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Originally Posted by Cos270
While I agree, the processes for obtaining the raw materials needed for battery production is "cleaner" than that for petroleum, I think what we're seeing now in terms of scale is a bit disingenuous. The demand for these EV materials is about to go stratospheric, and the supply is going to have to try and meet it. That means more mining and extraction several orders of magnitude greater than what is currently being seen. When scaled to match the current supply of petroleum, will the EV material mining processes still be cleaner? That's a study I haven't seen, yet.
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The scale will always be smaller for batteries vs petroleum. An EV battery doesn't last a week before the need to replace it like gas in a tank does. Even if the environmental impact of making an EV battery is a hundred times worse (which it isn't) than a tank of gas, it's only a couple of years before the impact of gas used greatly outweighs it.
Let's say we start at 0 cars in the US -
There's 17 million new cars sold and 105 million cars registered (passenger vehicles - cars and light trucks) in 2021 in the US. If all 17 million were only EVs, that's 17 million new batteries. After 10 years, that's 170 million batteries, plus replacements rounded up to 200 million batteries. Each year, the demand is pretty flat at around 17 million batteries.
With 17 million new ICE cars sold per year and each using 10 gallons per week, that's 170 million gallons per week at the end of year 1, 340 million gallons per week at the end of year 2, etc up to 1.7 billion gallons per week at the end of year 10. Clearly, the scale is going to be smaller for EVs.
Widespread use of EVs is also have a beneficial effect on the "grid" where we can use electricity stored in batteries in a neighborhood of cars to make up for power generation deficiencies when everyone is using one, two, or more air conditioning systems in their homes on the increasingly hotter summer days each year.
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Much like the horsepower and top speed wars, EV manufacturers need to come up with an agreement not to keep throwing bigger and bigger batteries into vehicles for more range that is rarely going to be used. A cap on battery weight per vehicle corresponding to say 200 mile range would be one way not to waste those resources.