Da Techguy's (no longer backup) Blog

By Christopher Harper

Going green may end up making many of us see red, particularly since the Brandon administration plans to force automakers to make 50% of all automobiles electric by 2030.

All you have to do is look at the issue with one important mineral in developing a “green” car: lithium.

First, the cars will be significantly more expensive. The cost of lithium has increased geometrically as governments push for so-called “green” technology. Lithium, a mineral that is key for electric car batteries, has skyrocketed more than 250% over the last 12 months, hitting its highest level ever, according to an industry index from Benchmark Mineral Intelligence

The average cost of an electric-vehicle battery ran $157 per kilowatt hour, a measure of energy capacity, in 2021, the Department of Energy said in October. That means a typical EV battery is between $6,000 and $7,000, a Bloomberg analysis showed.

Battery costs would need to come down to $100 per kilowatt hour for overall EV prices to compete with traditional internal combustion engine cars, according to Bloomberg. The price of lithium will play a large role in achieving that goal.

Second, the United States has limited lithium resources, while China and Russia have vast amounts of the mineral. China dominates the battery processing market, and it is responsible for about 80% of global battery chemical refining capacity.

Depending on China and Russia for such minerals is a bad option in anyone’s book. Just think about how the U.S. dependence on foreign oil dominated American economic and foreign policy for decades.

Third, a big surprise: environmentalists, who say they want “green” energy, don’t want the mining industry to provide it from the United States.

Lithium Americas proposed to mine lithium on a dormant volcano in Nevada. However, the firm has yet to mine any lithium due to pushback from environmentalists and ongoing lawsuits related to allegations that the federal government approved the company’s mining permit too quickly.

But there’s more. Lithium isn’t technically what’s known as a “rare-earth mineral” because there’s supposedly enough to go around. We’ll see once the developed countries force most people to buy an electric vehicle.

China mines over 70% of the world’s rare earths and is responsible for 90% of the complex process of turning them into magnets used in electric vehicles and other “green” technologies, such as windmills.

Not surprisingly, environmentalists are also holding up permissions to mine rare earths in the United States.

Isn’t it time to realize that the movement toward “green” energy needs to pause to determine what economic and political costs are associated with such a radical change in the energy needs of the United States?

Do we really want to be dependent on China for our energy?

The answers seem pretty obvious to me.

there was an amazing story that came out yesterday concerning the death rate in the US:

Davison said the increase in deaths represents “huge, huge numbers,” and that’s it’s not elderly people who are dying, but “primarily working-age people 18 to 64” who are the employees of companies that have group life insurance plans through OneAmerica.

“And what we saw just in third quarter, we’re seeing it continue into fourth quarter, is that death rates are up 40% over what they were pre-pandemic,” he said.

“Just to give you an idea of how bad that is, a three-sigma or a one-in-200-year catastrophe would be 10% increase over pre-pandemic,” he said. “So 40% is just unheard of.””

Gee what might this large group of working people across the country have in common?

I predict that before election day 2022 and certainly during the 2024 election the media will pivot to giving credit to Donald Trump for the vaccines (we’ve already seen that begin from the White House) but I also predict that at the time said pivot takes place, the credit will have turned to blame.

A while back I wrote a piece about what what both Tom Brady and Bill Belichick had to do in order to be considered successful in their new situations: Brady in Tampa Bay and Belichick in New England.

It goes without saying that Brady winning a superbowl means that he is a success and everything else is gravy.

But now with one game to go in the Season the New England Patriots are back in the playoffs and more importantly with a 10-6 record after week 17 would be in the playoffs even if another playoff team was not added.

Additionally they can still win their division if they win and the Bills lose or tie and while it’s unlikely that the Chief and Titans also somehow implode they could still actually end up as the top seed and get a 1st round bye

This is the first time that Bill has made the playoffs with a starting QB not named Tom Brady and with one game left to the season puts his record as a head coach in games when Brady has not started at 35-40 with the potential to get to .500 in non Brady games sometime next season.

Given these facts we have to conclude that Bill Belichick has not only had a successful season (no matter what happens in the playoffs as there are no pushovers in this field) and if Zac Taylor’s Bengals were not tearing up the league the top contender for coach of the year.

I would not be surprised if they are bounced in the 1st round by Buffalo, or the Chiefs, or the Bengals or the Titans or, if they win the division the Colts. But neither would I be surprised if they won a playoff game against any of these teams.

I’m sure the NFL is praying for a Brady vs Belicheck superbowl but while it’s unwise to ever bet against Brady I think it’s unlikely that Bill and Mac Jones can get past that really tough field to set up that matchup.

But no matter how you slice it we must conclude that Bill, like Tom have proved to anyone that doubts it, that both of them deserve all the credit in the world for the six superbowls that they were able to win together and the nine that they appeared in .