• Womble@lemmy.world
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    1 year ago

    if you want to be like that nothing is. Solar requires vast amounts of rare earths to be mined and wind requires huge amount of unrecylable blades and generators to be produced. On total lifecyle damage to the environment all three are very low but non zero.

    • CookieJarObserver@sh.itjust.works
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      1 year ago

      Solar requires vast amounts of rare earths to be mined

      Not true, the newest solar panels don’t need rare earths at that scale.

      and wind requires huge amount of unrecylable blades and generators to be produced.

      Both are recyclable and even if they were not they are not radioactive, poisonous or otherwise hazardous… The blades are from a Artificial resin And glas fiber and the generators are from normal industrial materials like iron aluminum and copper.

      Over all actual renewables are much more environmentally friendly and have less emissions. But yes they are also not absolutely zero emission (even though that being possible)

      • Womble@lemmy.world
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        1 year ago

        Huh, i thought they did require rare earths in construction, but apparently not. They do require silicon wafers boron and phosporus, and small instalations typically come with large li-ion bateries which clearly do require lithium. But the panels themselves dont. Still my point stand that ANY method of generation requires industrial activity which has downsides, pretending nuear is unique in this is dishonest.

        Please dont call people trolls just because you disagree with them, this isnt reddit.

        • schroedingershat@lemmy.world
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          1 year ago

          Lithiun is also not a rare earth, and is not required (doubly so in sweden). Even if you do choose to use it, you need it in significantly smaller quantities than uranium, and mining it is significantly lower impact.

          The mining impact of PV and onshore wind is acceptably small (although should still be reduced further), the orders of magnitude worse impact of digging up or leeching uranium ore with lower energy density than coal, poisoning indiginous communities with the milling waste and then never cleaning it up is not.

          You’re sharing praeger U propaganda talking points. This is trolling.

        • Aesthesiaphilia@kbin.social
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          1 year ago

          iirc earlier solar panel construction required rare earths

          In the last 10-15 years they’ve moved to more abundant materials