Electric Cars Emit 50% Less Greenhouse Gas than Diesel, Study Finds

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Electric cars emit significantly less greenhouse gases over their lifetimes than diesel engines even when they are powered by the most carbon intensive energy, a new report has found. In Poland, which uses high volumes of coal, electric vehicles produced a quarter less emissions than diesels when put through a full lifecycle modelling study by Belgium’s VUB University.

“On average, electric vehicles will emit half the CO2 emissions of a diesel car by 2030, including the manufacturing emissions,” said Yoann Le Petit, a spokesman for the T&E think tank, which commissioned the study. “We’ve been facing a lot of fake news in the past year about electrification put out by the fuel industry but in this study you can see that even in Poland today it is more beneficial to the climate to drive an electric vehicle than a diesel.”
 
gamerk2 said:
Well, this should shutdown "the carbon costs are ultimately the same" arguments.

/sarcasm
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Seriously..this is another study that has not shown its data...only its conclusion. Unless the data is there for all to see and ensure that proper variables are controlled...It is nothing more than propaganda for gain or excuse for people to engage in confirmation bias. Personally, i'm tired of it..from both sides. Anytime a study is released the data should be available unless it can be shown that releasing the data will cause actual harm.
 
Trepidati0n said:
Seriously..this is another study that has not shown its data...only its conclusion. Unless the data is there for all to see and ensure that proper variables are controlled...It is nothing more than propaganda for gain or excuse for people to engage in confirmation bias. Personally, i'm tired of it..from both sides. Anytime a study is released the data should be available unless it can be shown that releasing the data will cause actual harm.
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You mean trust me I got a royal flush doesn't work in poker?
 
Trepidati0n said:
Seriously..this is another study that has not shown its data...only its conclusion. Unless the data is there for all to see and ensure that proper variables are controlled...It is nothing more than propaganda for gain or excuse for people to engage in confirmation bias. Personally, i'm tired of it..from both sides. Anytime a study is released the data should be available unless it can be shown that releasing the data will cause actual harm.
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Well see this is kind of how it works in academia, when someone says a "a study says" it usually means a paper has in fact been published, because publishing is the go to metric that you're doing something with your postdoc fellowship job.
Now in the world of news, they give you big head lines, maybe they site a source but they don't tell you were that source is, and then a bazillion other news agencies basically parrot the same thing without giving you any information of the actual material.

That said, it didn't take me but a couple clicks and a google to find the briefing of the study and the study
https://www.transportenvironment.org/sites/te/files/publications/2017_10_EV_LCA_briefing_final.pdf
https://www.transportenvironment.org/sites/te/files/publications/TE - draft report v04.pdf
 
It all comes down to thermal efficiency.

Gasoline powered internal combustion engines have pretty low theoretical thermal efficiency, and real world thermal efficiency (because we don't always operate at ideal RPM, at ideal temperature, we have to stop and start, etc. etc.) is absolutely abysmal. Single digits in most cases.

Diesel improves on this a bit, and gasoline-electric hybrids improve on it some more, but it is still pretty low.

A modern gas fired power plant with a good gas turbine can have thermal inefficiencies in excess of 70%.

What this means is, even with transformer and transmission losses across the grid, and with losses during the battery charging process, the end result is you use A LOT less fossil fuels in an electric car, even if the source of the electricity is 100% fossil fuel based, and 100% fossil fuel power mixes are pretty rare these days.

In the U.S. we are about 35% carbon free in our power mix now, so this shifts the benefit even further in favor of electric cars.
 
Gotta give the cult of thermogeddon credit, they failed to show CO2 is the boogeymany they claim will kill us all and have moved on assuming we all believe them anyway. Next study... pirates emit more CO2 than Pokemon... discuss.. ;p
 
nutzo said:
How much pollution does the recycling cause?
Have you seen how electronics are recycled in some 3rd world countries?

Recycling is not all butterflies and unicorns.
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There's a reason 3rd world countries are called that.
 
sfsuphysics said:
Well see this is kind of how it works in academia, when someone says a "a study says" it usually means a paper has in fact been published, because publishing is the go to metric that you're doing something with your postdoc fellowship job.
Now in the world of news, they give you big head lines, maybe they site a source but they don't tell you were that source is, and then a bazillion other news agencies basically parrot the same thing without giving you any information of the actual material.

That said, it didn't take me but a couple clicks and a google to find the briefing of the study and the study
https://www.transportenvironment.org/sites/te/files/publications/2017_10_EV_LCA_briefing_final.pdf
https://www.transportenvironment.org/sites/te/files/publications/TE - draft report v04.pdf
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Thanks for the links.

The study seems to only concern itself with CO2 and not environmental pollution in general. It also reaches that 50% number by making an assumption the the EU will generate a much larger percenteage of the rare earth minerals consumed in the EU in th EU, or that rare earth minerals will be less necessary in the manufacture of electric vehicles in the future to arrive at their 50% on average number.

Which... kind of sounds like bullshit.
 
I would be 100% in favor of electric vehicles if I could drive car/truck across Texas in one on a single charge. Take 5 minutes to "refuel" and drive back... This drive 200 miles, stop for 12 hours, drive 200 miles, stop for 12 hours... it's just nonsense...
 
Zarathustra[H] said:
It all comes down to thermal efficiency.

Gasoline powered internal combustion engines have pretty low theoretical thermal efficiency, and real world thermal efficiency (because we don't always operate at ideal RPM, at ideal temperature, we have to stop and start, etc. etc.) is absolutely abysmal. Single digits in most cases.

Diesel improves on this a bit, and gasoline-electric hybrids improve on it some more, but it is still pretty low.

A modern gas fired power plant with a good gas turbine can have thermal inefficiencies in excess of 70%.

What this means is, even with transformer and transmission losses across the grid, and with losses during the battery charging process, the end result is you use A LOT less fossil fuels in an electric car, even if the source of the electricity is 100% fossil fuel based, and 100% fossil fuel power mixes are pretty rare these days.

In the U.S. we are about 35% carbon free in our power mix now, so this shifts the benefit even further in favor of electric cars.
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And with the high costs of "green" electricity, it can cost more to drive an electric car than a hybrid.
This is the case out here in California. Even with our high gas prices, a Prius would be cheaper to drive than an electric. (unless you work somewhere that lets you charge your car fro free)

Ever notice how almost all electric care are tiny (smaller than a Pruis)?
Also notice how none of them even come with a spare tire?

I'll consider electric cars viable when they are the size of a Camry or Accord, get 300+ miles on a charge, come with a decent sized trunk, come with a spare tire (or at least a space to put one), and cost less per mile to drive than a hybrid. In other words, they still have a long way to go.

What I would like to see is a properly designed serial hybrid.
This would be a full electric car with short range battery (maybe 50 miles)
It would also include a small efficient gas or diesel generator and a small 5-10 gallon fuel tank.
The generator would just need to put out enough power to keep the batteries charged at 60 mph.
If you drove faster, the batteries would gradually discharge until you needed to pull over and let them charge for a while.
This would also allow for quick refueling on a longer trip.
 
KarsusTG said:
I would be 100% in favor of electric vehicles if I could drive car/truck across Texas in one on a single charge. Take 5 minutes to "refuel" and drive back... This drive 200 miles, stop for 12 hours, drive 200 miles, stop for 12 hours... it's just nonsense...
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I came in here to say almost this exact same thing. When an EV can match the usability of anything I currently own I'll look into one. My pickup can do roughly 500 miles on a 35 gallon tank. My corvette can do roughly 350 on a 16 gallon tank sometimes more. Each one of those can be 'recharged' in less than 10 minutes. I also can't imagine an EV pulling my toy hauler very well.
 
SomeFknGuy said:
I came in here to say almost this exact same thing. When an EV can match the usability of anything I currently own I'll look into one. My pickup can do roughly 500 miles on a 35 gallon tank. My corvette can do roughly 350 on a 16 gallon tank sometimes more. Each one of those can be 'recharged' in less than 10 minutes. I also can't imagine an EV pulling my toy hauler very well.
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A Tesla's 200 mile interval stops are only about a half hour, not 12 hours. Still not on par with gasoline but far better than every other brand of EV that exists.

Oh yeah and electric motors can haul much better than ICEs can. Its just a matter of someone making an EV to meet that market, Tesla will do it in the next couple of years, and there are others.
 
otherweeb said:
There's a reason 3rd world countries are called that.
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A Third World country is a country whose views are not aligned with NATO and capitalism or the Soviet Union and communism. The use of the term "Third World" started during the Cold War and was used to identify which of three categories the countries of the world aligned with.



Now stop misusing the term.
 
SomeFknGuy said:
I came in here to say almost this exact same thing. When an EV can match the usability of anything I currently own I'll look into one. My pickup can do roughly 500 miles on a 35 gallon tank. My corvette can do roughly 350 on a 16 gallon tank sometimes more. Each one of those can be 'recharged' in less than 10 minutes. I also can't imagine an EV pulling my toy hauler very well.
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Ya, I mean, for a commuter that drives 10 miles each way to work I guess it's fine, but if you have to actually do anything productive with your vehicle it's never going to work. EV's simply are not designed for people that use their vehicles for anything other than grocery getting and light commuting...
 
Revdarian said:
A Third World country is a country whose views are not aligned with NATO and capitalism or the Soviet Union and communism. The use of the term "Third World" started during the Cold War and was used to identify which of three categories the countries of the world aligned with.

Now stop misusing the term.
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Bah!

"...it became a stereotype to refer to poor countries as "third world countries",...' https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Third_World
 
Revdarian said:
It doesn't clash with your statement, they were called third world for reasons that had nothing to do with acquisitive power.

You were wrong.
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Ok, so I should have said 'There's a reason 3rd world countries are stereotyped as extremely poor, non-industrialized, backwards trash heaps for the 1st world.'
 
KarsusTG said:
I would be 100% in favor of electric vehicles if I could drive car/truck across Texas in one on a single charge. Take 5 minutes to "refuel" and drive back... This drive 200 miles, stop for 12 hours, drive 200 miles, stop for 12 hours... it's just nonsense...
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12 hours? you must not have been paying attention the pas 5 years. You can charge 300 miles of range in 1 hour on a Tesla supercharger, and they still are working on even faster charging methods.
 
KarsusTG said:
Ya, I mean, for a commuter that drives 10 miles each way to work I guess it's fine, but if you have to actually do anything productive with your vehicle it's never going to work. EV's simply are not designed for people that use their vehicles for anything other than grocery getting and light commuting...
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Light commuting eh? I drive 80 miles round trip every day in my Gen2 Volt.... and I only use 1/2 a gallon of gas to do it. I bought it as a "get my feet wet" in the EV world car. Even with my hour long commute each way, 6 days a week, I love only having to get gas once every 6 or 7 weeks.


Can't wait till the Model 3 is readily available - even the "short range" version is about 3X the range I need and would cover anyone that needs to go 100 miles each way to work. Even the smallest capacity Tesla you can buy new now goes a minimum of 250 miles on a charge, their top range models hitting 350-400 depending on how you drive.
 
collegeboy69us said:
Light commuting eh? I drive 80 miles round trip every day in my Gen2 Volt.... and I only use 1/2 a gallon of gas to do it. I bought it as a "get my feet wet" in the EV world car. Even with my hour long commute each way, 6 days a week, I love only having to get gas once every 6 or 7 weeks.


Can't wait till the Model 3 is readily available - even the "short range" version is about 3X the range I need and would cover anyone that needs to go 100 miles each way to work. Even the smallest capacity Tesla you can buy new now goes a minimum of 250 miles on a charge, their top range models hitting 350-400 depending on how you drive.
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No it doesn't. My boss has one of the earlier Tesla's with the 200 mile range. She has had to have it towed several times. Her commute is 60 miles and with errands/etc she should have been well covered. But the fact of the matter is, we have traffic congestion, detours, construction, etc. Not to mention the "Shit I forgot to plug in last night!" factor. It's not like you can just got to the gas station and grab some juice, or plug into the wall.

Outside of commuting, think of what a light duty pickup needs to be able to do.. Throw ~1k lb's of welding gear and equipment in the back and hitch a 6-7k lb trailer and haul it across the state, then use 4lo to pull it into a field to where the station actually is hundreds of miles away. And that is a typical light duty use... EV's are not capable of that...
 
Um, no they don't. You have to remember, where does the electricity come from? Probably a coal plant. Also, how much toxin is produced to make a battery for an electric car?
 
image.jpeg
 
raz-0 said:
Thanks for the links.

The study seems to only concern itself with CO2 and not environmental pollution in general. It also reaches that 50% number by making an assumption the the EU will generate a much larger percenteage of the rare earth minerals consumed in the EU in th EU, or that rare earth minerals will be less necessary in the manufacture of electric vehicles in the future to arrive at their 50% on average number.

Which... kind of sounds like bullshit.
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Well IMO it's a good place to start. First anti-EV argument is "you burn gas or you burn coal somewhere else" well this kind of points in the direction that burning coal somewhere else might be more preferable.

If you want to get into the ticks and tacks of things, then you compare battery recycling vs used oil recycling, materials used in ICE (and all necessary subsystems) vs electric motors, lithium mining vs drilling for oil.

Bottom line is this kind of debate isn't going to be settled with a single paper, this is trying to do an apples to apples comparison of one particular byproduct of driving a car. I mean after all you're always going to have the 1%ers who need to drive across Texas on and back on a single charge (which ironically started as getting to work and back without needing to recharge)
 
collegeboy69us said:
12 hours? you must not have been paying attention the pas 5 years. You can charge 300 miles of range in 1 hour on a Tesla supercharger, and they still are working on even faster charging methods.
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I just checked the map, the nearest Tesla supercharger is over 50 miles from me, the two next closest are almost 100 miles away and the next one is over 150 miles away. I would hate to have to drive 100 miles just to recharge in 1 hour. How long would it take to charge one with the 220v hookup at my house that would max out at about 50amps if I'm lucky?
 
jedijeb13 said:
I just checked the map, the nearest Tesla supercharger is over 50 miles from me, the two next closest are almost 100 miles away and the next one is over 150 miles away. I would hate to have to drive 100 miles just to recharge in 1 hour. How long would it take to charge one with the 220v hookup at my house that would max out at about 50amps if I'm lucky?
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About 8 hours with a 100 kilowatt battery pack.

Funny thing I never see written about is how the infrastructure is not even close to what is needed for the country to go all electric. I see people and articles written all the time about how we need to be all electric right now, or very soon, but we can't even charge all the cars and trucks that would be on the road if every car and truck turned over to electric right now. And if these cars and trucks had a 1,000 mile range with a 10 minute charge, there is no way the power grid could even come close to supporting that the way it is now.
 
Evil Scooter said:
Pull the plug on Tesla's state and federal subsidies and see how many weeks it takes to shut the doors...

It's Confirmed: Without Government Subsidies, Tesla Sales Implode
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Ummm, probably not as serious as you think.

So going by the article you posted, Denmark has a 180% tax on automobiles that use an internal combustion engine, almost tripling the price of an automobile. Enter the Tesla, a car that isn't cheap by US standards compared to most economy cars, but if a Toyota corolla ends up costing you 280% what it does, then the price of a Tesla seems damn good! Now the tax hungry state that Denmark is decided to change the law so that it's all automobiles regardless of how it is powered, so now the overly pricey car is now 280% overly pricey so yeah it's not too surprising that a country who's national vehicle is the bicycle (which IIRC they tax that shit as well) doesn't want to throw down a quarter million dollars on an electric car when all is said and done.

Now compare that with the subsidies that exist here, and you have a fairly vast difference, the subsidies you receive in the US aren't enough to take care of the sales tax on the higher end tesla models. So would they take a hit? I'm sure, but cause them to shut the doors? You're pretty delusional.

Honestly a better title for the article should be "It's Confirmed: Increasing the Taxes on Purchases Cause Sales to Drop"
 
Evil Scooter said:
Pull the plug on Tesla's state and federal subsidies and see how many weeks it takes to shut the doors...

It's Confirmed: Without Government Subsidies, Tesla Sales Implode
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More Bullshit. The Tesla Model 3 has close to 500,000 net reservations. The subsidy goes away after 200,000 sales of any EV model by that manufacturer. The vast majority of the people who have reserved the Model 3 know for a fact that they aren't getting the tax incentive because of 4th grade math, yet they've reserved anyways. So tell me again how Tesla won't be able to sell any cars without the government subsidy?

Oh wait, you can't. They'll do just fine, the number of reservations proves it. But go ahead, end the tax incentive. Fuck over every other car manufacturer other than Tesla, GM, and Nissan by ending the incentive before they get a chance to use it.

Oh wait, you won't. Those other car manufacturers will go apeshit with their lobbyists if anyone tries to end the incentive before they've used it. So no, not only is Tesla fine without the subsidies, if they did end early Tesla would be helped, not hurt.
 
Evil Scooter said:
Pull the plug on Tesla's state and federal subsidies and see how many weeks it takes to shut the doors...

It's Confirmed: Without Government Subsidies, Tesla Sales Implode
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Tell me again how well the auto industry did 10 years ago... oh that's right tax payers had to bail them out and hope we got paid back.

I got the subsidy on my 2017 Volt, was nice, but not a deciding factor. Just like when I plan on getting a Model 3 in 2019 hopefully once most preorders are satisfied, I know full well I will receive a fraction of, if not zero tax breaks on buying a full EV. Doesn't change my mind about spending the money.

While you are on an "end all subsidy's" kick, why not pull out the crap tons of money that goes to people who just don't feel like working, or the governments we subsidize with dollars in hopes we get something out of it at a later date? The government has thrown far more money away on far dumber projects.
 
nutzo said:
How much pollution does the recycling cause?
Have you seen how electronics are recycled in some 3rd world countries?
Recycling is not all butterflies and unicorns.
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There are several documentaries about ship breaking done in 3rd world countries. You want to see something eye opening take a look at it.
People can decry the environment impact but for the people doing that dirty work they earn a few rupies to support their family so the job is a great thing.
 
When they create an electric car which has a windmill on the roof so it can charge itself as it drives, then I'll buy one.
 
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