[GWSG] EV battery afterlife; trains hauling pv; democratic fix; Turkey Point threat; slow walking; gas slow-walks by land and sea

[Tilley, Al]

1. When batteries end their useful life in electric vehicles they can still provide stationary power storage, and when that time runs out, they can be recycled. Batteries need to be designed for easy recycling and the facilities must be provided. The EU and China (and, perhaps, Tesla) are showing the way. https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2021/aug/20/electric-car-batteries-what-happens-to-them

2. A consortium of CA firms is experimenting with a solar train which hauls its own power source. https://cleantechnica.com/2021/08/24/diesel-killing-locomotive-of-the-future-runs-on-solar-power/

3. Some have argued that democratic governments are unable to act quickly enough to handle the climate crisis. Kate Aronoff observes that given the policies and history of the world’s governments our best hope lies in more democracy.   https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2021/aug/25/is-democracy-getting-in-the-way-of-saving-the-planet?utm_campaign=Carbon%20Brief%20Daily%20Briefing&utm_content=20210825&utm_medium=email&utm_source=Revue%20Daily

4. The Executive Director of the Miami Waterkeeper group details why the nuclear plant at Turkey Point is a growing danger to the region as the sea rises around it. https://www.miamiherald.com/opinion/op-ed/article253692763.html

5. Bill McKibben’s New Yorker blog this week illustrates how oil companies and their banks are slow-walking the energy transition. “We didn’t ask for Hell when we climbed in the cab, but that may well be where we end up, unless we figure out how to grab the wheel.” He interviews Shanti Gamper-Rahindran on her new book America’s Energy Gamble (Cambridge UP) about the effects of Trump’s efforts to prevent climate action and Biden’s attempts to right the ship. https://link.newyorker.com/view/5be9cafe24c17c6adf39e724esq1y.hv7/b0c28a47

6. More slow-walking? The gas industry must have been happy to see Nature led by the Environmental Defense Fund to suggest in an editorial that we need more time and a couple of new satellites to decide where to cut methane emissions. (Meanwhile, as a beginning, we could tell them to stop developing new sources and to cut leakage below 3% or cease production--and then to cease production.) https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-021-02287-y

7. Maersk has ordered eight methanol-powered ships in the pious hope that eventually the fuel will be produced sustainably (perhaps through carbon capture, a major slow walk in itself). Meanwhile, there is the unnatural gas industry, and the ships can also burn bunker oil. https://www.ttnews.com/articles/maersk-invests-14-billion-methanol-powered-ships#:~:text=A.P.%20Moller-Maersk%20A%2FS%20has%20ordered%20eight%20new%20vessels%2C,Bo%20Christiansen%2C%20vice%20president%20and%20head%20of%20decarbonization.
A less friendly take on Maersk’s purchase: https://cleantechnica.com/2021/08/24/maersk-delivers-150-million-pr-win-for-shipping-industry-with-methanol-ships-purchase/

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