I guess the question is, is the production of pollution to create a single car battery greater than the pollution of a gas powered car. Yes the pollution caused by mining the minerals to create the batteries is bad, but it may be more than offset by the larger use of electric vehicles. Im not saying that the production of evs can't be greatly improved, but I feel that the end game is better than the current use of fossil fuel pollution caused by conventional cars now. Honestly the best way to fight pollution would be for countries to invest alot more in better public transit much like europe.,(reply>), @Andrew Chyrklund Think you are not wrong on that. Some years ago I went a few times to a small city in Florida. I had to travel 3 or 4 miles every day, public transportation took over an hour so walking was quicker.<br><br>The very sad joke here is: When I once used a train to go from the Netherlands to Bordeaux in France it costed me more than flying. Low cost airliners offer tickets for a few bucks all over Europe but that train costed me as much as half a ticket to Florida!<br><br>In all fairnes, even flying with smaller aircrafts can compete with using trains. 4 people in a Cesna 172 going from one end of our small country to the other used to pay just as much as taking the train but saved half a day in time while burning less fuel than a car.,(reply>), @Martijn Maas I guarantee your worst public transit trumps our best public transit here in the states. Our public transit is basically non exsistant outside of New York. You guys got trains to take to go all around Europe while we rely on planes or driving.,(reply>), I live in Europe, in the most dense populated country of it actualy, and our public transportation is a joke outside the big cities.<br><br>Biggest issues no one in the "civilised" world is willing to pay the actual costs. If all these materials would be mined with more measures against polution and miners treated the way we like to be treated there would be a huge price tag on it.<br>If we start focusing on local production for consumption people would realize better what actual cost and consequences of their choices would be.<br><br>(This comment is typed on an overly expensive laptop with most likely very a dirty battery, while drinking a coffee of wich I have no clue how many children have to pick the beans for. And brought to you by power inefficient wifi since it is cheaper than running LAN cables everywhere. Yes, I'm part of the problem.)