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124 comments on Metal Minerals Scarcity and the Elements of Hope

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Gail the Actuary on July 9, 2009 - 10:23am Permalink | Subthread | Comments top

Thanks, Andre for this post/presentation.

In many ways, this post is more troubling that your earlier post. The low amounts discovered in recent years and the high net imports of rare minerals are especially concerns.

You say (Slide 19)

Forget large scale conversion toward alternative energy sources

Forget large-scale electrification of land transport

Do you see any chance that the use of less rare minerals for say, batteries, will permit BAU?

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Andre Diederen on July 10, 2009 - 2:56am Permalink | Subthread | Parent | Comments top

Hi Gail,

I believe in the need for electrification of part of (land-based) transport, but I very much doubt that we will be able to swap from hundreds of millions of fossil fuel powered vehicles to the same extravagant amount of electric vehicles.

Batteries are expensive and lack the performance offered by liquid fuels. The metals needed for the best batteries are also the first to show cost constraints (lithium, nickel, cobalt). Just the battery pack for an electrified Volkswagen Golf costs 40,000 Euros (around twice the price of an normal Volkswagen Golf).

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124 comments on Metal Minerals Scarcity and the Elements of Hope

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