Plug-in cars no better for the environment.

[omn1potent]

Plug-in cars no better for the environment.
Barry Park, The Age, March 31, 2009.

http://www.drive.com.au/Editorial/Ar...rticleID=61878

A new study claims that electric cars plugged into coal-powered grids are no better for the environment than efficient petrol cars. By BARRY PARK.

In some parts of Australia, particularly Victoria, you would be better off buying a hybrid or even a small-capacity petrol-engined car. Figures released by the University of South Australia reveal how much carbon dioxide an electric vehicle will produce for each kilometre travelled in each state or territory based on how the electricity is generated.

In Victoria, where 85 per cent of electricity comes from power stations burning more highly polluting brown coal, the figures show an electric vehicle will produce the equivalent of about 130 grams of carbon dioxide a kilometre - about the same as small-engined petrol hatchback.

But recharge the same electric car in Tasmania, where almost all the electricity is generated using more environmentally friendly hydroelectric power plants, and the equivalent carbon dioxide output falls to about 13 grams.

This is far better than any car on our roads today - including petrol-electric hybrids - and lower even than the next wave of ultra-efficient vehicles slated for Australia.

No mainstream car makers offer an all-electric vehicle for sale in Australia, although Mitsubishi last week announced that it would test a small five-seat hatchback - the iMiEV - before making a decision to sell the car here possibly by the end of the year.

Senior research fellow at the university Peter Pudney said high levels of carbon dioxide from Australia's traditional methods of electricity generation highlighted the need for developing more renewable energy sources.

Dr Pudney said motorists should be able to buy green electricity generated using renewable resources such as wind farms or solar stations.

[phillyc]

Typical of drive by going for the big headline.

I work as an electrical fitter in the power industry and I reckon the advent of electric cars is a great thing for my job! But it is also from an environmental point of view as well.

If the car is charged up with renewables then the CO2 is neglible. A vast improvement.

Knowing what can be done with power electronics and current generations of batteries and engines, the possibility for huge performance and tiny emissions is entirely feasible.

PS Check out Brushless RC in you-tube and with this type of technology being scaled up the possibilities are amazing. The electrics kick, seriously kick nitro-methane powered rivals...

[Daymoe]

Originally Posted by phillyc

Typical of drive by going for the big headline.

I work as an electrical fitter in the power industry and I reckon the advent of electric cars is a great thing for my job! But it is also from an environmental point of view as well.

If the car is charged up with renewables then the CO2 is neglible. A vast improvement.

Knowing what can be done with power electronics and current generations of batteries and engines, the possibility for huge performance and tiny emissions is entirely feasible.

PS Check out Brushless RC in you-tube and with this type of technology being scaled up the possibilities are amazing. The electrics kick, seriously kick nitro-methane powered rivals...

Problem is, we generate a lot of our power from brown coal, charging your car from brown coal is just going to shift the CO2 emissions from cars to power plants, plug-in electric cars will only be viable if we go Nuclear or 100% renewable, forget about the latter, it'll never happen.

[mik]

i wonder if they have taken into account how much pollution is caused in the mining and processing the coal ?

[joolz]

Dont bother driving your plug in cars during a heat wave in Victoria or infact any state in Australia as the grid only just copes now. Do they also account for A/C in these plug in cars along with plug in stations in regional areas? Even the Hybrid leaves a larger impact on the climate through production than a petrol fueled car. Top Gear doesnt lie!

[DJR-351]

Forget electric cars, i cannot belive these things are still being pushed, all you are doing is shifting the pollution/energy problem...

These things have no decent range/power, the costs and energy used in producing these outweigh there supposed "greenness"...

[woodsy109]

I'll have to disagree with most replys so far and say i'm all for plug-in cars. Thats also to say it has to come with a change to nuclear and renewable power production as well. The electric cars have much fewer moving parts and will be cheaper to manufacture and the main gripe, the batteries, will soon have a longer range and lifecycle.

[vztrt]

That article is correct in the sense if there is a lot of cars are using the grid. These cars would most likely charge overnight at the off peak times when power is being lost anyway (same reason earth hour was a waste, but that was more a sign of support to CO2 reduction then actually saving something) so a small amount of cars wouldn't make that much of a difference. But if it did take off then it would be a waste when your power generation emits a lot of CO2.

BTW I'm talking about recharging of the car and not the 'carbon footprint' in producing these cars.

But as DJR-351 said these cars have no range yet so until they increase this to about 10-15 times what they have now these cars aren't really useful. I always think if you had an electric only car and had to drive from Melbourne to Brisbane when the battery ran out (lets say the range was about 700km) you would have to wait a fair while to get the car charged before you were on the road again. So until these cars can be charged within 30 mins and deliver a high amount of k's and be the same price as a similar car of its size it wont be a big hit in the market.

[chevypower]

According to that movie, "Who Killed the Electric Car" even if all the cars were electric, and ALL the electricity was generated using brown coal - not clean coal, solar, wind, hydro or other (or mix of all) - it would still be better for the environment than every car running it's own internal combustion engine. It makes sense too, because today's cars only run at a very low efficiency. Electric would solve the efficiency problem. Then if they switched to clean coal, the emissions would reduce by another 80% or so. So I don't buy this BS that Hummers are more environmentally friendly than a Prius, and all this other crap I keep reading to justify buying large engines. I would still like a 6.2 V8 in a 2010 F150, but I am not going to talk myself in to believing how I am doing the planet good by not going electric. I hope electric and hydrogen technology gets to the point where it's viable.

[imugli]

One thing I've always wondered...

I pay 10 or 15% extra for my electricity to be generated from 100% renewable sources. Now I understand that they don't go hooking my house up directly to a wind turbine or anything but surely this article is completely irrelevant to people in my position?

Carbon emissions from the generation of my electricity? 0
Carbon emissions from the car? 0

[cosmo20btt]

People must take in to account that when these so-called Batteries wear out or need to be replace that to dispose of them the effects of them on the envirment will be just as bad as the co from a nrmal combustion engine.