Electric Cars Are Not the Answer To Air Pollution, Says Top UK Adviser (theguardian.com)

Cars must be driven out of cities to tackle the UK's air pollution crisis, not just replaced with electric vehicles, according to the UK government's top adviser. From a report: Prof Frank Kelly said that while electric vehicles emit no exhaust fumes, they still produce large amounts of tiny pollution particles from brake and tyre dust, for which the government already accepts there is no safe limit. Toxic air causes 40,000 early deaths a year in the UK, and the environment secretary, Michael Gove, recently announced that the sale of new diesel and petrol cars will be banned from 2040, with only electric vehicles available after that. But faced with rising anger from some motorists, the plan made the use of charges to deter dirty diesel cars from polluted areas a measure of last resort only. Kelly's intervention heightens the government's dilemma between protecting public health and avoiding politically difficult charges or bans on urban motorists. "The government's plan does not go nearly far enough," said Kelly, professor of environmental health at King's College London and chair of the Committee on the Medical Effects of Air Pollutants, official expert advisers to the government. "Our cities need fewer cars, not just cleaner cars."

Comments

Not THE answer

[Mr D from 63]

This is no single answer. Not EVs, Not solar and wind, not nuclear, no single answer. They can all help tremendously if approached properly. When one considers socioeconomic challenges, we need a lot more answers than we currently have in our toolbox, and we can't afford to eliminate any of the ones we have.

Re: Not THE answer

[freak0fnature]

The article isn't even complaining about CO2 or global warming... it's talking about real pollution.

Re: Not THE answer

[Anonymous Coward]

Your standards for "evidence" is the problem. CO2 levels are at record highs, average global temperature is at record highs, and the vast majority of scientists have validated this fact in decades of peer reviewed research. If there was a solid scientific case that CO2 was not a real problem, there is no shortage of financial rewards awaiting that research. The problem is not a lack of evidence. It's denial based on ideological rejection of proposed mitigations. Rather than trying to wish it away, come up with an alternative mitigation.

Re: Not THE answer

[dugancent]

I'll be happy to listen to what you have to say

No you won't. There is ample amount of evidence and has been for years and what could get posted here makes no difference. You choose to ignore it then start arguments that will go nowhere.

Troll elsewhere.

Re:Not THE answer

[Grishnakh]

The other thing with EVs (and hybrids) is that they don't generate as much brake dust as regular cars, because they use regenerative braking much of the time.

In addition, the thing about brake dust sounds ridiculous to me. Modern brake pads don't even have asbestos in them, and the total volume is rather small (go look at some yourself, I'm sure the guy in Autozone will be happy to show you some). Those pads last a minimum of 30k miles, probably at least 50k up to 100k. Considering how much air your engine is ingesting and expelling during that much time, that volume of brake dust is minuscule. Same with tires. The problem with cars is the exhaust emissions; brake dust probably isn't healthy to breathe in in large quantities, but that's a far far lower concern than engine emissions, so much lower it's really laughable to consider it while we still have hundreds of millions of cars burning gas and diesel and spewing out noxious emissions from that.

We can certainly use better public transit, and I've been harping on SkyTran for years now but everyone tells me I'm crazy and that we need to stick with cars. Honestly, at this point I'm just hoping for a planet-killer asteroid to put us all out of our misery because we're clearly too stupid as a species to live.

Re: Not THE answer

[ShanghaiBill]

The article isn't even complaining about CO2 or global warming... it's talking about real pollution.

TFA is written by someone that doesn't even understand how electric vehicles work. EVs emit very little dust from brake pads, because they use regenerative braking (running the engine backwards to recharge the battery) and use the brake pads for only the last 10% of deceleration. Since energy is proportional to the square of the velocity, this last 10% of velocity is only 1% of the energy. Brake pads on EVs have so little wear that they last the life of the car.

Tire/Tyre wear is a concern because EVs have much higher starting torque. Tesla owner often report accelerated tire wear. But this is something that could be mostly solved in software, by controlling the torque. This would likely be unpopular.

Anyway, I am sceptical about whether "tire dust" is really a significant problem compared to tailpipe emissions. The sounds like silly alarmism to me, and makes me wonder if someone with an ulterior agenda is pushing this FUD.

Regenerative braking

[Anonymous Coward]

So the fight of gas vs electric is trying to find new ground. Interesting. Some points
a) regenerative braking does not put wear on brake shoes
b) smart cars can drive better to reduce tire wear

Re:Regenerative braking

[ctilsie242]

There is also the fact that an EV uses zero energy (well, except for the climate control system, radio, and electronics) when stopped. An IC vehicle still burns fuel. This in itself is a major fuel saver.

Perfect is the enemy of good

[sjbe]

Prof Frank Kelly said that while electric vehicles emit no exhaust fumes, they still produce large amounts of tiny pollution particles from brake and tyre dust, for which the government already accepts there is no safe limit.

Sigh. Another example of perfect being the enemy of good. No solution is going to be without some drawbacks. Electric cars are CLEARLY an improvement over internal combustion engines if for no other reason than the fact that they can be powered without fossil fuels. No they don't solve everything but that's not an excuse to not move forward. We're going to be using cars for the foreseeable future so we may as well make whatever improvements we can to them. EVs and hybrids are an improvement. Let's take that step and then take the next one when we are able.

"Our cities need fewer cars, not just cleaner cars."

That's fine but probably not going to happen without some VERY substantial investments in public transit.

Re:Ok. Get rid of cars...

[cayenne8]

No, take the bus, streetcar, & train.

Hm....nah, that just isn't going to work, just for groceries alone.

Not sure how with a train/bus/streetcar I'm going to manage to get my supplies just for this weekend:

1. 2 large bags of ice and case or two of beer for the ice chest.

2. I whole brisket, about 12lbs for the smoker.

3. A load of logs for the smoker, I lately buy bags from Academy Sports, hickory and mesquite blend...VERY heavy.

And that is just for the fun weekend stuff....that doesn't include my grocery shopping I do weekly...and hit different stores to get the best deals on things.

And on top of that, since it isn't door-to-door, it sure will be fun trying to get all that stuff on multiple trips during rain storms during summer with high heat and humidity.

And if sunday, I want to take some of my long guns out to the rifle range about 40 min away, I"m guessing public transportation wouldn't be too terribly thrilled about my being on there with 2-3 rifles and pistols and ammo.

The 2 examples here are NOT outliers...I do stuff like this regularly....or tow boats to go fishing, etc.

Public transport for routine US living, outside of the few extremely urban closed packed cities is just not practical for regular active families.