Lithium-ion batteries are everywhere — in phones, laptops, tablets, cameras and increasingly cars. Demand for lithium-ion batteries has risen sharply in the past five years and is expected to grow from a .2 billion market in 2020 to a .4 billion market by 2025, mostly due to the boom in electric cars. And a shortage of lithium-ion batteries is looming in the U.S.
Former Tesla CTO and Elon Musk’s right-hand man, JB Straubel, started Redwood Materials in 2017 to help address the need for more raw materials and to solve the problem of e-waste. The company recycles end-of-life batteries and then supplies battery makers and auto companies with materials in short supply as EV production surges around the world. Straubel gave CNBC an inside look at its first recycling facility in Carson City, Nevada. Watch the video to learn why battery recycling will be an essential part in making EV production more sustainable.
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How Tesla’s Battery Mastermind Is Tackling EVs Biggest Problem Video Rating: / 5
When you hear the term “Clean Energy” what do you think it means? Almost everyone would agree the term means wind and solar power. But that’s a premise that is ripe for questioning. When you start to look at the bigger picture, the illusion of “clean” wind turbines and solar panels quickly goes SPLAT!
VISIT Clear Energy Alliance https://clearenergyalliance.com/
For list of sources and downloadable transcript: https://clearenergyalliance.com/project/clean-energy/
Script:
Energy consumers everywhere, we need to clean up our act! Anti-fossil fuel activists are nodding their heads at that one. Except, I’m thinking about something a little different than what they’re thinking.
I’m referring to the commonly used phrase, “clean energy.” All of us, even those who understand that oil, natural gas, and coal run the world, often refer to wind and solar as “clean” without even questioning it. It’s time to do some questioning.
What is it that makes wind and solar clean and fossil fuels dirty? Well, with wind and solar you don’t see anything getting burned like you do with oil, natural gas, and coal. And it’s the burning that creates pollution. Fair enough. But let’s take a closer look at that.
Air pollution from the burning of fossil fuels in the United States has been in steep decline since 1970. And that dramatic drop across all six pollutants the EPA classifies as dangerous took place as Americans increased their fossil fuel use by 40 percent. From 1988 to 2015 our vehicle miles traveled have more than doubled! So as America has grown we’ve used more fossil energy, traveled a lot more and yet the air we breathe has continued to get cleaner. That’s amazing.
And, for those who are worried about energy-related CO2 emissions, they’ve been in decline for more than a decade.
Oh, and here’s one more amazing fact. Since 1970, the pollution coming out of the tailpipes of our cars and trucks has been reduced by 99 percent. Seriously, 99 percent. I’m not kidding, you can ask the EPA.
Now, what about wind and solar? We feel like they’re clean because we don’t burn them. Well… not directly. But, let’s be real. They aren’t born of unicorns and pixie dust. Producing solar panels and windmills requires a lot of mining for resources, especially for rare earth minerals. China owns 95% of the rare earth market and the Chinese government isn’t all that protective of the environment. Their mining projects are creating giant, toxic and radioactive lakes. It’s a serious problem they will be dealing with for decades.
And what about land use? The US Energy Information Administration estimates that natural gas, and coal use about 12 acres of land per megawatt of electricity produced. Solar and wind gobble up four and six times the amount of land that coal and natural gas do. So, what’s so clean about that?
There are other environmental impacts to consider. Industrial wind and solar projects kill a lot of wildlife. Wind turbines alone are estimated to kill 600 thousand birds a year along with a million bats. The bats are very important to our ecosystem because they are essential to pollination. Wind turbines cause visual blight and have negative health impacts for the people who live around them, like noise, shadow flicker, and vibrations.
Let’s keep in mind that fossil fuels have been running the world since they began fueling the industrial revolution and still carry more than 80 percent of the load. Wind and solar contribute less than three percent to our energy use and for that small amount of power, we’re dealing with a significant amount of environmental nastiness.
The point of all this is not to disparage wind and solar, but to talk about them in a way that makes sense. It’s ridiculous to say fossil fuels are dirty while wind and solar are clean. They’re not. All energy sources and technologies have their impacts, but in the case of oil, natural gas and coal, there have been astonishing improvements over the past half-century. They are much, much cleaner and getting more so all the time.
So all you energy consumers clean up your act. Stop using the word “clean” when talking about wind and solar.
For the Clear Energy Alliance, I’m Mark Mathis. Power On. Video Rating: / 5
Dr. Rob Maher, professor of engineering, explains that the Electric Grid functions only when energy production exactly matches energy consumption in that moment. The problem with renewable energy (photovoltaic, wind, hydroelectric, etc.) is that we do not currently have an efficient way to store that energy. Professor Rob Maher joined the MSU Electrical and Computer Engineering Department in 2002. A steadfast educator, inventor, and licensed Professional Engineer, his passions include audio engineering, audio forensics, and music. He has been a leader in the audio industry for many years as an entrepreneur, consultant, and a VP of engineering. He holds a BS degree from Washington University-St. Louis, an MS degree from the University of Wisconsin-Madison, and a PhD from the University of Illinois-Urbana, all in Electrical Engineering. He has written and lectured internationally, and also serves as an expert witness in civil and criminal cases. In his spare time, Rob enjoys music and both road and trail running. He is past-president of the Big Sky Wind Drinkers running club, and a member of the Second String Orchestra (cellist) and the St. James Episcopal Church Choir (bass/baritone). He and his wife, Lynn, have two grown sons. This talk was given at a TEDx event using the TED conference format but independently organized by a local community. Learn more at https://www.ted.com/tedx Video Rating: / 5
At American Waste Control, we have a passion for educating the next generation on the importance of recycling to keep our city looking beautiful. We truly believe that helping the environment and improving the lives of our neighbors starts with the simple things—like recycling and ends with turning on our neighbors lights. We call it the big picture.
So, what does the big picture look like? This amazing video helps explain the entire process visually and dramatically.
Our Mr. Murph program offers over 600 different sites in Green Country for you to drop off accepted recyclables. From there, these items are taken to our Tulsa Recycle and Transfer campus, where they are sorted utilizing our state-of-the-art MRF facility. The location is also home to the Tulsa Indoor Dump, a convenient and easy way to dispose of items without driving all the way to a landfill.
Items that cannot be recycled are sorted and hauled to our stunning American Environmental Landfill location in Sand Springs, Oklahoma. This beautiful stretch of rolling hills is home to the American Therapeutic Riding Center for disabled children, a large herd of Texas Longhorn cattle, honeybee hives, Monarch butterflies, and so much more. It is also the only waste-to-energy center in the state, providing thousands of families the energy they need to operate their homes by capturing methane gasses emitted from waste.
From tossing a soda can or plastic water bottle in a Mr. Murph collection container to providing lights for Green Country residents, the big picture is about more than just American Waste Control’s effort to make Tulsa more beautiful by reducing waste. It is part of ensuring everyone in the community enjoys a better tomorrow.
Discover more about American Waste Control, Mr. Murph, and American Environmental Waste-to-Energy Landfill:
americanwastecontrol.com/
feedmrmurph.com/
tulsaindoordump.com
aelok.com/
As we shift away from fossil fuel energy, communities like Gillette, Wyoming, face a renewable reckoning.
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100% renewable energy – El Hierro, the smallest of the Canary Islands, wants to be the world’s first island to cover its energy needs without fossil fuels. Even so, 60% of its electricity still comes from its conventional generating station. Video Rating: / 5
For a longer version of the story, check out this video: https://youtu.be/nS_HgfanRjA
With support from the National Science Foundation, a multidisciplinary team is engineering solar panel technology that makes greywater reusable while creating thermal energy in the process. What is now wastewater would be used at least twice, cutting demand, and the free solar energy can be captured as well.
The research in this episode was supported by NSF award #1038279, EFRI-SEED: Solar Optics-based Active Pasteurization (SOAP) for Greywater Reuse and Integrated Thermal (GRIT) Building Control. EFRI-SEED is short for Emerging Frontiers in Research and Innovation-Science and Energy in Environmental Design.
NSF Grant URL: https://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward?AWD_ID=1038279&HistoricalAwards=false Video Rating: / 5
Australian Renewable Energy Agency CEO Darren Miller told Sky News Australia has made “incredible progress” in the transition to renewable energy sources.
This comes after an International Energy Agency climate report set out a roadmap to net zero emissions by 2050 which suggested relatively wealthy countries should phase out coal-fired power plants by the end of the decade.
The report did not support calls for some states and federal politicians to continue investment in fossil fuels such as coal-fired power stations or Australia’s plans for a gas-fired recovery.
“The report is really saying what Australian is underway doing with our incredible progress we’ve made in renewable energy to date with almost 25 per cent of electricity coming from renewable sources now,” Mr Miller said.
“There’s sort of no stopping that transition because renewables are now the cheapest form of energy regeneration.
“We just need to figure out how to have that happen in a secure and reliable way as we balance the system and also as we turn our attention to the other parts of the economy outside of the electricity sector.
“It’s important to make progress on technologies to reduce those emissions too”. Video Rating: / 5
