Electric cars are dirty????

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Night Train
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Electric cars are dirty????

Postby Night Train » Fri Nov 13, 2009 10:54 pm

Article in Daily Mail.

Electric cars may not reduce carbon dioxide emissions - and could even increase them, a green lobby group warned yesterday.

The Environmental Transport Association said generating electricity - by burning coal and oil - to charge the so-called 'clean' cars could cancel out the benefit of abandoning fossil fuel vehicles.

Its report said hybrid cars such as the Toyota Prius could be the 'greenest' as they do not rely on mains power to charge batteries. (No, it just relies on a petrol engine and the occasional hill. Night Train)

It added that if electric cars become widely used, they would need a meter on the dashboard to charge motorists as they drive. (I always said that that would be likely! Night Train)

The report represents a potential blow to Gordon Brown's stated dream of making Britain 'the electric car capital of Europe'.

It also said there is potential for improvement in performance and reduction of costs in the medium term, but not enough to suggest electric cars could compete head-on with conventional vehicles within the next two decades.

Even if the National Grid has the capacity and infrastructure to meet the needs of electric cars, demand could lead to greater use of coal and nuclear power.

The report warned that European officials have assumed that electric cars are 'zero-emission', and failed to take into account the electricity they use.

But it said that once the effect of burning fossil fuels is taken into account, they actually emit more CO2 than a hybrid car.

It calculates that an electric car has emissions of 106 grams of CO2 for each kilometre used, compared with 172 grams for an average petrol car. By comparison the latest Toyota Prius hybrid car has official emissions of 89g/km.

ETA director Andrew Davis said the report was not meant to dampen enthusiasm for electric cars but 'their introduction should not be viewed as a panacea'

Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article ... z0WmYnqqQE


And I thought that generating electricity for the grid was more energy efficient then burning petrol or diesel in individual cars. I also thought that we had some renewables supplying the grid too.

The whole reason I think vehicles would be electric is that at some point we would use less fossil fuel powered generation and more renewables as well as being more energy efficient overall.

I wonder if the 172grams of CO2 from the average car includes the emissions from fuel tanker lorries, refineries, super tankers and the mining process?

clnbrtltt
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Postby clnbrtltt » Sat Nov 14, 2009 6:55 pm

Typical Daily Mail rubbish :!:
Proven 6kW Wind Turbine
3.8 kW Solar PV

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MB
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Postby MB » Sun Nov 15, 2009 7:21 pm

Unlike the journalist at the Daily Mail, I've read this report. I can say with confidence that the journalist at the Daily Mail has not read the report because he's taken figures entirely out of context to create his news article.

The report is written for EU Policy Makers as opposed to electric car owners. It explains in a lot of detail about the environmental impacts of electric cars, hybrid electric cars and plug-in hybrids.

The issue it is actually highlighting is a problem with the EU Emissoins Trading Scheme which allows car manufacturers to class electric cars as zero emitting vehicles, even though pollution is still generated - only at the power stations. Come 2015, car manufacturers have to ensure their cars only produce an average of 130g CO2/km, and 95g CO2/km by 2020.

The report says - quite rightly - that electric cars skew this equation because they don't pollute directly, only through the pollution at the power station. This means that car manufacturers that build electric cars can claim they hit these targets even though the use of the electric car does create pollution.

As a consequence, car manufacturers will end up producing cars with an higher average than 130g CO2/km in a real world example.

But let me quote from the policy recommendations on the last but one page of the report:

'Without a doubt, electric and plug-in hybrid cars can help reduce CO2 emissions and oil consumption.'

I will be covering this in a huge amount of detail in my next book, but you'll have to wait a few more months before that is ready...
My new book is out: The 2011 Electric Car Guide is available from Amazon and all good bookshops.

cianof
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Postby cianof » Sun Nov 15, 2009 9:56 pm

EVs move the responsibility for emissions from the motorist to the power company.

It's easier to make any changes that need to be made at the power plant than at the exhaust of a car given the number of cars. 25/26 million cars in the uk now I think.

EVs also give the motorist the ability to vote with their wallet. If I buy my electricity from a company that generates electricity from renewable sources I'll be investing in more renewable energy sources for the future.

http://www.airtricity.com/ireland/environment/

Airtricity's electricity is generated from, 79% renewable & 21% non renewable.

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retepsnikrep
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Good Energy

Postby retepsnikrep » Mon Nov 16, 2009 6:31 am

I use Good Energy which claim 100% renewable generation.

Not the cheapest but as you say vote with your wallet.

http://www.goodenergy.co.uk/wp-content/ ... -ts-cs.pdf
Regards Peter

Two MK1 Honda Insight's. One running 20ah A123 Lithium pack. One 8ah BetterBattery Nimh pack.
One HCH1 Civic Hybrid running 60ah A123 Lithium pack.

GregsGarage
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Postby GregsGarage » Mon Nov 16, 2009 9:58 am

I can't quote any sources, but studies in Australia show that powering electric cars from coal powered generating stations are about the same as normal petrol cars when it comes to CO2 emissions. Many people will say that because of this, there is no point to electric cars. They are wrong on this account, because once you have a substantial number of electric cars on the road you can then change your power station mix and get instant improvements in CO2 reductions. Basically an electric car gets cleaner over it's lifetime as old polluting stations are replaced by newer more efficient stations that generate less CO2. Compare this to a normal car that gets dirtier over its lifetime as the engine wears, maintenance gets neglected, etc. Remember that the published CO2 emissions are for the car when it is new, actual CO2 emissions will be higher as the car ages, while the CO2 emissions for the electric car should get lower as the car ages. 8)
Greg Fordyce

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http://www.evalbum.com/4191

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MaryRCrumpton
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Re: Good Energy

Postby MaryRCrumpton » Mon Nov 16, 2009 12:23 pm

retepsnikrep wrote:I use Good Energy which claim 100% renewable generation.

Not the cheapest but as you say vote with your wallet.

http://www.goodenergy.co.uk/wp-content/ ... -ts-cs.pdf


We use them too. I *think* they are the only supplier who can make that claim at the moment.

Mary.
BVS North-West Coordinator, based in Manchester.
Contact via Text/Phone on 07751 696 055

NickJ
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Postby NickJ » Mon Nov 16, 2009 1:30 pm

A duifficult one on the carbon issue. Grid electricity generates around 500g of CO2 for each kWh of energy delivered. So an EV getting 250Wh/mile is producing about 125g of CO2 per mile or 78g/km which is better than a Prius. Also wheras our Berlingo gets about 300-350Wh/mile (110g CO2/km at worst). I am currently driving a Mini diesel (since the sad demise of the insight) which claims 104g CO2 but in reality delivers around 130g/km or worse.
And of course with the supposed "decarbonisation" of out electricty generation via renewables and nuclear the CO2 figure for grid power should fall, though dont get me going on so called "clean coal"!

Good energy are currently the greenest, I think, and are a favourite amongst those with microgeneration (solar, wind etc). As someone working in microgeneration they are by far the most popular amongt our customers and last year we installed over 500kW of (mostly PV) generation.

All hopefully helping to make our EV's "greener"

which we knew they where anyway!

N

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ChrisB
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Postby ChrisB » Mon Nov 16, 2009 6:42 pm

Normal Daily Wail rubbish :roll:

If power stations opperated at anywhere near the efficiencies of our little ole petrol or weisel engines we'd be paying way more for our electric than we do now :wink:

Of course if you look at the whole manufacture of the batteries etc then we all might as well give up now :lol: but lets not mention that part :wink:

ChrisB
I reject reality and substitute my own !!!!!!

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MB
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Postby MB » Mon Nov 16, 2009 7:35 pm

Actually, from what I have managed to find out, the manufacture of batteries may not be as bad as the critics would have you believe.

For sure, they are the 'dirtiest' part of an electric car manufacture, but not considerably so.

From the charging point of view, of course, you can always measure the average CO2 the grid is kicking out at any one time and then charge the car when the CO2 levels are low. Here's a real time link: http://www.realtimecarbon.org/
My new book is out: The 2011 Electric Car Guide is available from Amazon and all good bookshops.


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