Vansh Patel0:00 Electric cars are too early for their time and should be considered alternative energy rather than green energy.0:07 My name is Von Spatel.0:08 I'm a second-year Georgia Tech student and I'm here to talk about why electric cars are far too early for their time.0:16 Right now that the main component of an electric car battery is lithium, which is a heavy metal that has to be extracted from the earth.0:25 So there are several environmental implications right now to extract lithium that make electric cars negligible in their energy savings.0:36 They severely displace land, and because lithium is found underground, they must excavate that dirt, and it disrupts many ecosystems.0:48 And not just that, the water around it is severely disturbed and can even be introduced to chemicals.0:58 So many people around the area can be introduced to harmful chemicals in their water.1:03 But not just environmental implications, there's also societal implications.1:09 Several indigenous tribes in Chile have been disrupted and moved from their land because of access to lithium.1:20 And I think right now the harm of lithium extraction far outweighs the minimal energy savings that these cars possess.
Gaines Gunn0:00 Vonch, I really like this topic.0:02 I think the thing that I like most about it is how much it's discussed in politics.0:07 Like, there are so many policymakers that are discussing electric cars, and you know, it's crazy how often they flip flop.0:15 Like, for example, everyone wanted electric cars when the Biden administration was in office, and there was such a heavy push for it, right?0:23 And the majority of those electric cars were Teslas.0:26 But now that Elon Musk was, I guess he had a fall off, but now that he was one of Donald Trump's closest um advisors, Tesla started getting basically destroyed in the streets.0:39 Uh the general population started hating them.0:42 Or it may seem like the people who wanted the electric cars in the first place decided that now they were bad because of the political stance that the creators took.0:53 And I just think it's really interesting how this idea of electric cars, in theory, it sounds great, but when you look at the statistics and where the materials need to come from, like the lithium you you said, for example, and the and and how they're extracted with all of the gasoline burnt by these excavators.1:14 It really makes you think like is the environmental impact that great to where offsets the mining for these, you know?1:23 And then also, I mean, there is the idea and the concern of charging these cars, you know.1:30 A lot of people bring it up, and a lot of people try to say, you know, we will charge them with green energy, right?1:35 We'll charge them with green energy.1:37 But the fact of the matter is the United States of America is a very coal-driven and fossil driven country, and so we are gonna be charging these cars with coal powered plants.1:49 And so if you do the math and you look over the years for how much you're gonna be charging your electric car, it is gonna be a lot of coal burned.1:57 And it's just true because at the end of the day, does it really offset that greatly?2:04 You know, that that's the big question here.2:06 And I think it's something that that um is really interesting and we should look more into.2:11 So thank you for bringing this up, Vonch.2:13 I love it.