Circular firing squad? Green groups resist projects needed to meet climate goals they set

A fight for lithium in the Nevada desert underscores how some of the most vocal opponents of the transition to wind, solar and electric vehicles are sometimes the very environmental groups that advocate for the transition in their quest to lower carbon emissions.

The Biden administration announced in April that it intended to enact some of the highest air pollution standards in the world for automobiles. In addition to other emission restrictions, the Environmental Protection Administration rules would require 67% of new passenger vehicles sold in the U.S. to be electric by 2032.

The Center for Biological Diversity condemned the proposed rules because they don’t go far enough.

According to the International Energy Agency, an electric vehicle requires six times more minerals than a conventional vehicle.

To make a half-ton EV battery, 250 tons of materials have to be processed for all the lithium, graphite, copper, nickel, aluminum, zink, neodymium, and manganese that goes into it, according to Mark Mills, senior fellow of the Manhattan Institute.

While the CBD wants to see more aggressive EV mandates than the EPA is proposing, the group also oppose the lithium mines that would help make that happen.

In 2021, the CBD successfully sued the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service to protect a type of buckwheat that would have been impacted by a proposed lithium mine in Nevada.

At another proposed lithium mine in Nevada, the Western Watersheds Project intends to sue to protect a species of snail from the mine.

Besides EVs, wind turbines and solar panels also need a supply of the critical minerals.

Kenny Stein, vice president for policy at the Institute for Energy Research, tells Just the News that environmental groups are ignoring the practical realities of green industrialization.

“There are trade-offs to any energy source," he said. "You have to burn something to get it. You have to build something to get it."

Furthermore, Stein said, opposing the development of mines in the U.S. will result in the critical minerals being sourced from countries with fewer environmental regulations.

It’s not just the impacts of mining that generate opposition from environmentalists. It’s also the wind and solar farms themselves and the associated transmission lines.

Local opposition over environmental impacts stalled a high-voltage transmission line for two years that will transport hydroelectric power from Canada to New England.

Meanwhile, the U.S. will need to double its high-voltage transmission capacity to derive 90% of its electricity from renewable sources, the National Renewable Energy Laboratory estimates.

The wind and solar farms also require large amounts of land.

According to a 2021 Princeton University study, expanding wind and solar capacity by 10% annually to 2030 would require a land area equal to that of South Dakota.

The vast tracts needed for such projects also poses potential harm to wildlife.

Environmentalists and others think offshore wind projects are potentially linked to an increase in the deaths of whales in the past several years but some have appeared reluctant to press the matter. 

The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration says, "There is no scientific evidence that noise resulting from offshore wind site characterization surveys could potentially cause mortality of whales. There are no known links between recent large whale mortalities and ongoing offshore wind surveys."

Still, Stein argues, if oil and gas development were suspected the response from environmental groups would be swift.

“When the Trump administration was just considering allowing offshore exploration to see if there’s oil and gas on the East Coast, these environmentalists had a meltdown about how it’s going to hurt whales and manatees,” he said.

Energy and environmental policy expert Steve Goreham suspects that when global warming activism falls out of fashion activists will seek new environmental causes.

“Maybe they’ll eventually get out there and start tearing down wind turbines," he said. "We’ll see. I don’t know if I will live that long."

However, Goreham argued the economic realities of green energy will likely diminish support longer before environmental groups get on board.

He thinks that as more wind and solar is placed on the grid prices will rise and the grid will become unreliable.

The resulting high energy bills and regular blackouts during inclement weather, Goreham continues, will further shift public opinion.

“It’s going to take a decade or two, but it’s all going to come crashing down," he said. "And then we’re going to get back to a sensible energy policy."

The pushback could already be underway in Europe, with delays in a number of energy efficiency, electric vehicle, and coal-fired power plant retirement targets in the United Kingdom, Germany, Italy and Poland.

Stein also pointed to European countries walking back their commitments as the shift that’s likely to turn energy policy, which has little to do with any environmental concerns.

“They’re walking back those commitments because one, they’re probably impossible, and two, they’re extremely expensive to even attempt. In a democratic country, eventually that becomes a problem,” Stein said.

He said he doesn’t think that the committed environmental lobby will ever reverse their support for wind and solar, even as the impacts become more obvious over time.

“Wind and solar are not free of environmental impacts. It's just a question of the different kinds of environmental impact that you get,” Stein said.

“The draft rule fails to require any improvement in the tens of millions of new gas-guzzlers, and even the strongest option falls well short of the 75% pollution cut necessary to protect our planet. Biden shouldn’t let automakers’ can’t-do attitude sabotage his best shot at cutting carbon emissions,” the group’s director, Dan Becker, said in a statement.

With 240,000 miles of transmission lines currently in the U.S, according to energy writer Robert Bryce, running the grid on renewables will require enough transmission lines to circle the Earth 10 times.