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Most Comprehensive Study Yet On Environmental Impact of Electric Vehicles
An anonymous reader writes: A few articles came out Thursday talking about the recently released report from the National Bureau of Economic Research on the environmental benefits of electric cars. The general consensus is kind of obvious -- that it depends on the ratio of coal vs. clean electrical generation that is used to charge your car. What is interesting is the extent to which it makes a difference, and that when viewed on a regional basis, there are cases where the EV doesn't do so well. And when it comes to policy decisions, it seems the central focus needs to be on the replacement of large-scale coal generation, and the rest will fall in to place. Here is one cover story from Ars Technica. Google others for varying perspectives.
Its a good thing my reason for wanting hybrid and electric vehicles is purely economical. Environmental benefits are a nice side effect in many cases, but the reason I want my country less dependent on oil is almost purely to reduce foreign dependency. Money spent buying coal from West Virginia stays in our economy, while oil bought abroad does not. Also electricity produced by coal is less expensive per mile driven than gasoline, so that allows money to be spent on more productive areas than natural resources.
The environmental benefits are still important, but dealing with dirty coal is a separate issue from electric cars IMHO.
-- All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing. -- Edmund Burke
Why are we dignifying it by calling it a "study"? It's not published in a journal. It's not undergone peer-review. It's a "working paper" on the NBER website. It's not the same thing. If it was legitimate, they would have submitted it to a legitimate journal and gotten it published. They have not, as it stands.
How long is it going to take for news sources to bother to check whether something has undergone peer-review before they start citing it as "science"? Let alone the "most comprehensive study yet"?
"You see, Government is a system that is based on weapons." -- Timster
Whereas with coal, all you have to do is tear great big holes in the ground, destroy the water supply, kill thousands of miners with black lung disease and untold thousands more with pollution, contribute to climate change and have the government subsidize the whole thing.
And there you are.
You are welcome on my lawn.
If you're going to take into account the whole supply chain for electric cars, you have to do the same thing for gasoline cars. This study doesn't do that. It calculates the CO2 cost of electricity generation for electric cars, but assumes that gasoline just magically shows up at the pump and doesn't incur any environmental costs in getting there. The CO2 emissions resulting from extraction, refining, etc. are completely ignored.
Would you like pictures of Lithium and Nickel mines ?