Tue May 25, 2021, 12:08 PM
mahatmakanejeeves (36,432 posts)
Exclusive: Biden looks abroad for electric vehicle metals, in blow to U.S. miners
Source: Reuters
May 25, 2021
11:03 AM EDT
Energy
Exclusive: Biden looks abroad for electric vehicle metals, in blow to U.S. miners
Ernest Scheyder Trevor Hunnicutt
U.S. President Joe Biden will rely on ally countries to supply the bulk of the metals needed to build electric vehicles and focus on processing them domestically into battery parts, part of a strategy designed to placate environmentalists, two administration officials with direct knowledge told Reuters.
The plans will be a blow to U.S. miners who had hoped Biden would rely primarily on domestically sourced metals, as his campaign had signaled last autumn, to help fulfill his ambitions for a less carbon-intensive economy.
Rather than focus on permitting more U.S. mines, Biden's team is more focused on creating jobs that process minerals domestically into electric vehicle (EV) battery parts, according to the people. ... Such a plan would help cut U.S. reliance on industry leader China for EV materials while also enticing unions with manufacturing work and, in theory, reduce pandemic-fueled unemployment.
{snip}
"It's not that hard to dig a hole. What's hard is getting that stuff out and getting it to processing facilities. That's what the U.S. government is focused on," said one of the sources. ... The approach would see the United States rely on Canada, Australia, and Brazil - among others - to produce most of the critical raw materials needed, while it competes for higher-value jobs turning those minerals into computer chips and batteries, according to the two sources.
{snip}
Read more: https://www.reuters.com/business/energy/biden-looks-abroad-electric-vehicle-metals-blow-us-miners-2021-05-25/
Hat tip, Lauren Boebert
It's on Twitter.
https://www.democraticunderground.com/10142748402What's the big deal? Mining? Nothing to it--it's not that hard to dig a hole.
Just like Bloomberg saying that there's nothing to farming--You dig a hole, you put a seed in, you put dirt on top, add water, up comes the corn.
Miners--along with the farmers--need to quit their bellyaching and learn to code and learn how to build solar panels and such.
If the primitives can't hate these elitist know-nothings for looking down their noses on ordinary hard working people with contempt, you'd think they could at least hate them for lying to them.
Biden pisses down their backs and tells them it's raining and they defend him.
Response to mahatmakanejeeves (Original post)Tue May 25, 2021, 12:39 PM
maxsolomon (24,322 posts)
5. We need to save these minerals for when we have to leave the planet.
I applaud this iron-fisted environmentalist futurism.
Response to mahatmakanejeeves (Original post)Tue May 25, 2021, 01:22 PM
Star Member George II (62,279 posts)
12. I don't see this as a problem.
Response to mahatmakanejeeves (Original post)Tue May 25, 2021, 02:41 PM
OneCrazyDiamond (923 posts)
15. I seem to recall a lot of abandoned mines causing problems.
It sounds like this is a good idea.
Response to mahatmakanejeeves (Original post)Tue May 25, 2021, 01:17 PM
Star Member Bayard (11,846 posts)
11. This will get played by rethuglicans
Broken campaign promises, ya know--buy American.
It won't get played by republicans, it will get pointed out by republicans--Biden lied!
Response to Hekate (Reply #20)Tue May 25, 2021, 04:29 PM
Star Member maxrandb (11,936 posts)
25. This is such bullshit, miner-worship horseshit
We truly do suck as a country.
For a god damned century, we have immortalized and fetishized the "miner"
They are constantly held up as the epitome of the "hard-scrabble, salt-of-the-earth, hard-working" 'Murikan Middle Class.
There are 158,000 Americans employed by the United States Mining Industry...
There are 1,319,000 Accountants!
There are 3,500,000 Teachers!
Nothing against Miners, my grandfather worked the mines around Corning, OH, but how we came to use miners as the example of workers whose jobs are so much more important and deserving of protections than other, much large workforce, is, quite frankly, MADDENING.
Fetishizing miners and miner worship--MADDENING!
Response to maxrandb (Reply #25)Tue May 25, 2021, 05:43 PM
Star Member Hekate (68,641 posts)
28. Right. I'd be more impressed with "concern" for miners if they were not still dying of black lung
...and worse, now that the coal has to be drilled out of layers of what, quartz? Whatever, it sickens workers even faster
Not everybody has enough brains to make a fortune reselling thrift store finds--some of us have to go out and make a living by doing real work.
