Chilling Read. Deep-sea minerals could meet the demands of battery supply chains - but should they?

[Miguelito Loveless]

3. Cobalt is being phased out of batteries

Copper is a highly recycled metal. Lithium supplies on land are quite substantial, and can meet the growing battery demand for some time. Heck, they are opening up hard rock lithium mines closed in the 90s as unprofitable. The major metal in need right now us nickel, which still has more than adequate land-based supply, that just needs to scale up production.

Deep sea mining is HIGHLY unlikely due to the huge cost and the environmental headaches. Please consider the source of this story.

The fossil fuel industry is bending over backwards to discredit EVs and renewable energy generation. The cobalt stories are popping up again (the most recent in Forbes) claiming that EV battery production will result in child slave labor, glossing over the fact that the oil industry (refining) and the legacy auto industry (catalytic converters) are a MUCH larger consumer of cobalt than the EV industry, and again, cobalt is being phased out of batteries.

The truth is every EV bought means 600-800 gallons of petroleum is not burned annually. That is called "demand destruction" by the oil industry, and means massive loss of profits for them. The NG industry is also starting to fight building code bans on gas heating, because electric heat pumps are more energy efficient, and far cleaner.

That said NO consumer good can be produced without the consumption of fuel, resources, and pollution. The issue is that gasoline/diesel/natural gas can be burned ONCE. Electricity from the sun (solar/wind/hydro) can be produced without burning anything, or digging anything out of the ground. In fact, solar/wind/hydro is the only power generation where the fuel comes to the generator.