If you have been reading this blog for long, you’ll know that I like the idea of electric cars as long as they are viable, long-distance modes of transportation. The distance requirements stem from the fact that if you’re in Montana, you can’t visit too many places without making a round trip of 150 miles or so. But some manufacturers seem to be getting that one under control.

More and more people are waking up and getting involved in the design and production of electric cars and batteries, which is sure to have them begin populating our roads over the next few years. The thing that worries me about that is the batteries. The current versions use pretty large lithium batteries.

So, when one of those vehicles ends up at a scrap yard, what happens to the battery(ies)? How do they get recycled? Who takes them out of the vehicle? Who’s responsible for the correct disposal? I believe somebody must have already thought of these questions and has answers – are you the one?

Well, the final numbers are in and the program even spent less than the allotted $3 billion. Government authorities are calling it a huge success. What I am looking for is the aftermath. What is going to happen now at the dealerships and the automakers? I sure hope I am wrong – with all my heart I hope I am wrong. If I am right, I would be willing to bet that we won’t hear much about how this program took the industry back toward the brink of collapse – it will be blamed on something else. Can you just see me shaking my head?

There has been a lot of pressure applied lately to begin the extinction of plastic grocery bags. A wide variety of bills and ordinances have come up across the nation as cities, counties and states have decided to try and do their part in plastic bag elimination. Of course, it wasn’t shocking at all to learn that Seattle, Washington was one of the first, passing a city ordinance imposing a $0.20 tax per bag. What is somewhat shocking is the recent vote to repeal this ordinance. It seems residents are more interested in recycling bags than doing away with them. It just goes to show how truly diverse opinions are about this subject. So where do you sit – get rid of the bags, recycle them, make them biodegradable?

I have asserted before that convenience is one of the most important things to getting people to recycle. This makes it difficult to implement any long-term recycling program that works because convenience costs money. The biggest factor causing this necessity for convenience is the ease of getting what we want when we want it. We have become so used to convenience in everything we do, it has bred a sort of “laziness” in us all so that even when faced with obvious good decisions such as recycling or not being wasteful, we only make the “best” decision when it is convenient or if we get something in return right now. And if you think the rising generation is more in tune with issues of conservation of resources, read this article. If we could just get most people to stop looking at every action with the “what’s in it for me” syndrome, I think we could finally take huge leaps forward in reducing waste, poverty, illness, greed, etc.

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