Just to be clear, the noise and air pollution that a switch to drone shows away from fireworks shows would save, would be incredibly significant. I don’t think the cost makes it viable yet, but it’s something to aim for.

  • TedZanzibar
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    3 hours ago

    This is the exact same argument that I see used against EVs almost daily, while the people making these calls for “better analysis” ignore the dodgy mining practices and literal wars that are the result of oil extraction. But let’s go back to fireworks. I spent all of 30 seconds Googling and found this. I’m sure it’s far from an exhaustive list of firework ingredients but it’s a decent start. Highlights include:

    Sulfur - extracted from oil and natural gas.

    Aluminum - 28% of US aluminum comes from recycled sources, which is great, but any that goes into fireworks is then lost forever. The rest of it comes from mines in Canada and Jamaica.

    Iron and copper - Mined domestically and both are recyclable but gone forever once they’re exploded.

    Strontium - Mined in Mexico.

    Barium - Mined in China.

    Sodium - Mined in Chile and Peru.

    How come you’re not asking for a better analysis of the mining practices for the ores extracted in Jamaica, Mexico, China, Chile, and Peru? How much of anything that makes up your average firework, including cardboard and plastic, is recycled at the end of that firework’s life? How many fireworks are reusable even once let alone tens or even hundreds of times? Much like with oil burning cars, these things are ignored because they’ve been around for a long time and it’s normalised. Meanwhile emerging technologies, while demonstrably cleaner/better in pretty much every metric, are held to impossible standards that the old tech gets a free pass on.

    No, we don’t recycle much lithium yet but it’s a new technology and battery recycling plants are springing up all over the place all the time, and these same plants often deal in the various other electronic materials that you cited. How much used petroleum is recycled each year? How many fireworks?

    I don’t want to argue and I should probably just delete this rather than posting it, having said my piece to myself, but perhaps I’m my own worst enemy…