Hybrid waste article:
Hybrid vehicle implications:
http://pubs.acs.org/doi/abs/10.1021/es702178s
Toyota Prius Harmony:
While car companies may give the impression that they are on the green side, it is visible that they are really just concerned with selling another product. Advertisement agencies have been able to take advantage of the consumer’s care for the environment and manipulate it. Consumers are told that if they buy a hybrid car with great gas mileage then they will be saving the planet and will be protecting the younger generations. Although this point is partially true you have to look at the process of creating one of these hybrid cars. For instance, the production that goes into making a Toyota Prius is one that is quite costly towards the environment. According to writer Dave Roos of HowStuffWorks.com, “in 2007, a report commissioned by an auto industry trade group insisted that when you factor in the waste generated during production, the notoriously gas-guzzling Hummer is actually greener than the Prius” (Roos). This shows that although the car does promote environmentally friendly miles per gallon it is actually damaging towards the environment. Not only is the waste produced by a hybrid car terrible for the surroundings, but the manufacturing factor is terrible as well. The process of building a lithium-ion battery takes incredible amounts of energy to produce, more so than a conventional car. They rely on mining nickel, copper and rare-earth metals like lithium, which are responsible for higher sulfur oxide emissions (Constantine Samaras).
Advertisements for the Prius portray a harmonious balance between “nature and machine,” which is obviously not true. Yet when someone sees an advertisement and does not know the whole story one would easily be manipulated by how the car is shown. I too have been persuaded by these hybrid cars. When one watches a commercial about a hybrid car there are noticeable appealing attributes. For example, the cheerful music, the smooth voice of the narrator in the background and the peacefulness that is displayed, are all reasons that make it apparent to buy this car. I believe this is true for many people who watch these adverts and can easily fall victim to the advertisement company’s ability to shape the minds of the audience. I thought how great it would be to own a hybrid because I would be doing my part to help protect the environment and show my own environmental justice, but I was wrong. I also believe that this is like the article Art in a Changing Climate by Bill McKibben because it shows how art can help bring harmony between people and the environment and these ads almost create the same type of grassroots efforts. After researching and looking into the production of a hybrid vehicle it is easily discoverable that it is not worth it in some aspects.
I agree with many of the points made in this blog. It mirrors my own blog post for the week on how the NFL is using the green movement as a public relations piece to gain favor while also possibly switching mainly to clean energy to power their stadiums to save money in the long run. Also to further this point, I do not have the research at my disposal currently but a few years back I took a environmental economics class at my old university and the teacher was very into exposing these same hypocrisies. One point he made is that researchers have looked into if all gasoline cars where switched to their electronic counterparts, that require plugging in, and they determined there would be no beneficial impact for the environment, and that the environment actually may be worse off because of the strain needed to produce this power from adding many new power plants, as these power plants do not emit “clean” energy. This claim could also be shrouded or have a source from oil companies that do not want to see the switch, but the main point is that currently all of our mass energy needs are far from being “clean” energy and a new technology must be produced in order to gain the sustainable long term clean energy many environmentalists desire.