Lithium-ion batteries for electric vehicles need to be studied

When environmentalists shout "buy electric cars to save the planet" and when Tesla owners talk about how environmentally friendly it is, some wonder: "does Tesla and other electric cars really look that good?" The answer to that question may surprise owners of electric vehicles such as Tesla, Volt and Leaf. Yes, your Tesla car looks green on the outside, but for people who really know its cost, it's a liability to the environment.

After a series of studies on the environmental costs of electric vehicles, the lithium-ion batteries used in electric vehicles were the focus of their research work, which they released to the public. The results show that the environmental gap between cars with internal combustion engines and electric vehicles is not as great as people think. If carbon emissions are not taken into account, the environmental damage caused by the manufacturing of lithium batteries cannot be ignored.

Is electric cars really green?

How are lithium batteries made?

Carl Sagan has a wise saying: "We live in a society that depends on technology to operate cleverly, but most people in this society are half-understanding of technology. Karl Sagan also directly mentioned lithium batteries. Anyone looking around within three feet can find something made with lithium battery technology, but in fact, many people don't know anything about lithium battery technology.

How does a lithium battery work? Like other batteries, the working principle of a lithium battery is that the positive and negative two electrodes of the battery react chemically with the electrolyte. Immediately, a flowing charge is generated between the positive (positively charged) and negative (negatively charged) electrodes of the lithium battery., IE, current. Lithium metal can be used to make high-performance batteries because lithium metal has good conductivity and is a high-quality electrolyte that produces high potential. Of course, the electrochemical reaction of the lithium battery can be reversed, allowing the lithium battery to be repeatedly charged and discharged.

Although lithium batteries have various advantages, they also have many disadvantages:

Lithium metal is a substance that can cause harm to the environment.

Lithium metal is flammable and can react violently with many substances, as evidenced by photographs of a lithium battery combustion accident in the Tesla electric car, but this lithium battery combustion accident is only one of the many hazards that lithium metal can cause.

The United States Environmental Protection Agency believes that strong fluxes used to make lithium metal electrolytes and battery cathode can lead to various diseases including cancer and nervous system diseases. In particular, cobalt metal used to make compressed high-power lithium batteries is a highly carcinogenic poison. As long as someone is exposed to cobalt metal, his lungs, nerves, and respiratory tract are highly likely to develop lesions.

Now, people have discovered a pattern: as long as it is used to make industrial fluxes, it is harmful to the environment and humans. It is well known that industrial fluxes are used extensively in battery manufacturing.

Other substances used to make lithium batteries may not be so harmful, but none of them are harmless. In terms of carcinogenicity, lithium iron film materials used to produce low energy density are not as high as cobalt metals, but the negative effects of lithium iron film materials on organisms cannot be ignored.

Is electric cars becoming more and more popular?

Obviously, there are environmental costs of making electric cars and plug-in hybrid cars. So what is the impact of lithium-ion batteries on the Arctic? Norway has published a study on the impact of the life cycle of electric vehicles on global warming potential, which looks at the entire process from the start of production of the mineral materials needed to make electric vehicles to their end-of-life recycling. Prior to Norway's release of the study, no other study had looked into the energy-intensive manufacturing process for electric cars, ignoring the important point that electric cars are no better environmentally friendly than cars powered by internal combustion engines.

In terms of global warming potential impact, the negative impact of electric vehicles is 24% lower than that of gasoline engine vehicles, while the negative impact of electric vehicles is 10% to 14% lower than diesel engine vehicles. These numbers for electric cars look good, but the situation is completely different if you consider the source of electricity used in electric cars. If the electricity used by electric vehicles is produced using coal as fuel, the negative impact of electric vehicles on the environment is 17% to 27% higher than that of diesel and gasoline engines.

The above data are based on the findings of studies conducted in the European power production structure. The power sources in the European region focus onspecial power, hydropower and other renewable energy generation, which is higher than the rest of the world.

The impact of electric vehicles on global warming potential is directly affected by natural gas, which is generally regarded as clean fossil fuel. If electric vehicles use electricity produced using natural gas as fuel, the negative impact on the environment is only 12 % lower than that of gasoline engines. It is basically the same as a diesel engine.

It is heartbreaking that if the electricity used by electric vehicles is produced using coal as fuel, the negative impact on the environment will be 17% to 27% higher than that of diesel or gasoline engines. This situation is particularly serious in the United States, where US coal-fired power generation accounts for 45% of total US electricity generation; in the three US states of Tennessee, Pennsylvania, and Ohio, the source of electricity is almost entirely coal-fired. For the US states with large populations, buying an electric car will not only poison the environment, but will also have a negative impact on global warming, and its environmental impact will be much greater than that of a gasoline engine car.

Why would electric cars, once considered "zero emissions", cause so much pollution to the environment? The answer is simple: the production of electric car batteries consumes a lot of electricity. The initial generation of an electric car and battery accounted for about 40 % of the carbon emissions of electric vehicles throughout their life cycle, which is twice the carbon emissions of a gasoline-powered car.

If an electric car uses electricity from environmentally friendly energy sources such as hydropower or wind power, its initial high carbon emissions can be reduced; If the electricity used by an electric car were derived from fossil fuels, the initial energy cost of the electric car would be hardly lower than that of a gasoline or diesel engine car, and may even be higher than both.

Previous assessments have overlooked the high energy costs involved in producing electric vehicles and have seen only one thing: that coal is technically more efficient than an internal combustion engine. In fact, in terms of carbon emissions, if the same energy is produced for cars to drive, coal emissions are twice as large as those of ordinary internal combustion engines. Therefore, only by improving the efficiency of electric vehicles can they make up for the carbon emissions generated on the production line.

"No war for oil! No! No war for lithium! "

Before converting an internal-combustion car into an electric one, one also has to consider the geopolitical implications. There is a view that, as long as we use electric cars, we can get rid of dependence on foreign oil companies or large oil companies. In fact, it is possible to shift from "dependence on big oil companies" to "reliance on big lithium products companies".

Sales of lithium batteries are expected to reach $22.5 billion over the next three years and could double by the end of the decade. These figures are small compared to the sales of petroleum products but will change if customers continue to buy electric cars or trucks.

As for getting rid of dependence on foreign raw materials, huh ... lithium metals are not rare, but there are few minerals worth exploiting. To the dismay of the US and Europe, the big lithium-metal mines are in countries such as Bolivia, China, and war-torn Afghanistan, none of which has a good environmental record.

Considering that most lithium batteries sold in the market are made in China, people can not help but pay attention to the pollution problem of lithium battery production. It is known that environmental protection is a problem that can not be ignored. Now, under pressure from China to sell lithium batteries to other countries at low prices, environmental concerns are growing.

Brief summary

Regardless of the form of development, electric vehicles are the trend of personal transportation development in the future. But electric vehicles are not a panacea for the current competitive clean energy market and cannot solve all the environmental problems. With the advent of new technologies, electric vehicles will also bring a series of new problems that we should be aware of before we form an irreversible dependence on new technology.

Finally, we do not want the blind optimism caused by electric cars to become the mainstream view; Otherwise, electric vehicles will have a negative impact on global warming and global energy consumption.

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