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Some Electric Car Drivers Might Spew More CO2 Than Diesel Cars, New Research Shows (bloomberg.com)
bricko shares a report from Bloomberg with the caption, "Making batteries is a mess": Beneath the hoods of millions of the clean electric cars rolling onto the world's roads in the next few years will be a dirty battery. Every major carmaker has plans for electric vehicles to cut greenhouse gas emissions, yet their manufacturers are, by and large, making lithium-ion batteries in places with some of the most polluting grids in the world. By 2021, capacity will exist to build batteries for more than 10 million cars running on 60 kilowatt-hour packs, according to data of Bloomberg NEF. Most supply will come from places like China, Thailand, Germany and Poland that rely on non-renewable sources like coal for electricity.
An electric vehicle in Germany would take more than 10 years to break even with an efficient combustion engine's emissions. "We're facing a bow wave of additional CO2 emissions," said Andreas Radics, a managing partner at Munich-based automotive consultancy Berylls Strategy Advisors, which argues that for now, drivers in Germany or Poland may still be better off with an efficient diesel engine. The findings, among the more bearish ones around, show that while electric cars are emission-free on the road, they still discharge a lot of the carbon-dioxide that conventional cars do. Just to build each car battery -- weighing upwards of 500 kilograms (1,100 pounds) in size for sport-utility vehicles -- would emit up to 74 percent more C02 than producing an efficient conventional car if it's made in a factory powered by fossil fuels in a place like Germany, according to Berylls' findings. Yet regulators haven't set out clear guidelines on acceptable carbon emissions over the life cycle of electric cars, even as the likes of China, France and the U.K. move toward outright bans of combustion engines. It all has to do with manufacturing. According to estimates of Mercedes-Benz's electric-drive system integration department, manufacturing an electric car pumps out "significantly" more climate-warming gases than a conventional car, which releases only 20 percent of its lifetime CO2 at this stage. "Just switching to renewable energy for manufacturing would slash emissions by 65 percent, according to Transport & Environment," reports Bloomberg. "In Norway, where hydro-electric energy powers practically the entire grid, the Berylls study showed electric cars generate nearly 60 percent less CO2 over their lifetime, compared with even the most efficient fuel-powered vehicles."
An electric vehicle in Germany would take more than 10 years to break even with an efficient combustion engine's emissions. "We're facing a bow wave of additional CO2 emissions," said Andreas Radics, a managing partner at Munich-based automotive consultancy Berylls Strategy Advisors, which argues that for now, drivers in Germany or Poland may still be better off with an efficient diesel engine. The findings, among the more bearish ones around, show that while electric cars are emission-free on the road, they still discharge a lot of the carbon-dioxide that conventional cars do. Just to build each car battery -- weighing upwards of 500 kilograms (1,100 pounds) in size for sport-utility vehicles -- would emit up to 74 percent more C02 than producing an efficient conventional car if it's made in a factory powered by fossil fuels in a place like Germany, according to Berylls' findings. Yet regulators haven't set out clear guidelines on acceptable carbon emissions over the life cycle of electric cars, even as the likes of China, France and the U.K. move toward outright bans of combustion engines. It all has to do with manufacturing. According to estimates of Mercedes-Benz's electric-drive system integration department, manufacturing an electric car pumps out "significantly" more climate-warming gases than a conventional car, which releases only 20 percent of its lifetime CO2 at this stage. "Just switching to renewable energy for manufacturing would slash emissions by 65 percent, according to Transport & Environment," reports Bloomberg. "In Norway, where hydro-electric energy powers practically the entire grid, the Berylls study showed electric cars generate nearly 60 percent less CO2 over their lifetime, compared with even the most efficient fuel-powered vehicles."
For a diesel Volvo vs a Tesla model S, assuming the average 2015 power mix in Europe the break even point is about 28.000Km.
I did take some big shortcuts tho. I compared 100kwh worth of Panasonic LiPo batteries + power to the diesel fuel needed to drive the volvo the same distance using Tesla Model S power usage figures.
There are way to slew this in one or the other direction - for instance I did also add CO2 Equivalent for refining the diesel.
Considering where Berylls Strategy Advisors is located and the fact that the German car companies still have no mass-market ready electric car my guess is that this is fake news and can be disregarded.
It's also only looking at CO2, and ignoring the other pollution. Diesels put out a lot of harmful particulate matter right where people live and breathe.
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Having an electric car is not CO2 free, but even the current mix of electricity in the US ensures it's about 50% cleaner in total. See figure ES-2 in this document. With low-carbon sources spreading, it's going to get even better.
Ezekiel 23:20
This is a terrible argument, and a poorly written article over on Bloomberg. The writer got themselves so flustered that they couldn't be bothered to proof-read, or make a coherent point that doesn't stretch credulity. I would call this, "panic journalism."
You can't do statistics this way because methods of generating power are shifting. Coal plants are dying off across the world. Part of the problem with this article, not to defend coal, is that there is no one way to measure coal emissions. It depends largely on when the power plants were constructed, what the local regulations are, and the size of the plant. You can't just run an average on it, and hope to be close to the truth of the matter. Even comparing Poland to Belarus is silly. And it gets sillier when you start talking about Germany and France.
But even that is mundane when you put it in the terms stated. Europe, as we all know is working hard to solve the power problem. They're doing it in ways that are a lot more radical than anything we've seen in the US. To start talking about carbon footprints, as they stand today, before the industry has even taken hold is throwing away the baby with the bathwater.
Of course, when it comes to panic journalism, that's kinda the point, so I can't fault them for that.
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