Climate Expert Shares Dirty Truth About Wind and Solar Energy

Wind, solar, and electric vehicles aren't the clean energy accomplishments that many claim, climatologist David Legates says.

“The lithium, the atrium, all of the rare earth minerals that are necessary for the batteries, that are necessary for the solar panels, that are necessary for the wind turbines … are called rare earths,” Legates explains on “The Daily Signal Podcast.” 

These rare earth minerals are acquired through strip mining, he says, a process that involves putting large chunks of earth into a solution. Once the minerals are extracted, what is left is a “toxic sludge lake."

The process of strip mining changes the environment, adds Legates, a visiting fellow who serves on the Science Advisory Committee for the Center for Energy, Climate, and Environment at The Heritage Foundation. Legates, also a professor emeritus at the University of Delaware, is the author of a Heritage paper on rising sea levels.

Legates, who joins this episode of "The Daily Signal Podcast," explains how wind turbines and solar panels are created and discusses his new book “Climate and Energy: The Case for Realism,” co-authored with E. Calvin Beisner. He also identifies what the cleanest form of energy really is. 

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