Trading in: Inefficiency for inefficiency

Hybrid vehicles, once on the road, clearly pose a more eco-friendly alternative to the standard automobile; however, if hybrid cars and their environmental impact are analyzed in a full scope that takes into consideration their environmental impact from production to sale, they are not living up to the eco-friendly pitch they are so well known to throw. Hybrid vehicles clearly emit less pollutants than a standard automobile, up to 90% less carbon dioxide than a standard vehicle, as do they offer consumers a more efficient vehicle in terms of miles per gallon; their problems lie in the nickel metal hydride battery that is required to power the vehicle, the novel/complicated technology and production needed to construct the vehicle, and the usage and acquisition of resources needed to fuel the entire manufacturing system of hybrid vehicles.
When analyzing the hybrid vehicle, before laying claims of it to be a godsend, one must analyze the entire package of the hybrid; and recognize that before the car is being driven by it’s owner, the production process is equally, if not more harmful than the production process of conventional automobiles.
Hybrid vehicles implement novel technology that is quite complicated to argue at least. They require a complex battery, an ample amount of copper for wiring the electrical system, a electric as well as petrol engine, and are typically 10% heavier than conventional cars of comparable size. To produce hybrid vehicles in the quantity necessary to make a large impact, new factories would need to be created, or old facilities converted; but either way, the amount of resources needed to complete this step alone pose a large detriment to the environment. Not to say some revolution in our production of vehicles is not paramountly needed, no; but it is arguable that if we converted current factories to produce hybrid vehicles, and made way for new factories, we would be trading in a flawed system for another flawed system.
Currently manufactures of hybrid vehicles and some environmentalists argue that hybrid vehicles are the way to go; and for car companies, creating a desire for consumers to purchase these new “eco-friendly” vehicles has become a new way to increase sales; primarily by tapping into capitalistic ideals and marketing practices. It is arguable to say that most of these people have not considered the entire environmental impact of hybrid vehicles from the beginning of their production to their sale; if they did, they might be stopped in their tracks when the subject of the hybrid battery came up.
Hybrid vehicles require a nickel metal hydride battery to operate, and while this novel technology does not operate off of fossil fuels, to produce it requires a vast and new wave of nickel mining that is indisputably devastating to ecosystems and the planet at large; and let none of us forget, mining requires vast amount of fossil fuels to make the process even possible. Mining for nickel has been at an all time high to produce nickel metal hydride batteries for hybrid vehicles; and aside from the initial environmental impact these batteries pose with mining, programs to properly recycle the batteries are feeble if non existent; and they are ultimately ending up in junk yards once the car is no longer of value. New concerns surrounding nickel metal hydride batteries also stem from the fact that they may possibly leak into water supply’s if not properly disposed of, putting whole communities at risk for water and land contamination that currently nobody is prepared to contain or neutralize.
Aside from the battery that is necessary to run hybrid vehicles, gasoline is still a necessary component to allow the vehicle equal capabilities and performance of a conventional combustion engine. Having stated that, the pollutants emitted when hybrid vehicles run off of gasoline is congruent with that of standard automobiles, thus not yielding much of an improvement in that department. Additionally, when the vehicle is on highways or straining, gasoline will be used as well. As mentioned earlier, hybrid cars are typically about 10% heavier than a conventional car of comparable size, coupled with the fact that the engine must come to a complete stop when the vehicle does, has lead manufactures of hybrids to incorporate petrol engines into them that supplement the engine with gasoline for initial acceleration, highway driving, and in order to give the vehicle performance and power comparable to conventional vehicles.
Even if a large percentage of the population converted to hybrid vehicles, they would still ultimately be producing pollutants and green house gasses quite regularly, because people would have to use the vehicles on highways and in circumstances where the vehicle would be using gasoline. As long as vehicles are using gasoline to fuel their systems, they are still colluding with, and supporting, the fossil fuel industry and all the environmental devastation they are responsible for. It is difficult to justify allotting the funds and environmental damage necessary to produce hybrid cars in abundance, or to make their technology a priority when we have the ability to put the same funds that could be used to develop/produce/ market hybrid cars into developing technology that actually lives up to its face value of truly being eco-friendly.
Overall, the hybrid vehicle, once it is driving around, is an improvement from conventional vehicles; however, there is an intricate and complex production process that must be considered to take an intelligent position on the phenomena of hybrid vehicles, and as far as I have researched, the technology simply has the potential to be better than what hybrids currently offer. Hybrids pose an improvement, but it is trading in a flawed system for another flawed system; vast oil drilling for reduced oil drilling and nickel mining; thus leading me to conclude by stringing in our class’s topic, to say that if the conversion to a vegetarian lifestyle took place, every step of the transformation would be beneficial to the environment. There would be the upfront costs of converting farms to a vegetarian system, but beyond that, there would be no need for an increase in clearing land to make way for farms, nor would there be an increase in the demand for natural resources. There would be a decrease in the demand for all resources-fossil fuels and water are of highest concern, and the land already exists delegated for agriculture, to be transformed from producing meat to producing vegetation. Additionally I will argue, that while not everybody drives or relies on a vehicle, almost every person consumes meat. If meat consumption was reduced or eliminated from diets, it would have an ample impact on the environment for the positive, and can be read about in my previous blogs.

By Belal Albar

SOURCES:
•http://www.ce.cmu.edu/~gdrg/readings/2005/08/31/Environ_Implications_of_Electric_Cars.pdf
• http://www.ocf.berkeley.edu/~coreyp/hybridenvimp.html
• http://www.newcarpark.com/blog/?p=68
• http://www.hybridcars.com/battery-toxicity.html