A Prius..... Not good for the enviroment.

I've known about this for a while,

Prius is partly driven by a battery which contains nickel. The nickel is mined and smelted at a plant in Sudbury, Ontario. This plant has caused so much environmental damage to the surrounding environment that NASA has used the dead zone around the plant to test moon rovers. The area around the plant is devoid of any life for miles.

The plant is the source of all the nickel found in a Prius' battery and Toyota purchases 1,000 tons annually. Dubbed the Superstack, the plague-factory has spread sulfur dioxide across northern Ontario, becoming every environmentalist's nightmare.

"The acid rain around Sudbury was so bad it destroyed all the plants and the soil slid down off the hillside," said Canadian Greenpeace energy-coordinator David Martin during an interview with Mail, a British-based newspaper.
All of this would be bad enough in and of itself; however, the journey to make a hybrid doesn't end there.

The nickel produced by this disastrous plant is shipped via massive container ship to the largest nickel refinery in Europe. From there, the nickel hops over to China to produce nickel foam. From there, it goes to Japan. Finally, the completed batteries are shipped to the United States, finalizing the around-the-world trip required to produce a single Prius battery. Are these not sounding less and less like environmentally sound cars and more like a farce?

How very green toyota....

Good post.

It seems that behind every headline grabbing 'green' achievement there is a whole catalogue of 'not so green' goings-on.

I wasn't aware of this (the Prius batteries) before so it's useful to know. Sooner or later it is quite feasible that one of those container ships will go down in transit; I wonder what scale of environmental disater that would be?

Anyone fancy going to the press with this? Might hurt Toyata a lil

It's been in the press a load. It's not all exactly true. Or it is true, but largely overstated.

Nevertheless, it is the case that there are non-hybrid cars which are better for the environment than the Prius - but in order for hybrid technology to evolve, cars like the Prius have to exist. You have to have a mkI before you can have a mkII...

Originally Posted by bazza

... but in order for hybrid technology to evolve, cars like the Prius have to exist. You have to have a mkI before you can have a mkII...

Good call

Its pretty well known, even mentioned on Top Gear (at least once), but Toyota keep giving free cars to 'celebrities' and pay to have them in high income films as product placement thereby obtaining discreet marketing and giving the impression everyone one loves them enough ot use them everywhere, at least everywhere seen on tv etc.
They are about as ozone friendly as the container ships the nickel is transported on.
Rock on the yoghurt weaving ignorant.

Originally Posted by bazza

cars like the Prius have to exist. You have to have a mkI before you can have a mkII...

But surely MkII will do even more damage than MkI

If you ask me ....... and I know you didn't, but i'm going to say it anyway.

Toyota Prius - one 'r' too many, one 'o' too few.

Originally Posted by harrythesnotgobbler

Its pretty well known, even mentioned on Top Gear (at least once), but Toyota keep giving free cars to 'celebrities'

Yup, the exact same celebrities that drive around L.A. in their shiny new free Prius, slavering on about 'saving the environment'... and then getting on a private jet with their hairdresser, manicurist and nipple tweaker and flying half way around the world to a film premiere. Pillocks.

Nipple tweaker - now theres a career that was never offered to me when I left school>

The hybrid idea was created for Californias
urban pollution zero/reduced emissions
legislation.

It is a deadend technology that will end up
doing more environmental damage than something
like VW's bluemotion initiatives or MCE 5.


I see Arnie has bailed out Tesla, which is
a good longterm investment. Bravo Governator

Now they need to invest in Nuclear to power
these 'leccy cars.

Originally Posted by OperationAlfa

But surely MkII will do even more damage than MkI

Erm... not sure why you say that?

You would expect better battery technology to result in more efficiency and longer life-time. Also possibly cleaner materials for the making of the batteries.

As Nev says though, for this to achieve anything other than localised reduction in pollution, we need to have ways of generating the electricity in the first place which are green.

Originally Posted by Nev

The hybrid idea was created for Californias
urban pollution zero/reduced emissions
legislation.

It is a deadend technology that will end up
doing more environmental damage than something
like VW's bluemotion initiatives or MCE 5.


I see Arnie has bailed out Tesla, which is
a good longterm investment. Bravo Governator

Now they need to invest in Nuclear to power
these 'leccy cars.

California had an electric car programme years ago. General motors rolled out the EV1, and the car itself was a resounding success, the drivers loved it, and there was a huge waiting list to get one.

Then general motors pulled the plug (excuse the pun) and sued the California governors and forced them in the court of law to reverse the regulations for production of zero emission vehicles.
Had those regulations been enforced, the electirc vehicle would probably be quite commonplace by now.

related, but o/t slighty.

One high profile celeb ordered a Lexus hybrid. Lexus, keen to exhibit the good customer service that has thus far defined the brand, flew the car to the owner. 'Green' owner, rightly, went ape. Why make an a green car and then fly the damn thing to me? Enjoy the irony; Toyota's desire to ride on the shirt tails of those celebs who support green concerns, has negated its green creds as it bum licks its buyers. Which proves this; Toyota could not give a hoot about being green - it cares about shifting metal, and it'll pretend to be 'green' if it thinks that's what'll bump up the volumes.

g

Just another hypocrite for all the enviromentalists out there.

Originally Posted by Scudetto

related, but o/t slighty.

One high profile celeb ordered a Lexus hybrid. Lexus, keen to exhibit the good customer service that has thus far defined the brand, flew the car to the owner. 'Green' owner, rightly, went ape. Why make an a green car and then fly the damn thing to me? Enjoy the irony; Toyota's desire to ride on the shirt tails of those celebs who support green concerns, has negated its green creds as it bum licks its buyers. Which proves this; Toyota could not give a hoot about being green - it cares about shifting metal, and it'll pretend to be 'green' if it thinks that's what'll bump up the volumes.

g

Paul McCarthy I think it was..

Prius Versus HUMMER: Exploding the Myth - The Car Connection

Sadly I have lost the list of Cars.

The 156 was about 3/4 the way down

Automotive Energy

The Company that did the Study

Yet more marketing bull kaka from Toyota and their Pious.

Prius hybrid to get rooftop solar panel | The Register


Fitting a "solar panel" to a car has already been done.
Audi have it as an option for their models.
It provides enough juice to run the ventilation fan whilst
the car is stationary. That's it.

Surely the best way to be green would be to not race at all?

Toyota Hybrid to race at Le Mans...

Originally Posted by Scudetto

related, but o/t slighty.

One high profile celeb ordered a Lexus hybrid. Lexus, keen to exhibit the good customer service that has thus far defined the brand, flew the car to the owner. 'Green' owner, rightly, went ape. Why make an a green car and then fly the damn thing to me? Enjoy the irony; Toyota's desire to ride on the shirt tails of those celebs who support green concerns, has negated its green creds as it bum licks its buyers. Which proves this; Toyota could not give a hoot about being green - it cares about shifting metal, and it'll pretend to be 'green' if it thinks that's what'll bump up the volumes.

g

I read once that once Lexus had some form of online forum where people could speak to celebrity owners of hybrid cars, one of whom was Bob Geldof.

Asked why he chose hybrid, he said that he bought it to avoid the congestion charge.