3 ms·

I would guess that even charging an EV from a "dirty" power source is still better than an ICE, simply due to efficiencies of scale.

_0w8t 5y ago
Indeed efficiency of a modern ICE engine in a car is 25% max in ideal conditions, while a modern industrial turbine powered by natural gas can get 60%. In fact even with coal the amount of CO2 will be smaller per distance driven. The efficiency of the latest coal power stations is about 48%. With this and accounting for significant energy losses to refine gasoline from oil the electrical cars are already greener than gasoline or Diesel engines unless one use the energy from very old coal plants with low efficiency.
kkfx 5y ago
What efficiencies? Those who demand energivore and polluting oil, gas, coal extraction and processing to a moderately near power plant + the energy you loose in transport + the energy you loose in battery and relevant inverter and intermediate transformers of the energy grid? An electrical motor is very efficient, a battery system is moderately efficient and combined with all environmental costs to source needed materials, dispose of end-of-life batteries (witch means 5 to 8 years per battery in mean) are huge. Of course pushing refined oil around the world is not efficient either but such infra is already there, while no country in the world can recharge their potential EVs on scale nor we can produce them in sufficient numbers nor we know how to dispose of them. Costs should be computed in total, not just in the running part. Like cost of trains must take into account the construction of the train network, it's entertainment etc NOT just the energy the train use.
- dangrossman 5y ago
  Where are you coming up with this stuff? Well-to-wheel, covering every single CO2 molecule involved in producing, transporting, burning and consuming ANY fossil fuel used for electricity production, electric cars are still more efficient and produce less emissions per mile. You could turn over the entire fleet of cars on US roads to electric today, and charging them would not pose a problem for the grid. Batteries do not reach end of life in 5-8 years. Every EV battery on the US market comes with a minimum of an 8 year 100K mile warranty, and they do not get disposed of the day the warranty ends. They have 10-20 years of usable life in a car, then another 10+ years as stationary storage with reduced capacity. When an EV gets totaled out, the batteries never ever go to a landfill, even 10+ year old ones, as they have so much usable life in them they're still worth thousands of dollars. For one point of reference, a 10 year old Nissan LEAF EV battery -- which were tiny compared to the batteries that come in new EVs today -- will still have more usable capacity in it than a brand new $11,000 Tesla Powerwall for whole-home battery backup and solar storage.
  - rootusrootus 5y ago
    > For one point of reference, a 10 year old Nissan LEAF EV battery -- which were tiny compared to the batteries that come in new EVs today -- will still have more usable capacity in it than a brand new $11,000 Tesla Powerwall for whole-home battery backup and solar storage. Before the pandemic sent used cars prices to the moon, there were people buying used Bolts (and probably Leafs, I imagine) to park them permanently just to use the battery capacity for their off-grid home. Apparently it was cost effective, and the Bolt wiring is pretty straightforward to work with.
  - kkfx 5y ago
    > Where are you coming up with this stuff? From the Real Life World®©™ instead of the advertised world. Did you ever have a lithium battery of any kind for more than 10 years? Try to look for real EV patterns: there is not much easy to access but actually daily used EV with a bit of mileage can't be used anymore, at the performance level the owner need after 5 years. Less used EV cease to be usable in around 8 years. After that sure, if you buy a Tesla just for weekly casual trip and have ICEs for daily use things change, you Tesla can potentially last even 15 years. Also sorry but NO statistic, at least not one public, cover the pollution of lithium mining since that happen in exotic and poor places. Almost no one these days want to publish against the Green New Deal, it's seen like a classic patriotic act by many, unfortunately if you are intellectually honest and really an environmentalist you should know that from advertisement and reality there is a big difference. 100k miles came quickly for anyone who use a car for real, in 4-5 years actually BTW, and while ICEs cars have formally equal guarantees in mileage terms, they can last issueless for around 200k miles, and with not marginal entertainment till 400k. EU commercial vans, bus, trucks are used normally for 2 million km and some last other two in third world countries. So please be intellectually honest. Even carmakers publicly declare that with actual chemistry it's impossible going electric on scale except marginal markets like the (in)famous "glorified golf cart" and few luxury car. If today all USA cars switch to BEV the USA electricity grid will collapse in few hours and can't recover even with continuous rolling blackouts for years, even here (France) with all NPP operational it will be impossible to recharge the actual ICE magically transformed to EV. That not counting the homes switching to heat pumps. Just to gives you a realistic dimension this month I've used form grid 151.2kWh and from solar 209.18kWh, in January 460kWh from grid, just 171 from solar, that's in a modern home super-insulated with heat pump heating/cooling/cooking etc. If I count consumed diesel in kWh (around 1000kWh/month), well, I need to triple my small plant. And of course I need two car per head to be used alternatively to recharge them. Now try the same basic calculation for someone who live in an apartment and do not WFH nor that near home. Just to dimension mere energy needs, not counting costs (in natural and economical terms, producing capacity in natural terms etc).

_0w8t 5y ago

Indeed efficiency of a modern ICE engine in a car is 25% max in ideal conditions, while a modern industrial turbine powered by natural gas can get 60%. In fact even with coal the amount of CO2 will be smaller per distance driven. The efficiency of the latest coal power stations is about 48%. With this and accounting for significant energy losses to refine gasoline from oil the electrical cars are already greener than gasoline or Diesel engines unless one use the energy from very old coal plants with low efficiency.

kkfx 5y ago

What efficiencies? Those who demand energivore and polluting oil, gas, coal extraction and processing to a moderately near power plant + the energy you loose in transport + the energy you loose in battery and relevant inverter and intermediate transformers of the energy grid? An electrical motor is very efficient, a battery system is moderately efficient and combined with all environmental costs to source needed materials, dispose of end-of-life batteries (witch means 5 to 8 years per battery in mean) are huge. Of course pushing refined oil around the world is not efficient either but such infra is already there, while no country in the world can recharge their potential EVs on scale nor we can produce them in sufficient numbers nor we know how to dispose of them. Costs should be computed in total, not just in the running part. Like cost of trains must take into account the construction of the train network, it's entertainment etc NOT just the energy the train use.

dangrossman 5y ago
Where are you coming up with this stuff? Well-to-wheel, covering every single CO2 molecule involved in producing, transporting, burning and consuming ANY fossil fuel used for electricity production, electric cars are still more efficient and produce less emissions per mile. You could turn over the entire fleet of cars on US roads to electric today, and charging them would not pose a problem for the grid. Batteries do not reach end of life in 5-8 years. Every EV battery on the US market comes with a minimum of an 8 year 100K mile warranty, and they do not get disposed of the day the warranty ends. They have 10-20 years of usable life in a car, then another 10+ years as stationary storage with reduced capacity. When an EV gets totaled out, the batteries never ever go to a landfill, even 10+ year old ones, as they have so much usable life in them they're still worth thousands of dollars. For one point of reference, a 10 year old Nissan LEAF EV battery -- which were tiny compared to the batteries that come in new EVs today -- will still have more usable capacity in it than a brand new $11,000 Tesla Powerwall for whole-home battery backup and solar storage.
- rootusrootus 5y ago
  > For one point of reference, a 10 year old Nissan LEAF EV battery -- which were tiny compared to the batteries that come in new EVs today -- will still have more usable capacity in it than a brand new $11,000 Tesla Powerwall for whole-home battery backup and solar storage. Before the pandemic sent used cars prices to the moon, there were people buying used Bolts (and probably Leafs, I imagine) to park them permanently just to use the battery capacity for their off-grid home. Apparently it was cost effective, and the Bolt wiring is pretty straightforward to work with.
- kkfx 5y ago
  > Where are you coming up with this stuff? From the Real Life World®©™ instead of the advertised world. Did you ever have a lithium battery of any kind for more than 10 years? Try to look for real EV patterns: there is not much easy to access but actually daily used EV with a bit of mileage can't be used anymore, at the performance level the owner need after 5 years. Less used EV cease to be usable in around 8 years. After that sure, if you buy a Tesla just for weekly casual trip and have ICEs for daily use things change, you Tesla can potentially last even 15 years. Also sorry but NO statistic, at least not one public, cover the pollution of lithium mining since that happen in exotic and poor places. Almost no one these days want to publish against the Green New Deal, it's seen like a classic patriotic act by many, unfortunately if you are intellectually honest and really an environmentalist you should know that from advertisement and reality there is a big difference. 100k miles came quickly for anyone who use a car for real, in 4-5 years actually BTW, and while ICEs cars have formally equal guarantees in mileage terms, they can last issueless for around 200k miles, and with not marginal entertainment till 400k. EU commercial vans, bus, trucks are used normally for 2 million km and some last other two in third world countries. So please be intellectually honest. Even carmakers publicly declare that with actual chemistry it's impossible going electric on scale except marginal markets like the (in)famous "glorified golf cart" and few luxury car. If today all USA cars switch to BEV the USA electricity grid will collapse in few hours and can't recover even with continuous rolling blackouts for years, even here (France) with all NPP operational it will be impossible to recharge the actual ICE magically transformed to EV. That not counting the homes switching to heat pumps. Just to gives you a realistic dimension this month I've used form grid 151.2kWh and from solar 209.18kWh, in January 460kWh from grid, just 171 from solar, that's in a modern home super-insulated with heat pump heating/cooling/cooking etc. If I count consumed diesel in kWh (around 1000kWh/month), well, I need to triple my small plant. And of course I need two car per head to be used alternatively to recharge them. Now try the same basic calculation for someone who live in an apartment and do not WFH nor that near home. Just to dimension mere energy needs, not counting costs (in natural and economical terms, producing capacity in natural terms etc).