Chris Siak
THE ENGINEERING ETHICS OF ELECTRIC VEHICLE BATTERIES
Chris Siak ()
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Chris Siak
INTRODUCTION
Engineering new methods of transportation that are better for the planet is a top priority for many companies in the corporate world. Many car manufacturers are producing new hybrid electric cars such as the Chevy Volt or Nissan Leaf that provide an alternative to gas-powered cars. Eventually, engineers hope to improve the car battery far enough so that the public will be coaxed into switching to cost-effective, long-lasting electric cars. However, a number of issues can rise up when implementing new batteries into commercial cars, as with any new technology. For example, issues may arise during the design process that involve possible areas of failure in the design, or a client may have requests that are difficult or unwise to fulfill. Engineers must take these possible anomalies into account before they begin to mass produce final designs. Richard Burgess of the National Institute for Engineering Ethics writes that “Engineers are uniquely suited to contribute to the solution rather than the problem” [1]. In other words, engineers are here to solve today’s problems and innovate a better world, so they must make wise decisions when considering the ethics of the situation they are dealing with;this ethical responsibility is extremely applicable to the engineering and design of electric car batteries.
SCENARIO: THE LIFE AND DEATH OF BATTERIES
We have all been in the situation where our old electronic device is not powering on and the culprit is the leaking batteries inside. You remove the batteries, clean up your device, put new batteries in, and throw the old ones out. These decaying batteries are sent to a landfill to sit, where they can take years to decay, damaging the environment. These small batteries are enough to cause concern, but the large batteries that could be implemented in hybrid cars in the near future will eventually die as well. They too will end up in the landfills, polluting the Earth and potentially our bodies. In fact, Linda Ager-Wick Ellingsen of Yale University writes in her study on battery life cycles that the “environmental contributions of battery production and use phase can be significant” saying that even producing the batteries may be harmful for the environment, possibly to the point where it may not be worth it to make the switch from gas to electric [2].
With that being said, imagine a scenario where I am an engineer building a new battery for electric cars. This battery features lithium ions travelling through silicon and copper mesh, aided via the use of carbon nanotube technology, which, as discussed in the previous assignment, can increase battery life by a substantial percentage [3]. The battery lasts long enough to be viable for consumers and is cost-effective. Given these factors, once the battery reaches use in commercial vehicles, many consumers will switch from gas to electric cars, which is the ultimate goal of creating this battery. However, I discover that the combination of chemicals in the battery will, after the battery begins to decay, react and form new chemicals that will take an extremely long time to decay in the landfill. Also, the production of the batteries themselves is a rather difficult and energy-consuming process, having to form large amounts of Li(NixCoyMnz)O2 and 360 separate cells per battery [2]. I am confronted with the issues of, firstly,bringing the chemical anomalies to the design team’s attention, or not mentioning them in order to save time and money, and secondly, determining if the process of mass-producing the battery and dealing with its future decay is still more energy-efficient than using a gas vehicle. As a professional engineer, I would consult a code of ethics to help me make a decision.
Ethics Code and Case Study on Integrity
The National Society of Professional Engineers’ code of ethics is frequently referenced by engineers in situations similar to mine, and an important canon regarding my predicament is canon 5, which states simply “Avoid deceptive acts” [4]. I would most definitely be deceiving my team members and clients by withholding the chemical issues. More specifically, rule 5a states that “presentations incident to the solicitation of employment shall not misrepresent pertinent facts” [4]. This means that it would be unethical to withhold the fact that the batteries may truly not be energy-efficient when presenting information about the project to the rest of the team and the client. After consulting this code of ethics, I should clearly make the decision to share my findings with the design team.
My hypothetical scenario is similar another fictional case studied by Texas Tech University. In this case, Julie Adams is an engineer who recently finished a structural survey project and after completing the write-up and doing a last-minute check, discovers a rusted-through support clip. Julie’s advisor recommends that she not mention the situation, saying that the client could have checked on his own for an issue. Jane is thus presented with the issue of whether or not to expose the truth [5]. The largest majority of TTU engineers surveyed said that Julie should inform the client of the situation, against the will of her advisor, which would comply with canon 5 of the NSPE ethics code [4] [5]. After personally studying this scenario, I would follow in Julie’s footsteps, and tell my engineering team about the potential damage to the environment that the batteries may cause.
Ethics Code and Case Studiesrelated to the Uncertainty of Environmental Impact
If I go through and present the issue to my team, they may still want to go through with the production, which would bring up the second ethical issue in my scenario. Is it better to continue to burn fossil fuels with gas cars or to eventually have a problem with battery acid decaying in landfills, and consume large amounts of energy creating the batteries? As an engineer, I would consider points 5 and 7 in the IEEE’s code of ethics, which states that engineers should work to “improve the understanding of technology, its appropriate application, and potential consequences” and “seek, accept, and offer honest criticism of technical work” [6]. While these canons do not offer a direct solution to my problem, they point me in the right direction of what I should do. It is still unclear whether the battery is going to have more or less of an environmental effect than the gas engine, so it would be impractical to try and force only one option on the public. Instead, studies should be performed over long periods of time to see which option the public should turn to, and the switch should then be made gradually. This would allow my team to release their battery to car companies to be implemented in consumer vehicles, which can be the subjects of these tests, to be performed on the batteries and their environmental impact after years of use and decay.
This ethics issue is similar to case 11, as presented by Stanford University’s biodesign program. The case features an engineer who has just developed a new medical device to be attached to the aorta during surgery. It will significantly reduce the time necessary for surgeries, but the risks of the device are still unknown. The engineer has the option of going through and implanting the device in patient surgeries, or holding out and waiting for possible risks to be determined [7]. While Stanford’s case study does not offer a solution or advice for the engineer, it is likely that most engineers would say that the device should be further tested in order to discover any risks, and testing should likely be done on volunteers that are being operated on and are interested in the benefits of the device, such as a closed chest surgery as opposed to an open one. This case’s details and outcome are helpful to me as they can be applied to my predicament, where I can act as Stanford’s engineer would. I could have the battery introduced in a small number of electric vehicles and have those vehicles and their batteries tested for their environmental impact when compared to a typical gas vehicle. The results of the experiment would then be used to determine which type of car should be used in the future of the automotive industry.
While the previous two case studies were helpful and provided me with advice about my situation, not all cases are going to be directly as applicable or useful. In webGURU’s case “Sometimes Silence is Golden,” an engineer is working on an exciting project with a graduate student, who he hears discussing the project with a student in another research group. This normally would not be a problem, but a confidentiality agreement has been signed by all members of the group, which means that the graduate student wasviolating his signed contract [8]. The engineer does not know much about the student’s contact with the other student, he does not know the extent to which the confidentiality agreement has been broken, and thus does not know the appropriate action that should be taken. In the end, the engineer decides he should confront the grad student about the issue, and depending on the severity of the breach, inform the university and the company they are doing the research project with, complying with the code the NSPE and the IEEE codes of ethics [4] [6][8]. While this case is a great example of a whistle-blowing situation that I could see as a future engineer, it would be considerably less useful than the other two cases for evaluating my own scenario. An important lesson learned from this case is that one must consider all options before taking action, shown by the engineer in seeking his advisor for help and trying to estimate the severity of the grad student’s breach. In my situation, the problem was different in the fact that I would be withholding information instead of another team member giving it away, but I could at least take from this case that it is best to evaluate every aspect of your situation before making a clear-cut decision. This would apply to the testing of the batteries, and the uncertainty of their environmental footprint.
Seeking the Advice of my Colleagues and Other Sources
Other than hypothetical, or even nonfictional case studies, I can turn to other sources to help me evaluate my position in the scenario and make a logical decision, outside of just engineering’s codes of ethics. Personally, whenever I feel like I need advice, I will turn to some colleague or higher-up, whether it be an advisor, family member, or anyone with more experience than me. In this electric battery vs. gas scenario, I would likely first turn to a more personal source of advice, such as my roommate, Matt. My roommate and I help each other with our problems, and when I asked him what he would do in a situation like mine, he recommended that I confront the team the team about the batteries. He went on to insist that we still go on with their production because most of the public will not initially switch to the new technology, allowing the consumers that do buy the electric cars to serve as test subjects to be compared with gas vehicles on the road, assuming they agree to have their battery performance monitored (which should not be a problem) [9]. Matt makes a good point, as I had neglected to realize that, just as with any new technology, the public is usually hesitant to change what they are used to doing, or driving. The switch from gas to electric would be gradual enough that by the time the public starts switching in large numbers, studies will have already been conducted (likely by my team) that would determine the batteries’ environmental impact.
Engineering ethics is a glorified way to describe integrity, sensibility, and honesty. Thus, a legitimate way for engineers to seek advice for their situations is to consult a book focused on integrity. As a future engineer, I would consult Integrity: Doing the Right Thing for the Right Reason, written by McGill University’s Barbara Killinger. In this book, Killinger writes that “Integrity suffers greatly when ‘whatever works’ is seen as acceptable, and what doesn’t ceases to inform judgment” [10].Killinger’s words are very applicable to my engineering scenario, and after reading them, I realize that taking a shortcut to get a job done and profit quickly is usually not the best way to go about solving a problem, and dishonestly will likely produce negative or unwanted results in the future. In other words, neglecting to tell my engineering team about the possible environmental impact of the electric batteries and pushing the batteries through production and into the public market will likely produce unwanted results for either the environment, my engineering firm, or both in the future. Again, and for my final decision, I should tell my team about the situation and evaluate the batteries from there, comparing them to typical gas engines by slowly introducing them to the public for testing purposes. This ensures that the safety of the environment is kept as a priority, but so is the profit of the company.
CONCLUSION
Many different options and sources were available to me to aid in my decision making process. Tara Hoke of the American Society of Chemical Engineers writes that “Case studies give young engineers an opportunity to see ethical precepts at work in actual situations and, through discussion, to benefit from the views and experiences of other professionals” [11]. The cases I looked at were very helpful, and it is important for engineers in the real world to know that these resources are available to them to help them in their situations. I would advise engineers today to consult these resources in order to make the most productive and honest decisions in their work, and to ensure the safety of anyone involved in a project. They must be self-aware of their scenarios, and if nothing else, use common sense and make moral decisions. Only throughthis commitment to integrity can engineers continue to innovate and invent with the benefit of the public in mind.
REFERENCES
[1] R. A. Burgess,M. Davis, M. A. Dyrud, et al. (2012). “Engineering Ethics: Looking Back, Looking Forward.” Science and Engineering Ethics. (online article). DOI: 10.1007/s11948-012-9374-7. p. 1404
[2] L. A. Ellingsen, G. Majeau-Bettez, B. Singh, et al. (2014). “Life Cycle Assessment of a Lithium-Ion Battery Vehicle Pack.” Journal of Industrial Ecology. (online article). DOI: 10.1111/jiec.12072. p. 115
[3] H. Zhang, G. Cao, Y. Yang. (2009). “Carbon nanotube arrays and their composites for electrochemical capacitors and lithium-ion batteries.” Energy & Environmental Science. (online article). DOI: 10.1039/B906812K. p. 932, 934, 940
[4] “Code of Ethics for Engineers.” (2007). National Society of Professional Engineers. (online article). pp. 1-2
[5] “Case 1010 – What’s the Angle?” (2014). Texas Tech University. (online article). pp. 1-8.
[6] “7.8 IEEE Code of Ethics.” (2014). Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers. (online article). p. 1
[7] “Case 11 – Incremental Development.” (2014). Stanford Biodesign. (online article). p. 1
[8] “Sometimes Silence is Golden.” (2014). webGURU. (online article). pp. 1-2
[9] M. Cain. (2014, 20 October). Interview
[10] B. Killinger. (2010). “Integrity: Doing the Right Thing for the Right Reason.” McGill-Queen’s University Press. (online book). p. 5
[11] T. Hoke. “The Importance of Understanding Engineering Ethics.” (2012). Civil Engineering. (online article). p. 40
ADDITIONAL SOURCES
G. Carli, S. S. Williamson. (2013). “Technical Considerations on Power Conversion for Electric and Plug-in Hybrid Electric Vehicle Battery Charging in Photovoltaic Installations.” IEEE Transactions on Power Electronics. (online article). DOI: 10.1109/TPEL.2013.2260562.
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
I would like to acknowledge and thank Dr. David Sanchez, for years of inspiration; Dr. Nancy Koerbel, for her writing instruction; and Julie Mueller of the O’Hara Writing Center for helping proofread my paper.
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