lead consumption and pollution in china

[starbits]

This is an article about lead pollution in china, but there were a couple interesting statements.

"China is the world's biggest consumer of refined lead, and battery making accounts for 70 percent of that consumption, which is likely to grow to 4.1 million tonnes in 2011."

"About three-quarters of lead-acid battery manufacturing plants in China could be phased out in the next 2 to 3 years after Beijing launched a crackdown, an industry body said last month."

Just because the plants are phased out doesn't mean they will be making fewer batteries, but if they did it would surely have an impact on lead supply.


Here is a link to the article. Oh! do you know where your aluminum foil is from?

http://www.newsdaily.com/stories/tre75b0pe-us-china-lead/

Starbits

[lwknight]

Can you imagine what a new battery for your car would cost if it were made here in the USA?
After the EPA regs and the union agreements we would be lucky to get a battery under a grand.

[zxcvbob]

I wonder if new cars can be adapted to magneto ignition and hand-crank starters? Then you wouldn't need a battery. Not a large one anyway. (I'm pretty sure my previous old pickup could, it still had a carburetor, but you'd have to be Superman to turn the crank)

[secondshooter]

my dad told me about hand crank starting cars when he was a young man, its seems its not so much fun when its raining , snowing or hard to start! getting people to go back to that would be a struggle, maybe a compressed air starter like on some mac trucks is the answer? those old tractors with a shotgun starter are very cool too?

[bumpo628]

I'm sure their lead consumption won't go down. What would they coat the toys with? ;-)

[t_dickinson]

Does this rag smell like Chloroform to you?