Are you seriously going to say the engine in a car is more efficient than an oil power plant? Your focus on lithium is strange. First off, you do know a lithium ion battery is only about .1% lithium right? And, it's the mining and processing of it is toxic, not really the metal itself(unless you are ingesting a lot of it). But you can say that about the mining process of all metals. Again, what about all the other chemicals, liquids and gases, that are produced from a combustion engine? You going to ignore carbon monoxide? Lubricants? Coolant? And yes, lithium batteries can be recycled. I'll say it again, the electric car is much cleaner than a gas powered car. You can dispute that all you want but there is zero evidence to support your claim. Unless you just want to focus on lithium mining.