Electric bikes, also known as “e-bikes”, have claimed more lives in fiery explosions, the Guardian reports. A total of 13 people have died from the bikes in New York since the beginning of 2023.
E-Bikes are the descendants of the relatively rate motorized bicycles, themselves a hybrid between traditional bicycles and motorcycles. Rather than functioning with a combustion engines, e-bikes rely on modern lithium batteries.
These batteries are key components to many “green” technologies, especially the electric cars. Reports of lithium batteries exploding in electric cars have also been reported. The rare earth materials needed to build them are mostly extracted in China.
Many users of E-Bikes are gig workers in large cities, such as Door Dash deliverers. Bikes are expensive to purchase, especially for the working class people who need them for their job. Cheaper bikes will undoubtedly use less safe materials in their lithium batteries, further putting people at risk.
The safety concerns combined with class inequality, affordability, and national security all make electric vehicles a potentially dangerous technology.
