[Eternal Student (OP)]

Hi.

    I hope this Biology sub-section is a reasonable place to put this question - but I'm happy to have it moved elsewhere.

    So, I'm thinking of getting a car and that means I have to choose a seat material.   The main options are leather or leatherette car seats.

    Now, for years, I would have assumed that there is a surplus of leather available since so many cows are slaughtered for the meat industry.   Indeed I've probably said exactly this to other people.   

   I think it's time to double check this information.   

1.   A brief survey of web results suggests that leather prices are ever increasing and there may not be any surplus.   
2.   Some web search results are suggesting that most leather is imported from countries that may very well be slaughtering the cattle just for the leather and possibly in very horrific ways to keep the skins in good shape.   That may be just scare-mongering but the thing is I just don't know.    Car seats are some of the most extreme examples of leather use,  you can't make large items like a car seat from several small scraps of leather stitched or glued together, you would want good and fully intact skins.
3.   Even the most prestige brands of clothing have been shown to be sourcing materials and labour from developing countries quite often and I have no reason to assume prestige car manufacturer brands would be any different.   If BMW and Mercedes-Benz can get large pieces of quality leather from a country whose animal welfare standards may be un-acceptable in the United Kingdom, then they would probably still be getting their leather from that country.

     On the other hand, leatherette seems to be a vinyl material.   I'm no expert on materials and fabrics so you may wish to check that - but if it is based on poly-vinyl-chloride then that stuff is a plastic.   So, leatherette seats are products of the petro-chemical industry and that's not something that can be ethically ignored either.    How much oil is used, how much harm is done to the environment when it is made and how much harm is yet to come since this synthetic material won't bio-degrade and is just another large piece of plastic burried in our land-fill sites and possibly contributing to the issue of micro-plastics entering the rivers and oceans?   Perhaps natural leather is the more environmentally friendly solution?  I don't know.

    Anyway, that's the background and the motivation for the question.   Which kind of car seat will be the most "green", "animal friendly",  "environmentally responsible" and if there's any other ethical considerations you believe are relevant then I'll just say "most ethical choice"?
   I'd be grateful for any insights you may have.

Best Wishes.
 

[Petrochemicals]

Some web search results are suggesting that most leather is imported from countries that may very well be slaughtering the cattle just for the leather and possibly in very horrific ways to keep the skins in good shape.   

I can not believe the meat is not consumed, even in India where cow killing is illegal in some states, and how on earth are cows killed where the leather is not preserved?

Most environmental will probably be recycled plastic. Never did like leather to sit on, but if hard wearing is the thing I suppose I'd choose it. The best leather comes from cattle that are open range on grass, it keeps them clean and limits injuries and therefore scarring, this usually comes from South America, who export lots of beef too. I don't think there is much of an issue with animal welfare and slavery there, although workers rights may not be the best. I should think the tanning industry is where you will find any human rights issues.

[vhfpmr]

IME vinyl seats went out of fashion in the 1970s, leather seats are only found on prestige cars, and everything else has cloth seats. I don't think cloth manufacture is particularly environmentally friendly either though,

When it comes to the environmental damage from cars, I think that seats are the least of our worries, have you considered not running a car at all?

[Eternal Student (OP)]

Hi
Thanks for replies so far.  I'm using a small mobile to reply today and it's just too fiddly to write much.

Have I thought of going car-free?  Yes but I don't think I can do that just yet.  I'm currently thinking of a small electric car.  No emissions in town etc. and have at least one other forum thread about the batteries and range.  I'm just human and wouldn't mind having a nice cabin area but my young vegan daughter will prefer synthetic seats and maybe I also would.  Seems silly to have an environmentally friendly car except for the seats.

Best wishes

[paul cotter]

I cannot give you the answer you are looking for but I do have a comment. The idea of sitting on a vinyl surface does not appeal to me as I reckon it would trap sweat, like sitting on any plastic surface. A cloth surface is the only one I would accept.

[Petrochemicals]

How do you plan on charging your environmentally neutral car?

[Eternal Student (OP)]

Hi.

How do you plan on charging your environmentally neutral car?

   That is the main issue with electric cars and why I only said no emissions in town,  there will be power stations emitting fumes elsewhere and and at some other time.
    However, I can probably charge overnight since I rarely make long journeys that would demand a re-charge in the day.   The current energy infrastructure of the United Kingdom (and most countries I believe) is that our National Grid can't shut down many power stations overnight because of these issues:
  (i) they would take too long to start up again in the morning;
  (ii) the wear and tear on the equipment from shut down and re-start is significant and it can be more sensible to just leave it running for a few hours.
   So, basically, fossil fuels get burnt in the power stations overnight anyway and this energy is frequently wasted one way or another (e.g. discharged as heat out of the top of the power station stack because we can't just have all the turbines pumping electrical power into the grid all the time since that would spike the voltage way above the 240V threshold).

    What we have is surplus power generation overnight but almost no storage capacity for this.   Some countries have hydroelectric power reservoirs where the water can be pumped back up the hill overnight as an effective overnight energy storage solution but Britain is quite lacking in this sort of thing.   This may change in the future  (see for example:   https://www.neso.energy/document/273166/download) but at the moment charging your (car) batteries overnight is the one of the best things we could do to help the National grid be more efficient overall.   
     Obviously, I can also switch to a supplier that offers cheaper electric overnight - so that's another good thing for me but everyone gets the benefit of overall lower fossil fuel use.   

Best Wishes.

[Eternal Student (OP)]

Hi.

The idea of sitting on a vinyl surface does not appeal to me as I reckon it would trap sweat....

    I am assured by the car salesmen that the leatherette is very well perforated and it's a slightly more sophisticated compound material than just pure vinyl.  Overall, it really doesn't stick to you in the hot weather.   They claim it's as good as leather.   I don't know... just what they say... they can't tell me exactly what composite material it is.   They also can't tell me from which country they source their leather although I have asked them (politely) to do their job and look into that question for this potential customer but so far......   I guess I give them another week.

Best Wishes.

[Petrochemicals]

  I am assured by the car salesmen that the leatherette is very well perforated and it's a slightly more sophisticated compound material than just pure vinyl. 

Doing comedy now too I see.

[alancalverd]

he current energy infrastructure of the United Kingdom (and most countries I believe) is that our National Grid can't shut down many power stations overnight because of these issues:
  (i) they would take too long to start up again in the morning;
  (ii) the wear and tear on the equipment from shut down and re-start is significant and it can be more sensible to just leave it running for a few hours.

Not really true. You can keep the turbines spinning if you want to, without generating a significant amount of power, and this allows you to respond quickly to demand changes. The only genuine baseload supply is from nuclear power which is slower to respond and involves a very high capital cost so it makes sense to run the reactors continuously and close to full power, but this only represents  about 5% of total installed capacity.

The ethical objection to BEVs is that your travel is being subsidised by essential users of electricity (schools, hospitals, pensioners...) whilst the ICE user pays the full cost of his travel.

[alancalverd]

Modern fiber cloth seats are in my opinion  more comfortable and safer (better frictional retention when cornering) than leather. Whilst the contoured leather pilot seat of an airplane feels good, the occupant wears a four or five point harness, but I recall some miserable journeys as a passenger secured by a lap belt on a very shiny leather seat in business class - almost impossible to stay upright to eat your lunch!