I was walking into my local Kroger store the other night, and, well, funny thing.
I’m not a car guy. Never have been. I hardly know one make from another, and don’t care a whole lot.
But I’m walking in the store, and I feel this, like, magnetic pull,…from this gleaming, jewel like, black thing in the parking space next to mine.. that makes me swing around like I’m pulled by strange tractor beam. Stop. And look, and stare.
I’m thinking..
What is that? BMW? Infiniti? Lexus?
Nope. It’s a Tesla. And Dayuum – that is some kinda beautiful machine. All sleek, and black, and shiny, and polished, and curvy, and sleek, and well, just..wow.
So I go in and buy some fruit and hummus. And on the way out, I see this tall, distinguished looking gent approach the car and beep it with his keys.
“How do you like your Tesla?” says I.
He cracked a huge smile.
“It does exactly what they say it does. I’ve been to Detroit and back, Grand Rapids and back, with no recharge. I love it.”
Sorry Fox News. Electric and Hybrid Cars are taking over.
In a welcome development for the planet, the cars on American streets are becoming much more climate-friendly much sooner than many had expected. Consumers are increasingly buying fuel-efficient hybrid and electric vehicles thanks to breakthrough innovations and supportive government policies.
The transportation sector accountsfor 28 percent of American greenhouse gas emissions, the most after power plants. Reducing those emissions will require many changes, including greater use of public transit. More efficient cars will almost certainly play a critical role, too; increased fuel efficiency helped reducecarbon dioxide emissions from passengers cars by 16 percent from 2005 to 2012.
Automakers sold more than 350,000 hybrid and electric cars in the first seven months of this year, up 30 percent from the same period in 2012. While these vehicles make up less than 4 percent of light vehicle sales, hybrids, which use electric motors and conventional engines, are now so mainstream that there are more than 40 models available. The most popular one, the Toyota Prius, is among the 10 best-sellingpassenger cars in the country.
Fully electric cars are still a niche product bought mostly by affluent drivers. But sales of even these vehicles have been growing fast, thanks in part to federal and state tax rebates. Among the best selling of these cars is the luxurious Model S produced by Tesla Motors, which has been so successful that companies like BMW and Cadillac are also rushing to bring out high-end electric cars.
Federal policy has been an important driver. The 2010 mandate requiring a doubling of new-car average fuel economy by 2025 has pushed industry to accelerate the development of more efficient cars. So has the Obama administration’s program, much maligned by Republicans, of loan guarantees to renewable energy and electric-car companies. Despite a few regrettable failures, the government’s $36 billion loan portfolio has suffered losses of just 2 percent; in May, Tesla paid off its $465 million loan nine years ahead of schedule.
Hybrid and electric cars still have a long way to go. That they have come this far shows that timely regulation, targeted assistance and government-private sector cooperation can pay big dividends for industry and the environment.
I want a Tesla S soooo badly. You’re right, they are very pretty AND environmental besides. Gusty sigh….
It is possibly the highest performance car in this class – and it is almost 2X as efficient as the Prius. Put some solar panels on your roof, or work to have your electricity supplier to go 100% renewable, and you’ll have that performance and looks and safety and efficiency *carbon free*. 🙂
yes it does look like the best car ever…finally a model that looks like the automotive equivalent of the iPad. I hope it’s cheaper in three or four years’ time, when I’ll change my current car.
you ought understand that the final discourse in the video should be considered absolutely unnecessary – if you’d like this kind of car to become the norm, it should happen because people like its shape or features (as you did) and not because there’s a talking head that says it’s the ethical thing to do.
actually on second thought all that mentioning of desperate needs and revolutions might put people off. The minute an object acquires political connotations (like the Prius), half of the population won’t touch it with a long pole
I would like nothing better for all of the “liberal mainstream news media” to jump on all the awards and accolades Tesla has earned for the Model S
– Car & Driver, Automobile Mag, Consumer Reports, incredible safety rating from the NHTSA – and proclaim it as the Official ObamaCar of the American Socialist.
The rightwing deserve to have this thrown in their faces after all the BS we’ve had to stomach about the stimulus, Solyndra and how Obama is forcing up gas prices.
of course MorinMoss -you don’t care about the planet or the atmosphere or Society, you’re only out for petty revenge – but I had understood that already
Oh yes, PanOpticus – you certainly have the measure of all we lesser beings.
A pity the OM in your moniker isn’t enough to create your preferred “reality”.
But in this universe, it’s neither an impossibility nor a contradiction to care deeply about something and despise something else.
And, for your edification, throwing back the smears of the rightwingnuts is not revenge, merely a retort.
(retreats quietly to avoid causing additional psychological imbalances)
Have a nice life. Hope not to see you again soon.
O-Logos is correct when he speaks of being careful about “putting people off” with “political connotations”. To remind everyone, recent studies have shown that many conservatives are “put off” by touting the environmental-friendliness of a product on a package. Perhaps the best known of these was done with light bulbs. When the package stressed the cost savings and long life of high efficiency bulbs, roughly equal numbers of both liberals and conservatives said they would purchase it. When the packaging instead stressed how good the bulbs are for the environment, the number of conservatives who said they would purchase them dropped significantly.
This finding reinforces the recent posting on this site (or a similar one?—CRS at my age) that says the argument for fighting climate change and switching to various alternatives must be presented to conservatives from a personal and economic perspective. That is more likely to get them moving in the right direction, at least the significant number of them who don’t give a rodent’s rear end for scientific truth or the greater good of society and the biosphere.
(And the Prius family is breeding like feral cats in my part of the country in spite of its “political connotations”)
conservatives always take umbrage when you say they don’t give a damn about the environment. findings like this would seem to reinforce that idea.
I’m hoping that proves to be more of a generational gap than one that divides the political spectrum, much like gay marriage.
In other words, while it might turn off crusty old conservatives, their sons & daughters will simply do the math, enjoy the quiet and love the ride.
Omnologos does have a valid point. What can be said on MSNBC is better not mentioned on Fox. The light bulb industry discovered that “conservatives” are more inclined to buy a product if the label only describes total cost of ownership without mentioning that using less power is more environmental.
The only thing they like about Tesla is the stock price.
Nothing else seems to matter.
“without mentioning that using less power is more environmental.”
see what I mean?
Fox News conservatives hate the living planet, outside of what they can see on the golf course or in their gated communities.
We’re back into “our political opponents are simpleton and cartoonish” territory – shall I remind anybody here that that’s exactly what propelled Bush Jr to power, both in Texas and at the White House?
There is nothing better than having an enemy that constantly underestimates what you can do.
Let’s try to push this discussion a bit higher. Do conservatives (in the USA, and elsewhere) care about the environment? I say, most of them do. This is what people care about in 2013, among other things. But they might not think that taking care of the environment means to do what you suggest them to do.
To just write “this is environmentally friendly” doesn’t mean something is environmentally friendly. For example I have a mix of old lightbulbs and new ones in the house, because using less power has to coexist with having mercury next to children. To my ears, the long monologue at the end of the Tesla-S video is as boring as listening to a preacher talking a foreign language I don’t understand. And hybrids are like half-virgins, thanks but no thanks with all that dead baggage to carry around aka “the other engine”.
Everybody wants a better world. Nobody has a monopoly on dictating what that should be.
“We’re back into “our political opponents are simpleton and cartoonish” territory”
balderdash. that’s a lie from the pit of hell.
exactly 😉
O-L says “We’re back into ‘our political opponents are simpleton and cartoonish’ territory –”
Yes, and we have been there since the Republican Party went off into La-La land in 2008 with Palin and especially since the clown circus that left Romney as the last (but not best) man standing.
O-L asks “Do conservatives (in the USA, and elsewhere) care about the environment? I say, most of them do…..But they might not think that taking care of the environment means to do what you suggest them to do”.
Yes, I would agree that many TRUE conservatives DO care about the environment. After all, to be “conservative” means to preserve and protect, and the state of the environment underlies all human endeavors (including getting filthy rich at the expense of others), so why wouldn’t they? Unfortunately, the Republican Party has been bought and is now wholly owned by the likes of the Koch brothers and others who would deny climate change. (Not to say that the Democrats are guilt free—Hedges in “Death of the Liberal Class” makes that clear). And even more unfortunately, the conservative way of thinking is much more susceptible to cognitive dissonance and confirmation bias than the liberal-progressive. They do not THINK about what evidence is out there about climate change, they FEEL, and Faux News, Rush, and Glenn Beck tell them what they want to hear, and thereby make them FEEL affirmed in their ignorance. The two books by Mooney are must reads for anyone who wants to understand the latest findings in the field of political psychology and political neuroscience—“The Republican War on Science” and “The Republican Brain”. Reading them will give a good understanding of why it is difficult to get conservatives to “think that taking care of the environment means to do what you suggest them to do”
O-L also says “To just write ‘this is environmentally friendly’ doesn’t mean something is environmentally friendly”.
It doesn’t? Does everyone who says that lie?
And “Everybody wants a better world. Nobody has a monopoly on dictating what that should be”.
Translation for those who do not recognize cognitive dissonance: “I KNOW that I am a good person and my heart is in the tight place. I will believe what I WANT to believe based on my feelings and beliefs (ignorant and closed-minded as they may be), and anyone who tries to speak scientific truth to me or get me to rationally analyze evidence is DICTATING to me and their arguments will be instantly rejected”.
dumboldguy (DOG for short)
DOG – You’re saying I am irrational and you are rational because you are rational and I am irrational.
Well, that’s exactly why you are demonstrably irrational, independently from my own rationality state 😉
The following is an adaptation of an exchange between Alice and the Duchess—taken from Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland, Chapter 9.
“I quite agree with you,” said Omnologos; “and the moral of that is–‘Be what you would seem to be’–or if you’d like it put more simply–‘Never imagine yourself not to be otherwise than what it might appear to others that what you were or might have been was not otherwise than what you had been would have appeared to them to be otherwise.'”
“I think I should understand that better,” dumboldguy said very politely, “`if I had it written down: but I can’t quite follow it as you say it.”
“That’s nothing to what I could say if I chose,” Omnologos replied, in a VERY pleased tone.
“Pray don’t trouble yourself to say it any longer than that,” said dumboldguy.
“I have a mix of old lightbulbs and new ones in the house, because using less power has to coexist with having mercury next to children.”
Progress happens. LED bulbs don’t contain Mercury. They are more efficient and last much longer than CFLs.
“We’re back into “our political opponents are simpleton and cartoonish” territory – shall I remind anybody here that that’s exactly what propelled Bush Jr to power, both in Texas and at the White House?”
I don’t believe Dubya was portrayed as a doofus during his initial run for the Texas governorship. Wasn’t it more about Ann Richards being an anti-gun (rumored) lesbian?
I think that having a President for a dad also helped more than hurt.
He did put Texas on the wind power map – not sure how conservatives feel about that and I don’t recall him talking much about that when Halliburton was helping him run the country (into the ground?).
“There is nothing better than having an enemy that constantly underestimates what you can do”
Like voter suppression in a swing state? Thanks to little brother John-Ellis.
“To my ears, the long monologue at the end of the Tesla-S video is as boring as listening to a preacher talking a foreign language I don’t understand”
Which doesn’t mean that it’s inaccurate or not insightful.
It’s possible that the problem resides in the listener, not the speaker.
“And hybrids are like half-virgins, thanks but no thanks with all that dead baggage to carry around aka “the other engine”
They do seem to be neither quite fish nor fowl. The original Prius had many shortcomings, not least was that the tiny battery and that it was a plug-in from the start and that wouldn’t be an option for 15 years – by which point more than 2 million non-plugins has been sold.
While I’m not particularly wow’ed by the BMW i3, it would be more impressive if its range extender could be swapped in and out easily.
In your view it seems like speed limits is also not necessary as you “might not kill someone” by driving faster.
Do you have any empathy for other people at all?
What on earth is wrong about doing something “just in case there was something to global warming after all?”. Talk about ego-trip.
Prius envy ..
Will you guys stop flaming each other already! This isn’t AOL, for Pete’s sake! Back to the subject, the car looks great and fantastic. Like any new innovation, others will follow and are following. While this is all great, Yale 360 posted an opinion suggesting that perhaps a more prudent way to really ramp up a reduced CO2 footprint would be to concentrate more on infrastructure energy. The transportation sector should follow. Don’t forget too, that we have a whole new generation of consumers who don’t seem to value the automobile the way us older member . Here’s the story. Thoughts? http://e360.yale.edu/feature/why_pushing_alternative_fuels_makes_bad_public_policy/2682/
Nick -the Yale guy makes a good point. Anything promoted by government ends up with too many unexpected consequences to be any good. This is an issue intrinsic to parliamentary democracy as every law is the amalgamation of independent interests, so it’s impossible for just the one idealistic outcome to happen and nothing else.
You just have to compare the original Carter push for corn ethanol with the mighty mess of the Energy act of Bush Sr and then the absurd results in the 2000’s.
Rest of article unfortunately suffers from CO2 obsession – one is left unsure if the author really wants a cleaner and better planet, or just fewer emissions. The latter don’t imply the former, just like the signing of an Act pushing for corn ethanol ostensibly for environmental reasons hasn’t much helped the environment.
Public policy is complex and can only create disaster where the means (less emissions) are confused with the goals.
We could easily reduce emissions massively by killing vast numbers of people. But that’s not what anybody wants. People want a better place where to live. If only everybody could keep that always in focus.
maurizio,
The push for corn ethanol was directly related to the profits of corn producers and the ostensible benefits were directly related to energy independence. Environmental benefits were nothing more than a phony sales pitch, which according to your mode of thinking should have been a negative since it is such a turn off to the people for whose tender sensibilities you have such touching concern.
“Public policy is complex and can only create disaster where the means (less emissions) are confused with the goals.”
Try as I might, I cannot parse this statement. It is a completely confused mess of right-wing ideology and cognitive dissonance. As if that were not a distinction without a difference.
Perhaps I should take your advice, maurizio, and tread lightly on calling you out for your serial idiocy. It only seems to encourage you. In that spirit, you are doing a wonderful job of defending reassuring falsehoods.
S
JP – what is the goal here? The “goal” isn’t “to reduce carbon emissions” because you want to reduce carbon emissions for a purpose, ie for a goal (climate change mitigation, presumably).
As for the Energy Act of 1992, you should read more about the work of Rep Philip Sharp (D-Indiana). The guy’s been working about clean energy since 1975.
Yes like restricting smoking because scientific evidence showed it was bad for your breath. Let the market decide who is smart enough to live or not…? Sounds just like something from the Koch-bible.
Sometimes people are just to stupid to know whats best for them, either because they are just incredibly ignorant even in the face of evidence, or just because it doesn’t sound right with their egos or wallets.
You do know that the last housing bubble wouldn’t have happened had the government actually controlled the banks and limited their actions?
Free market will generally just create ego-trips and promote “whatever you can grab” kind of thinking. It will also create a highly inefficient system where the same stuff is reinvented 10 times and sold with 10 different designs – where the idea is generally to just make the consumer buy it and not care much for longevity. If the free market had decided about guarantees there wouldn’t be any the moment you left the store.
Edit: that should be “bad for your health”… 🙂 – Bad breath is ofc another side effect… 🙂
jd64 – if you still don’t understand that anti-capitalist rants put people off and ruin whatever argument you might have had, there is a lot of stupidity on the wrong side of your keyboard 😉
As for the Nissan Leaf I tried to give it a try but it would have been impractical even for my wife’s relatively short commute. Plus (and worse) it was just a car with electrics, as for some unfathomable reasons they tried very hard to pretend it was a car with an internal combustion engine.
Omnologos, sure I know the anti-capitalist ideas are overshadowed by an irrational fear of socialism (especially in USA) and that the government will take away all you have strived for all your life. Coming from Norway I believe socialism is more around us than many politicians like to admit.
I tend to say that green socialism is willingly giving through understanding the problems and facts, while the classic red socialism is the one that is stuffed down your throat when you least want it due to some idealism (rational or irrational). Some think that we can get there by the free market by giving people “green stuff” that is better than the “non green one” – but in this case I don’t think that’s possible because fossil fuels is almost like concentrated magic. In this case a fair share of the grey cells need to be operating in order to grasp the problem.
I know its a difficult problem, I know a sentence can make it sound so simple to reach utopia or some other state that is better than the current one. But I do believe knowledge of facts, openness, transparency and care for one another goes a long way to accepting that we might have to “swallow some camels” (a common term we use in Norway) in our welfare and tone down the expectation of instant riches and fame. People today are basically taught a very odd social status rat race that is kept alive by the consumption smorgasbord. Its a superficial illusion of happiness and status that has no use whatsoever besides destroying the planet.
Admitting that status quo might not be a good way to go about things and understanding that its certainly not sustainable doesn’t mean that you have to be a sterotypical old Soviet socialist or something. People are just treating behavior by the tags they have and not what good they do in the long term. So being kind to your neighbor once by letting him ride with you to work is good social bonding, but asking that people should do this more and you are so easily branded a socialist anti-capitalist bastard. Even though we perfectly know that less driving = less traffic = less pollution = less impact of these.
Of course we both know its not this black and white, but the way we tend to place everything in political boxes – with the extreme one being the US two party thing – its almost impossible to talk about solutions but just spend a lot of time flaming each other. I wish more of the discussion was about “what is the best solution in the long term?” – “what are the impacts over a 50 year perspective?” – I believe the answers to many of these will point towards a transition away from traditional capitalism and how we have been going about doing things these past thousand years.
As for the Nissan Leaf, not sure what you had expected really? Its a transportation device you can sit in and drive from A to B. I don’t particularly like the appearance of it myself but it does the job it was supposed to do. I guess part of the problem is that the range requires it to have a large battery so that affects a lot of how its designed too (the thing weights 1.5 metric ton). Also a lot of people that aren’t convinced of the CO2 benefit simply just want a car that looks like any other combustion engine, so I can perfectly understand this design decision.
If I was the socialist dictator, I’d ban all fossil fuel cars, put rails (or some other guides) in the roads and invest heavily into making a transit based system where the power of the car was outside the actual car to get the weight down – separate car traffic from pedestrian traffic – and 100% automate the things. 🙂
Enacting a substantial, and steadily-rising tax, on carbon-based fuels would be a great way to adjust shockingly inaccurate market pricing, and to minimize command and control intervention.
do you mean, it would replace/remove all subsidies?
Absolutely. Government would only invest in basic science, not companies or subsidize any particular product via price subsidy or tax code. (In fact, renewable energy companies would be closer to parity without government subsidies already.) In the first few years, part of the revenue would be returned to taxpayers as a dividend and to companies which need to depreciate carbon intense capital goods more rapidly.
Nice one!
I don’t understand what all the fuss is about. It’s a rich person’s car and since it’s electric, it’s clean and green? It’s still plugged into a coal burning electric power grid. Considering the vast inefficiencies of that transfer of energy, I’m not impressed nor do I want one. I’ll keep my bicycle for most transportation and keep my old beater p.u. truck for hauling the straw bales and I’ll still beat the carbon footprint on that piece of shiny.
Well a lot of people who actually know about EVs want one and the Model S is at the top of the list – for those who can afford it.
I think you need to do some research but I’ll give you on tidbit for free.
Please keep this super-classified plan to yourself unless you want to end up like Snowden or Manning.
Aug 2006, from the private files of Elon Musk.
http://www.teslamotors.com/blog/secret-tesla-motors-master-plan-just-between-you-and-me
John’s comment is entirely sensible and true. Building, supplying the energy to, and maintaining a Tesla Model S is FAR more carbon intensive than riding a bicycle and using an old pickup now and then.
Beyond that, earning the money needed to BUY a Model S will require a heavy carbon footprint in and of itself.
But we don’t see that because we “want one”. It’s at the “top of the list” for those who can afford it.
“Please keep this super-classified plan to yourself unless you want to end up like Snowden or Manning.”
That sentence makes no sense to me. I’m guessing it’s a joke, but it comes off more as a threat.
BTW, recent study:
http://assets.climatecentral.org/pdfs/ClimateFriendlyCarsReport_Final.pdf
“Eighteen states, including Colorado, Missouri, New Mexico, Michigan, and Ohio, still heavily depend on coal, or have virtually no renewables and little nuclear power in their electricity mixes. Driving and recharging an electric car in these states is worse for the climate than burning gasoline in a conventional hybrid or high-mileage car, even when manufacturing emissions are excluded.”
The guy that Peter met is creating more CO2 with his Tesla than he would by owning a Prius or a Camry. Not even having a car, or only using it occasionally, is even better – far better.
Morin’s comment was sarcasm. I thought it was funny. Boys will be boys.
Maybe, the Tesla owner had solar panels at his house. If not, he’s probably inclined to join others to demand/buy green power delivered on his grid. Everything can’t happen all at once. Not owning a car is best. I don’t because I retired and moved to a place with good mass transit. But that wasn’t always an option.
Looking at the vehicle sales summary from Wards Auto, an affordable electric truck is also needed.
Pickups have been sales leaders for a long time.
That leaves forty-three where an EV is an equal or better choice and, from the report, 13 states where you need an ICE rated at 70 mpg or better to match a Nissan LEAF.
And the world is a slightly bigger place than just the USA.
What about Mexico, Canada, France and most of Europe?
As for coal plants, the ones that aren’t shutting down need to be made as clean as possible – I’ve read that some of the newer ones are on par with gas plants.
It may be expensive to do as a retrofit but, amortized over the operating life of the plant, not a prohibitive cost.
Gah, too early for arithmetic. That should be THIRTY-TWO, not forty-three.
Good one!
The Tesla-S is the best, most beautiful car in the sordid history of cars. The Smart Car EV is the cutest, and sells for a fraction of the price.
http://www.smartusa.com/models/electric-drive/overview.aspx
If the Tesla-S is the equivalent of the iPad, the Smart Car EV is the analogous of marmite. Nice, if you’re into that sort of thing.
Otherwise, quite awful.
The Nissan Leaf is both practical and cheap here in Norway – hence it has a huge success here. Ofc we also have the benefit of our electricity being mainly from hydroelectric as well.
There are quite a few of the Renault Twizy on the roads too now. Its very cheap and has room for 1 adult and 1 kid (or a small adult) – perfect for short trips to the shops or delivering a kid at kindergarden. Considering its very cheap as well I can see many houses having one of these as well around.
But I agree with others here, if you can hop on your bike its much better than the carbon footprint we have for making these cars. I guess a problem where I live is that it rains more than 200 days a year so many simply don’t feel like riding a bike in that weather. 🙂
I think the “electric cars charge with coal” argument misses the point, in that, EV or no, we have to stop burning coal everywhere – and as we do – having an EV will make more and more sense.
That said, moving away from the auto as base of the transit system in the US is a long term goal, but I’ve pointed out to a lot of enviro types, even if we were to institute an Apollo-type program for mass transit that took us to European levels in the next 30 years, we’d still have a lot of cars. There are too many wide open spaces here to reliably cover in any near term. I’ve posted a number of times on the fact that car use is flat or down in the US for a number of reasons, especially among younger people, and especially when people have mass transit options.
The cities that are serious about prospering and attracting the kind of young people that will help them prosper are without exception investing in mass transit, which is increasingly becoming more regional.
As we accelerate the trend to low, or no carbon electricity sources, and I believe that is happening as well, and as we build out the smart grid to allow such options as vehicle to grid charging, EVs can be a component of a green economy.
I’ll be updating my “electric cars and hybrids” video soon – I made it before the Chevy Volt came out – but a lot has happened since then.
I believe Blizzard and World of Warcraft can take some credit for the young people not wanting cars. They are too busy raiding or leveling a new toon. 🙂
Seriously, the internet and online “life” has really made a lot of people less likely to live extravagant lives as it generally doesnt take a high income or consumption to have a “full life” on the net. Whether its good for your health is another thing – but the computer has brought out creativity in people that would otherwise be out in the streets.
The fact that also science can be communicated effectively through the internet has likely also influenced peoples opinions on climate change issues. Especially since you can basically see the state of the planet through a multiple of mediums and basically tap youtube for distaster footage shortly after it has happened. While its desensitiving for some, I do believe some see this as a possible threat when its occurance is frequent.
So keep on writing good articles – I am sure some new souls pop by your blog by accident every day – hopefully some stay to actually learn something and perhaps realise that their world picture from watching Fox news (or equivalent) wasnt quite right. 🙂
in the meanwhile boys are still boys, and the longest thread in this blog is about…cars! 😉
Those who are opposed to the electric car (for reasons like yours) also seem to be the ones holding back the changes we need to the electric grid. It starts somewhere, and if the energy companies don’t want to be the leaders, than the consumers aka American citizens will force the issue. The writing is on the wall, it’s going to happen despite all the push-back from entrenched interests. It might be delayed but it won’t be stopped.
We have a company in our town that sells electric trucks, and they sell the solar panels to charge them also. So. If our electric companies are unwilling to give us what we want, we have other means.
My comment was supposed to be in response to John Jorgensen’s.
Sorry, but it’s ridiculous to people like John Jorgensen are “holding back the changes we need to the electric grid”. He’s not saying any such thing. He’s saying that maybe we should consider just using less energy in the first place. The effect of many people doing so would immediately reduce far more carbon emissions than replacing a handful of personal autos with EVs.
The simple fact that HAS to be addressed by those who care about this issue is that EVs DO have a carbon footprint, and a rather significant one. Yes, it will lessen as the grid adopts more renewables, but it will never, ever have the impact of just not using the energy in the first place.
EVs have a carbon footprint in the manufacturing process, in shipping them, in their energy usage, and in their maintenance. One thing never addressed is the simple fact that more expensive vehicles require more earnings, which require a higher carbon footprint (more trips to the office, more energy that ripples in the entire economic chain).
People like these shiny pretty things because we always want to splay our tailfeathers. But we really should be talking more about using cars less, building bike paths, improving our mass transport grid, restructuring neighborhoods to reduce travel, AND improving the renewables mix in the energy grid. EVs simply aren’t the solution to the level of problem we have with carbon emissions. They help A LITTLE, only in places where there’s a high mix of renewables in the electrical grid. In places like Michigan, they help more than buying an F-150, a little, but not much. I’m betting the guy that Peter met is thinking he’s whipped the CC issue for himself personally with his Tesla, when all he has done is offset it by a tiny fraction.
Take a tub. Fill it with full glasses of water to about the midway point. Now, have more people pouring water to illustrate a growing economy. It’s going to fill twice as fast. Now, reduce the water poured by each person to half a glass to illustrate efficiency measures and technological innovations. But the tub is still getting filled, and if the number of people doubles again it’s getting filled rather quickly.
Or, figure out how to not pour any water AT ALL. We can’t handle that, though, because it won’t grow our economy, it won’t let us each show off our shiny new things, and it’ll require personal sacrifice from us all. But if we don’t, that tub still gets filled – and rather quickly.
Jimbills said, “EVs have a carbon footprint in the manufacturing process, in shipping them, in their energy usage, and in their maintenance. ”
That’s is because they are built with energy provided by coal fired plants. If the grid were renewable, then the carbon footprint would go down on every step of the supply chain (assuming ocean-going vessels could also convert to some form of renewable).
While I agree that we need to become less energy-hogging as a society, and that using alternative transportation is one aspect of the changes our society needs to make, that will not be enough, for the simple reason that you’ll never convince everyone to do it. So there needs to be a multi-pronged approach, including reducing auto travel, improving public transportation, increasing home and manufacturing efficiency, increasing the percentage of EV autos (would be awfully nice to increase the KINDS of EVs available too), AND converting the energy grid to renewable.
And it IS often true that the same people who disregard electric vehicles also oppose any change to the way we get energy. I’m surprised you would deny that.
Until we get a good lock on replacing fossil fuels with renewables in the energy grid, we’re just spinning our wheels with EVs. It’ll just make the problem worse. Cutting energy use should be the top priority – it has a far greater effect than hiding our energy patterns (which, right now, is what EVs do).
Take a look at John Jorgensen’s profile photo. Do you think he’s a Faux News addict?
Let’s think beyond the Western world.
China, India, Brazil, etc are rising and even if their per-capita energy consumption and personal vehicle ownership never exceeds Ireland’s current status, you’re going to need several more bathtubs, even if America’s energy use and car ownership goes to ZERO.
And they’ve already tried the bikes & old vehicles routine and I doubt they’ll agree to remain where they are just because we think it’ll be bad for the planet if they aspire to our standard of living.
So both they and we need viable alternatives. EVs and V2G are part of it, especially as we move to a greater penetration of intermittent energy generation.
Let’s switch from adjectives to numbers. What is the CO2 emissions break-even point between a Tesla-S, charged by power from a coal power plant, and a gasoline powered vehicle, as measured in miles per gallon?
After factoring in combustion and electric relative engine to wheel power inefficiencies, 1 gallon of gas supplies the equivalent useful work from the piston engine as 33.7 kWH’s of energy from batteries powering an electric engine. In order to avoid unit conversion befuddlement, EV fuel efficiency is measured in Miles per Gallon gasoline equivalent (MPG-GE). We’ve just seen that miles per gallon is equivalent to miles per 33.7kWH.
Now let’s look at emissions. Coal based power emits 2.1 lbs. of CO2 per delivered kWH. The Tesla-S charging efficiency is 87%. Therefore, the Tesla emits 2.1x.87×33.7 = 61.6 lbs of CO2 per “gallon equivalent”. Gasoline combustion produces 19.7 pounds of CO2 per gallon.
The Tesla’s gets 89 MPG-GE. Therefore, a coal powered Tesla will emit the same amount of CO2 as an auto that gets 89 / (61.6 / 19.7) = 28.4 MPG.
Don’t forget the insane carbon intensive operation of getting petrol from the ground to the tank of the ICE.
Electrical transport will always be easier and be more carbon neutral, AND it has the option to come from cleaner sources – while an ICE always has the carbon footprint of a full fossil fuel cycle, from the ground till its converted to CO2 in the streets. Naturally the fact that emissions can be centralized with electrical “fuel” also enables carbon capture if someone bothers to do that, and if not you don’t stink out the streets with nasty diesel fumes (here in Norway the stench of diesel is everywhere you go, terrible stuff due to stupid policies with less taxation on diesel and the fact that there as just too many dummies buying SUV’s with their new “rising market price of house loan”).
That’s about in line with the figures I’ve seen, too. Although, it doesn’t factor in cost of production. EVs have a more carbon expensive production due mostly to the batteries – mining and production – but also they have more intricate components. Another factor is battery drainage – rechargeable batteries lose their charge over time.
The bottom line, and all I’m saying, is that EVs are just a fractional improvement at this point in time, but they’re pitched as some sort of godsend. In most states, a Prius is a better choice. In all states, a bike is a better choice by many times either vehicle. Walking is even better than a bike.
Why don’t we focus on reducing travel and on improving mass transport? Why do we have to have this obsession with high energy usage (personal autos)?
Until we get the electrical grid to have a much higher mix of renewables than it currently does, we’re just deceiving ourselves. We’re going to keep pumping out CO2 with either EVs or gas-powered cars – and with just tiny fractional improvements (like with EVs) all it takes is a little extra time to be meaningless. And in a growing economy, it’s even more meaningless.
Understood. Most non self-absorbed humans, who gives a damn about future generations, are impatient for a more rapid transition to 21st century energy and transportation infrastructures. Until we hit a technology or cultural tipping point, we’ll have to settle for incremental progress and plan for a godsend. The IBM 5100 was the state of the art desktop computer less than 40 years ago. Deployment, with all of its flaws, is not just an end. It’s also a means to an end.
Jim,
What you are saying is what I hear a lot of people saying – but I’m not sure how a battery takes so much more energy than does smelting and casting aluminum, and making and transporting *thousands* of parts used in an ICE car.
I think it is quite possible that we don’t actually know how much energy overhead there is in either an EV or and ICE car. And we should be careful about repeating things that may or may not be true.
Do you have references on this, or are you saying it because you have heard it somewhere?
Neil
Page 22 here:
http://www.internationaltransportforum.org/jtrc/DiscussionPapers/DP201203.pdf
Also here:
http://www.greencarcongress.com/2011/06/lowcvp-20110608.html
There are several other studies, too.
Another look:
http://science.howstuffworks.com/science-vs-myth/everyday-myths/does-hybrid-car-production-waste-offset-hybrid-benefits1.htm
What about lithium itself?
http://www.greenpacks.org/2009/05/28/could-lithium-be-the-new-pollutant/
What I am saying is that EVs aren’t really “green”. They’re certainly more green than a pickup truck, and they’re slightly greener than an average sedan, but if we really care about the environment and the amount of CO2 that is going into the atmosphere and the oceans, we have to take an honest look at this. There are FAR greener alternatives for transport than EVs (mass transport, biking and walking, extremely low gas mileage vehicles like mopeds, etc.). This is especially true today – although granted, the equations will change a bit if more of the grid is hydro, wind, and PV.
I like Amory Lovins take on efficiency where, for a given system, the benefit of all the efficiency tweaks is greater than the sum of each individual component’s offering. So if you do 10 things to make your home more efficient at a cost of say $3,000, and all of a sudden you don’t need a $6,000 air conditioner anymore, you can get away with a $2,000 one, so you actually come out ahead of the game (that is, if you’re in the market for a new air conditioner) from the start.
So the idea behind the EV cars is that they help stabilize a smart grid that has lots of variable sources (solar, wind) attached. You still want those batteries that are sitting in your EV car to keep the grid alive and well, so they’re gonna be there anyway (not to discount the efficiency of replacing a bunch of small batteries with larger, fewer ones), but in addition to that benefit you get something to run your errands and go to work with. This multipurpose integration adds efficiency to the system as a whole, and shouldn’t be discounted during a head to head comparison between EV versus non-EV cars. (EV cars allow a smart grid to take on more solar and wind and thus allow the grid to reduce coal and gas, while at the same time using less oil).
I’m going to go get something to eat. But it’s dark outside now, and people here in Los Angeles drive like maniacs, so I won’t be using my bike presently. Waiting for the price of a 1 year old Volt to ring in at $15K…
Hi Andrew – but what do we do first? Without a high mixture of renewables already in the grid, we’re just creating more demand for coal and natural gas. We have to do the electrical grid first. And before we can really get into renewables, we have to build a smarter grid system. A to B to C.
Let’s take another analogy. Let’s say a person, right now, has $40K to burn. Even then, they can’t afford a Model S, but they could get a Leaf or a Volt. If they did, they’d offset their carbon footprint (on transport only) by maybe 25% if they lived in a state with a high renewables mix.
Or, they could use $20K and install a grid-tied solar array to their roof, buy energy efficient windows, put insulation in the attic, buy a nice bike with the intent of using it, and several other things. They’d offset their carbon footprint many times over the choice to buy an EV. Plus, their bills would be significantly lower. They could ride share and halve (or more) their costs.
Most people would choose the first option, though. Cars are sexier, they can show off to those around them, and they can prove how much they care for the environment.
But in ten years, they’ll have to get a new car, or at least swap the batteries – when the person who chose option 2 would have done far more for the environment and themselves.
EVs are currently a distraction, a bauble. They might be a wise investment in several decades, but as a society we’d be far wiser figuring out how to use less energy instead of the same amount of energy. We’d be far wiser insisting on a renewables grid. EVs don’t create demand for renewables – they create demand for electricity.
On the Volt being $15K, don’t hold your breath. We’re a ways away from that. I think it’s far wiser to just buy a second-hand subcompact. You take out the production footprint, or at least halve it, and your CO2 output won’t be much higher than that of an EV. If you have the money, get a hybrid.
Or, start talking with others about how we desperately need solid and secure mass transport options.
Thanks Jim. All you say is true. Certain pieces of the puzzle have to be in place before other pieces can be placed. And for limited budgets certain updates have more impact than others.
Yet in the context of how innovation and technology play out in the economy with regard to time, price, and socio-behavioral reactions, and given that our economy is huge enough for us to work on multiple things simultaneously, I’m for an all-of-the-above strategy.
It would be great if humans were brilliant central planners, and local municipalities, etc. would say, ‘We need to start pushing for a smart grid’, but I don’t think there would be much will to do that unless they themselves were pushed to do so because the grid was being overwhelmed with solar and wind and the folks with vested interest in the solar and wind were countering the utility’s desire to continue business as usual (or the utility wakes up and realizes they have to update to stay in business). At the point when they recognize that they have to update the grid, if the EV’s are already in abundant number, then that component can be readily adopted into their grid plan. Further if the EV’s are there, and owners actually get paid to let the grid use part of their battery’s energy, that means more pressure (popular pressure) to update the grid is in place.
So how can the EV’s be in abundant number at the point when the planners are ready to update the grid? It’s a slow process. Car companies have to retool, rework supply chains, etc. The first models have to prove themselves, then the second generation gets better, then the third generation gets better and cheaper, and then more people get interested, and anticipated high volume of demand means companies can sell the product cheaper, and so on and so forth until the market matures.
Because our economy is huge, this maturation process should in no way inhibit building owners from retrofits, solar companies from innovating, battery designers from innovating, wind companies from building and adding onto the already existing grid, light rail and bullet trains to show up, etc. All can be done simultaneously.
I’m with you on the individual updates: When I first moved in my place, I updated my A/C/heat pump to an energy star unit. Since then, because the south side of my place is almost all glass, I’ve card-boarded up the upstairs windows and put up double curtains, so I don’t even need heat in the winter time, and I use less A/C in the summer. I’ve also put a bunch of shading in front of (and solar screen on) the downstairs windows to reduce direct heat flowing in from the sun. I haven’t even used my A/C that much this year. At night, I open the downstairs/upstairs windows, and I put a fan in the upstairs window that blows the hot upstairs air outward, whilst the heavier cool, outside air flows in the downstairs windows and helps the fan push the hot air out the upstairs window. I also keep the doors to non-A/Ced rooms/closets closed to act as ‘thermal buffer zones’ or large, insulating air pockets for the inner living space, when the A/C runs.
I could try to put in new windows, but because my condo shares a water system with the other condos, I have, by the design of the building, two large water pipes running under my floor downstairs that deliver hot water to the neighbors. They’re great in the winter – like I said, I never use heat, but not so great in the summer. I’m afraid to put up better insulated windows because at night, on the occasion I feel like running the A/C, it would be more so fighting that heat load from the pipes.
But I’m at that point now, where I only used $600/year of electricity last year and will be using less this year (because i haven’t used the A/C all that much), and do most of my chores on a bike. So my next step is to use less oil, when I drive to work. I drive slow – that helps more than you think. In my area, we have enough wind and nuclear that I may see some reduction in CO2 if I got a Volt, but as you said, it’ll be a while before they hit my price target.
One more look at EVs compared to gas-powered cars in just the operation, not production, cycle. The figures come very close to Charles’s analysis above:
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/04/15/automobiles/how-green-are-electric-cars-depends-on-where-you-plug-in.html?pagewanted=all&_r=0
Bicycles and public transport are great and agreed. However, let’s be careful with the numbers on CO2 from EVs. The subject does not seem to be so cut and dried.
http://mediamatters.org/research/2012/02/08/myths-and-facts-about-electric-cars/185798
Feb. 8, 2012
FACT: Electric Vehicles Cause Substantially Fewer CO2 Emissions
Electric Vehicles Emit Less CO2 Even If Coal Supplies The Power. This chart from the Department of Energy shows that, even though coal is the source of nearly half the nation’s electricity, all-electric vehicles (EV) like the Nissan Leaf, and plug-in hybrid electric vehicles (PHEV) like the Chevy Volt cause on average substantially less carbon dioxide emissions than conventional gasoline-powered vehicles:
I think we better go with the Department of Energy on this one.
Yes this is exactly what I have been saying everytime the discussion is brought up. Many seems to forget the intense carbon emissions we have from locating, drilling, pumping, transporting, refinering, transporting to pumps, driving to the pumps, until its finally in the tank of the car. Compare this with the cycle of electricity to a socket in your house where you can plug in your EV and its obvious that even with coal powered electricity you’d pollute less.
And again as I have said many times, centralized electricity “extraction” can be optimized in a number of ways – from carbon capture to more efficient burning – to tearing it all down and put a farm of windmills and solar panels. The advantages of electrifying all transport is immense – even though more of it should go on rail as public transit and not EVs to everyone.
By the way. The DOE study and the NYT report actually seem to agree. Both say a really high mpg car might have the same or less emissions than say, a Leaf that was charged in a dirty coal state.
It is a position that Nissan says it has held since the Leaf program began, yet the studies that the company offers in support of its position show electrics outperforming only vehicles with fuel economy ratings from about 27 to 36 miles per gallon.
Since a large majority of vehicles driven have lower mileage than that, the statement is still true. Given that only a small fraction of gas powered cars in only a minority of states meet the criterion of having lower emissions than a Leaf, the statement still stands.
However, this misses the point entirely. No amount of future changes in the energy mix will improve the emissions of gasoline powered cars. Only reduced consumption can do that. On the other hand, EVs can be charged from sources that are less GHG intensive. That means EVs win hands down. References to bicycles and public transport notwithstanding, the success of EVs are relevant and important to the future and GW.
This source points out that fossil fuel only gets dirtier over time. (tar sands, fracking, deep well, ocean drilling). Meanwhile the grid gets cleaner.
http://www.midwestenergynews.com/2013/08/13/commentary-electric-cars-clean-today-even-cleaner-tomorrow/