is a religion whose adherents are blind to the ramifications of their system.
Ignore the collateral damage because the end justifies the means, the god’s of the environment will be appeased and all the world will see how much they care.
People who have no legal standing on the issue complain about school mascots, but seem to have no problem with flooding out Native American land.
Battery based electric cars are an expensive fad. Develop hydrogen fuel cells if you want electric cars.
The small savings in co2 output in VT has already been overshadowed by the forest fires in western Canada that were set by idiots. I’m sick of paying for nothing except the leftist commie feelz…
NOTICE HIW ALL THIS MATERIAL IS CHINA OWNED OR CHINA HAS ITS FINGER IN THE PIE.. A THOUGHT, CHINA REALLY IS NOT ONE OF OUR ALLYS!!! THEY WANT YO TAKE OVER THW WORLD AND EVENTUALLY THEY WILL.. WHERE WILL WE BE THEN?
WAKE UP PEOPLE THERE IS NO SAVING THE WORLD!!!! THE SUB IS GOING TO TURN
INTO A LARGE FIRE BALL. EVENTUALLY AND US UP. EVEN SCIENTISTS KNOW THIS,JUST DONT KNOW WHEN
Liberalism is a mental disorder.
Interesting how the Dems and Progressives claim to love the earth and want to save it, but in actuality they are destroying it!!!!!!!!! Typical of how they don’t think through their wanton spending of our tax dollars, only to do us more harm than good.
Yes they turn a blind eye to the need of more huge pit mines needed for the 50,000 tons of earth needed to extract enough minerals for ONE lithium battery. They turn a blind eye to the child slave labor who will work the mines.
They turn a blind eye to the disposal of the expended batteries. They turn a blind eye to the fact that making these batteries will deplete the reserves of minerals that won’t regenerate like NATURAL FUELS.