I'm searching through the article and cannot find where they define "lifetime" of a vehicle. Wouldn't that graph change quite a bit between lifetime of 6 years and 12 years?
My car is 25 years old and currently sits at 150k. An EV would need at least 2 batteries by then. Not sure if it’s a huge difference environmentally but it definitely is financially for anyone who’s not rich
From the article:
>A typical passenger vehicle like the Toyota Camry emits about 68 tons of CO2 in its lifetime, compared to 15 tons of CO2 emitted for an electric Tesla Model 3
It would take 5 lifetimes of a Model 3 to reach parity with a Camry's CO2 emissions. That's assuming the battery needs changing at 125,000 miles, which it doesn't. In reality, it would take more like 15 lifetimes of a Model 3 to reach parity with a Camry's pollution level.
Not even close. My i3 is nearly at 80k and shows 0% degradation. There are i3s out there on 300k and over 90% capacity. And when cells do go (which is rare) they can be replaced in segments rather than swapping the whole thing.
>My car is 25 years old and currently sits at 150k. An EV would need at least 2 batteries by then.
Where do you get that idea from?
High powered lithium batteries have a life time of 1500 full charges. If a charge holds 300 miles, that would be 450.000 miles before the battery would reach its second life.
Lower powered lfp batteries, such as in the model 3 standard in europe has a life time of 3500 recharges. That will put them on more than a million miles before the battery is dead.
Didn't Tesla also said they would give 1 million miles of warranty on their semis?
My motor and battery warranty on my Tesla was 8 years or 192.000 km. Whatever comes first
Hybrid battery packs get a lot more charge cycles than Ev packs, they also are discharged from full to empty more often.
Depth of charge plays a huge role in degredation,which is also why cellphones and laptops die so fast.
Whereas a Ev with a 300 mile range pack generally doesn't drained to the bottom very much, so it lasts many more cycles.
There’s zero data suggesting that you need “at least” 2 batteries to do 150k miles. Zero. You’re suggesting that batteries would need to be replaced at 75k miles max, meanwhile the warranty covers to 100k miles, and the battery actually last *much much* longer.
Actual data shows that batteries retain about 80% capacity after 200k miles. You’d still be on the original battery with plenty of miles left in it. Even at 80% it is still usable.
Definitely not. It completely depends on the vehicle, and how it was taken care of. If you only ever used "super-charging" from empty to full, over the entire ownership, then maybe. Even then today's battery packs can be recycled or reused in stationary energy supplies as well.
Unopopular opinion: when comparing EVs to gasoline cars, *hybrids* should be the basis of comparison rather than non-hybrid ICE.
Why? Because hybrids have a fairly small price difference, no range anxiety, and don't depend on being able to charge at home or extra infrastructure. They are a drop-in replacement for ICE. Hybrids should have been the standard years ago. No doubt EVs still come out ahead, but it does shrink the gap.
Best I can find: https://www.carboncounter.com/#!/explore
Idk why people get mad at electric suvs and sedans and stuff, it’s fine. But why take away stuff like the V12 and W16. Literally under 1% of the population drive those cars.
You know what else is cleaner than personal EVs and ICE vehicles?
It's called using public transportation such as bus or rail. Walking. Cycling/biking. Micromobility such as e-scooters.
It's a shame North America is built around this highly inefficient mode of transportation (personal cars).
I'm cool with EV's, but new cars as a whole are ugly soulless appliances. the good EV's are hypercar price. I'll keep my 20-30 year old ICE until they make decent EV's for decent prices
and I'll keep my ICE cars forever for weekend joy rides/etc
People complain about mining for battery material like they forget where oil comes from, the processes to turn oil into petrol, and then the fact you have to fill a car with petrol indefinitely throughout the car's life.
My FIL worked for big mining here in Australia. Guess what? If there's a cheaper way for mining companies to do their job they'll do it - and that includes using electric vehicles (for reliabilities sake - a broken diesel engine can lose the company hundred of thousands). There are big mines that already use solar energy and self-driving trucks.
I see that everywhere nowadays in nearly every community and on nearly every topic. Complete lack of desire to think critically. And how short is people’s attention span? Half the time articles are posted here people don’t even get past the headline lol
> Complete lack of desire to think critically
Because thinking critically sometimes mean you have to learn new information that change your mind, or find out that reality aren’t decided by your personal preferences.
In contrast, it’s much easier and feels better to just keep believe in something because you *want* it to be true.
And Social Media has only made that so easy these days.
There's a significant subset of the population that seems to think staunchly maintaining objectively untrue beliefs in the face of evidence is "integrity," and that changing one's mind to more closely align with new data is "hypocrisy."
It drives me crazy. Some people just don't like EVs so when they see any out of context negative factor they jump on it. Like lithium mining. All of a sudden anti-EV people become super environmentalists against mining and speculate that we can't possibly grow lithium refining to match demand.
But a quick search confirms that lithium is extremely plentiful and even when mining grows to support the needs of world wide battery storage that it would be TINY compared to all the other mining that anti-EV people conveniently forget about. Iron mining alone is 3 BILLION tons a year, while lithium mining at its peak will only need to be around 4 million tons a year (40x current levels).
Or people will come up with absurd qualifications, saying that you won't be able to drag a 50 year old EV out of a barn and get it working with a few simple tools, or load up an EV truck with a few thousand pounds and drive a thousand miles on one charge, as if that fully negates any positives.
People also seem completely unaware that the majority of refined fuels are trucked into their final destinations; they don't just magically appear at the gas station. At least electric distribution has minimal losses in comparison...
And what is not trucked is instead flowed through massive pipelines in the most fragile areas (Deepwater Horizon, Keystone pipeline, Keystone pipeline again, Keystone pipeline for a third time...).
It's all about deciding what you value in transport accidents.
[Which Is Safer For Transporting Crude Oil: Rail, Truck, Pipeline Or Boat? (Forbes, 11-Oct-2018)](https://www.forbes.com/sites/jamesconca/2018/10/11/which-is-safer-for-transporting-crude-oil-rail-truck-pipeline-or-boat/?sh=63dac7257b23)
>So which mode is safer? For oil, the short answer is: truck worse than train worse than pipeline worse than boat (Oilprice.com). But that’s only for human death and property destruction. For the amount of oil spilled per billion-ton-miles, it’s truck worse than pipeline worse than rail worse than boat (Congressional Research Service). Even more different is for environmental impact (dominated by impact to aquatic habitat), where it’s boat worse than pipeline worse than truck worse than rail.
Point is, compared to electrical distribution, oil distribution for a car's energy source is much, much worse.
People also forget that the raw materials for each battery are only mined once. Recharging the battery does not require further mining. People also forget that the batteries are very recyclable.
Fuel refining is an energy intensive process, even more so with the type of crude Canada(well just Alberta mostly) produces. Tar sand are pipelined all the way to Texas to be refined into their products, and that's a very, very long distance to say the least.
Unlike "sweet light" crude that the Middle East is known for, relatively easy to refine compare to tar sands. Well-to-wheel efficiency is often no quoted in critical pieces against EVs. It assumes gasoline or diesel is produced at the pump itself magically.
You might want to back up on the light sweet crude from the middle east. The middle east crude is heavier now as there supply has dwindled they can no longer just open the tap more to produce more. Those wells are starting to play out.
Fun fact- Canada has refineries entirely capable of refining tar sands. but the waste is so horrific they won't allow it in their environment. The US, on the other hand, will allow anything for its fossil fuel masters.
Oh and don’t forget that the oil needs to be transported across the globe and moved to any and every location it’s needed. The marginal cost of “moving” electricity from the generation sites to the demand sites is effectively zero.
People also seem to absolutely ignore that:
- most countries do not have an electric grid ready for the insane electricity demand of EVs. People act as if every country is Sweden where 90% of energy is clean (and abundant).
- most places in the world produce electricity with gas or coal
The demand isn't insane, FYI. It's about a 10% addition to total electricity demand, and it generally comes at times when the grid is not at peak capacity, so it will often require no increase to peak load at all. The UK national grid did a big investigative study into this and found that everyone could switch to an EV overnight and we'd basically be fine in terms of stability and generation. With a few policies to incentivise using EVs as grid storage, they would actually make the grid far greener and enable more renewable installation.
Sure, they are. But why are middle-class consumers supposed to fix the world when governments and corporations aren’t doing enough?
The top 15 largest shipping vessels create the equivalent of one billion ICE cars. There’s no regulation on that.
> But why are middle-class consumers supposed to fix the world when governments and corporations aren’t doing enough?
Governments are mandating energy transition and corporations are following suit.
Middle class consumers on reddit are complaining about government overreach and car manufacturers going all in on electric motors, while also complaining that governments and corporations are not doing enough.
> The top 15 largest shipping vessels create the equivalent of one billion ICE cars. There’s no regulation on that.
1. Not true. If we're strictly talking about CO2 emissions, pollution from passenger transport is [significantly higher](https://ourworldindata.org/co2-emissions-from-transport).
2. It's easy to electrify cars. It's not easy to electrify bulk shipping.
3. What do you think those big ass shipping vessels are doing? They're hauling all the stuff that middle-class consumers consume. Including fossil fuels.
There is no way in hell to get an accurate figure on emissions from shipping. The amount of Chinese, Russian, and other shipping vessels burning heavy fuel oil (bunker fuel) is impossible to count with zero reliable statistics coming from their companies.
Source: Worked with these companies for several years in a supply chain job.
That's just not true. You're comparing other types of emissions to CO2. ICE cars produce a fuck ton of CO2.
"There are 760 million cars in the world today emitting approx 78,599 tons of Sulphur Oxides (SOx) annually. The world's 90,000 vessels burn approx 370 million tons of fuel per year emitting 20 million tons of Sulphur Oxides. That equates to 260 times more Sulphur Oxides being emitted by ships than the worlds entire car fleet. One large ship alone can generate approx 5,200 tonnes of sulphur oxide pollution in a year, meaning that 15 of the largest ships now emit as much SOx as the worlds 760 million cars."
Wrong. The 15 largest shipping vessels emit the nitrous and sulphuric oxide pollution of one billion cars. Cars emit far, far more CO2, the thing that's relevant to climate change. Nox pollution sucks, but oceanic pollution affects almost no people, and is also a much less significant threat to ocean life than climate change.
Under capitalism, there is no solution other than people buying different stuff. There is no fairness, there is only profit. Don't like it, change the system.
Locally, it's up the middle class to fix pollution. Looking at pollution levels in larger cities, it's due to millions of cars driving around. The government could do better with public transit, but cars are now so ingrained in our culture that EVs are really the most realistic scenario to reduce local pollution in cities. Globally, yeah it's going to take a much larger effort though.
Even if it wasn't true its like not like it wouldn't improve over time.
It's like telling Karl Benz "Your 'automobile' isn't as fast as horse. Give up."
No no, you don't understand... EVs have already peaked, the power grid can not be upgraded, and no new battery technologies that improve energy density, lifespan, cost, and use better materials could ever be found.
/s
people will continue to ignore this and push the whole bullshit “evs are worse for the environment” not because they care about the environment and what’s best for it, it’s because evs threaten these peoples already fragile masculinity
And yet look at the 30% downvote…
I wonder if those “adults” don’t believe in these studies, or if they just don’t *like* the conclusion of such studies.
I just moved from germany to Ohio.
Living in conservative germany to hillbilly usa, I can tell you adults who don't use reddit aren't more mature than people on reddit or any other place.
The most insane person I know is a german, lived in munic, worked as an engineer at audi, lived in Czech at a machine manufacturer, lived two years on Texas and now in Ohio.
He denies climate change, he thinks by 2030 people in germany have to move out of their houses because the "greens" passed a bill for that, and while climate change is a hoax and we actually live in an ice age, ICEs are still greener and emitt less co2 than EVs
I don't think the Facebook memes I see about how much fun it is to roll coal past a Prius are coming from 14 year olds. The people involved are only adults in the chronological sense.
Well as a petrolhead we don’t like this change off course. But as a member of society I don’t want to be a science denialist and I have to admit things need to change urgently.
All mines are bad for the environment. All farms are bad for the environment. All Wal-Mart's are bad for the environment. Human civilization is bad.for the environment.
It's like the opposite of that "repeat the lie until it becomes the truth thing". You have to keep confirming the science again and again until people finally move on.
At least in this particular case, EV adoption and other green tech is happening regardless. I really don't think we are going to see something along the lines of "JK EVs don't work ICE forever lol" in the coming decades.
The question for EVs is longevity and cost to repair.
I have to say Hyundai and Kia have nice EV designs, however, their track record of reliability is a major detractor for me. The Ioniq 5 and 6 are great looking.
EV makers have 100,000 mile battery warranties. So we can assume they will last at least 100,000. After that when you get to the end some makers will swap the battery and some will swap specific cells. Obviously swapping batteries or cells will be expensive but it’s relative given the only maintenance prior was tires and breaks so small price to pay. As EVs are more common the cost to swap batteries or specific cells will go down
There’s not tons of real-world results at this point.
Manufacturers rate mileage for things all the time. Hyundai and Kia have 100k warranties and their engines blow up as early as 20-30k (Theta 1, 2, and Taos) miles. Sure it might be under warranty but it’s a major inconvenience no one wants to deal with.
> There’s not tons of real-world results at this point.
Geotab. They have a lot of real world data from fleet EV's and the data shows very high sustained battery health.
I’ve done 38k miles in 14 months in an MG5 EV. At the last service battery SoH was 98%.
At this rate I will blow past the warranty within two years. I’ll see how the car is then but besides having 6 new tyres everything is still looking nearly new at this point.
The "cost" will go down in a financial sense, but not environmental sense. This article is about how clean they are, and requiring a battery swap (ie. More resources to be used), effectively doubles the sarbon footprint of the car.
A recent article in ARS Technica said that one of the major problems with recycling is that the batteries are lasting way longer than people anticipated.
The break even point for carbon footprint of gas vs EV is within 2 years of hitting the road on average. The EV will already be years better than gas for carbon footprint if it was trashed at that point. Throwing in a new battery and keeping it going is even better. Any argument otherwise is severely misinformed
Did you read the article? No matter how you slice it, over the lifetime of the vehicle EVs come out ahead so they are more environmentally friendly.
Issues with extraction of lithium and cobalt mining are well known and documented and no one disputes the higher carbon emissions associated with ev production, this is accounted for and despite this, EVs come out ahead
Surveys suggest reliability is about as varied as ICE vehicles, and it should improve because there’s far fewer parts in an EV. Manufacturers haven’t been making them for nearly a century though. The concern about batteries isn’t as relevant anymore with active battery management. The current batteries are good for 250,000+ miles I think.
The other big question I have is how recyclable are current EV batteries. Extracting things from the ground is always bad for the environment but if materials going into batteries can be recycled then maybe it’s cleaner than oil long term.
I think of I get an electric commuter car in the near future it will be an EV or a PHEV with a modestly sized battery.
I saw somewhere that the batteries can be recycled into solar storage batteries, as they won't need to handle a high draw in that kind of configuration. I am not sure about actually breaking them back down into raw materials though.
I don't understand why being for EVs and being a car enthusiast have to be exclusive. In fact, wouldn't you be more of a car enthusiast to be enthusiastic about EVs in the same way as rotary engines or other types of unconventional engineering?
I think largely the hate for EVs comes because of the upcoming ban on combustion cars, there would be way less hate for EVs if governments would stop the plans to ban sale of combustion vehicles and let consumers choose how their car is powered.
If EVs are the way forward people will adopt them naturally, and if they aren't the governments are shoving them down everyones throats not recognizing the fact that combustion cars and EVs can co exist
Not necessarily because a lot of car enthusiasts are attached to the visceral experience of an ICE. I don't care how fast an EV is it'll never beat the feeling of driving an ICE vehicle. That's not even factoring in a manual transmission that you can't get with EVs.
It's really a work of art aesthetically and mechanically. On an extremely basic level it's like an electric powered fireplace vs a wood fireplace. They both give off heat but that's about where the similarities end. Wood fires are always far more enjoyable as they stimulate more of the senses.
I was never excited about EVs until I drove one. I became a mechanical engineer because of how fascinating Turbo ICE is, but I've been there, done that and EVs are so much more fun to daily drive. EVs and car enthusiast definitely go together.
haha, thank you! I'm *very* enthusiastic about EVs. Last time I checked, those are cars! So I think that makes me an enthusiast of a specific subset of cars, or, if you will, a car enthusiast! lol
The first time I charged my EV6 at an Electrify America Level 3 fast charger, it was like experiencing what I imagine the car culture of the '50s and '60s could have been like. Lots of interesting models pulling in and out with drivers who were more than happy to talk shop about their car and what they like about it. Plus, with fast charging taking at least 15 minutes, usually more, you were kind of forced to wait around anyway--why not socialize while you do so?
It was really exciting. Kind of like a miniature, impromptu, relatively-budget-friendly "Cars and Coffee" meet up. Every one of us was a car enthusiast at that EA station, and I'm happy to be a part of this new flavor of car culture!
Yea me too. The sound is just the cherry on top. It’s also really personal preference too but in my opinion I love when I hit the gas and hear the engine because I really like how some engines sound.
EV production emissions will continue to improve. It is hard to say this as a ICE enthusiast, but people need to really stop fighting the movement towards EVs.
Quick math, i replaced my diesel van with an electric van of the exact same model.
my old diesel van ran at 8L/100km. I drive 30k km per year. So 2400 liters of diesel. At 2,7kg co² that's 6,5 tons of co² in a year.
Producing a lithium battery creates 61-106 kg of co² per kWh according to Google. My battery is 75kwh, so 4,5-8 tons of co².
Even with the worst case battery production my ev is greener than the diesel in just over one year.
And that's ignoring the co² from the production and transport of the fuel, and the production of the ice power train, when compared to buying a new diesel van.
It's also ignoring the production of the electricity, but i'm running on 100% wind/solar. So it's a drop in the sea.
Of course. The local environmental impact of oil drilling, the huge oil spills every now and then and [the human rights violations](https://www.unepfi.org/humanrightstoolkit/oil.php) in oil drilling definitely also have an impact.
Ofc lithium has issues too. Older methods were quite disruptive with open pit mining. Modern geothermal lithium extraction on the other hand is cheaper, more efficient, essentially carbon free, and also supplies geothermal heat or electricity to local communities, with no negative impacts on ground water levels or quality.
The big issue is always cobalt. It makes up about 1% of the total battery pack with current nmc batteries, and ofc lfp and sodium batteries use none.
There are a lot of projects looking at opening cobalt mines in non-conflict areas like a big mine in sweden that could supply all europe's needs. And ofc manufacturers have significantly reduced the amount in batteries, even going as far as switching to cobalt free chemistries despite Slightly lower energy densities.
There's big plants going up in us and europe, so far it's not taken off yet because batteries are lasting longer than expected though. So only a small portion of the 10+ year old batteries are reaching end of life.
And ofc modern batteries are expected to last 30+ years, so it will be even longer before we reach a real circular economy where we don't need to mine more, but we will get there eventually.
https://www.fortum.com/services/battery-recycling/lithium-ion-battery-recycling-technology
Currently We're getting over 95% of the valuable minerals back. Not quite 100%. But 100% will probably always be unattainable.
Even with the worst case that you worked out there, you didn't include the CO2 production of making and transporting the diesel. This is something that people always leave out and it gives an "unfair" advantage to ICE.
A more "fair" comparison, which I'm going to make as unfair as possible would be charging emissions vs fuel emissions.
Going on Poland which has some of the highest CO2 emissions per kWh of electricity generated in Europe of 635g per kWh. Going on 5km/kWh, which is pretty bad for an EV, over the course of that 30k km you drive per year, it's going to produce 3.8 tons of CO2 charging that van. Going on Norway which has the lowest CO2 emissions per kWh of electricity generated in Europe of 26g per kWh, the same distance with the same efficiency, you're going to produce 156kg of CO2.
Honestly that much should be obvious with just some rudimentary research. Beyond just the emissions that result directly from internal combustion, ICE cars also generate a constant stream of petroleum waste in the form of used motor oil, brake fluid, transmission fluid, gear oil, etc. Battery components are also highly recyclable meaning that worn cells that have reached their EOL can be broken down and processed into new ones.
Then there is the corollary development of technologies accompanying EV's. Increasing electrical efficiency, distributed storage of electrical energy, electrical transmission, etc. are all things which are not only necessary for the mass market adoption of EV's but also critical in the development of a robust electrical network that can make the best use of renewable/green energy production.
Agreed. There's way more to affordability than just what a new car is priced at. I've never bought a new car in my life and I'm sure I'm not alone in that. There is no way in hell I'm buying a used vehicle that I know has a huge lump sum cost coming down the pipe. I'll gladly shell out $1000 here and a $1000 there to keep my car going. And sure, maybe at the end it costs just as much as a battery replacement for some of these vehicles. But I can't afford the huge one time bill I'm seeing for some of these battery replacements.
And make it a diesel manual wagon used from factory that has a handbrake and priced so it’s a complete loss for the company and I might ponder buying it
That last one is the biggest imo and why I hate current and upcoming EVs. proprietary everything, everything linked to the cloud, and non existent 3rd party repair. Just turning these cars into black box pieces of tech
I’m definitely a car enthusiast. Just ordered my first EV and I’m excited for it.
I find it so odd people cling on so hard to what powers their vehicle.
I own a manual brz,2 pickup trucks and a diesel 3500 ecoline van. The cost to fuel these vehicles skyrocketed in Canada to almost 3$ a litre. it’s what tipped the scale for me to switch. I live 30 minutes outside of a small town (1500 people) and 2 hour drive north of Toronto. If I can daily a EV with home charging and Canadian winters(just got 30cm, 12” in freedom units) most of the world can as well.
I understand not adopting a electric vehicle if it’s your only vehicle but I don’t understand the hate it gets.
I think it's due to the mandated sunsetting of ICE vehicles. Maybe we'll achieve proper infrastructure by then but it's hard to see that happening everywhere, and that's scaring people into thinking EVs will have to be their only vehicle before that becomes a practical or realistic option for them. If we let the market decide when EVs completely replace ICE then there wouldn't be nearly as much pushback.
Big problems require big solutions which is why we have governments. I’m glad our governments are making these big moves even if it’s very late. EVs still aren’t great for road trips and you need a charger near work or home but those are the only two big problems at this point. By 2040 when people in the used car market start getting pushed to WV those problems should be solved (think of where tech has come in the prior 20 years)
Most definitely are none yet. Il keep my brz as long as I can ( full stainless exhaust from headers to tips and ecu tuned) but i don’t dislike electric vehicles just because they’re electric.
I wouldn’t trust one as an only vehicle but as a daily/winter vehicle with a ICE backup vehicles I’m in a unique position to finally try owning a Tesla.
Nearly all studies include that and the article includes emissions related to electricity production.
You can read the pdf they cite that the article links to right there.
These articles are just writing about studies that look at the full life cycle of a product or service called life cycle assessment (LCA). If you haven't heard about that methodology yet, your program maybe needs a bit of improvement. Since you're a student, you probably have access to most academic journals through your library and should have learned how to do research in them. If you search for life cycle assessment studies on electric vehicles, you should find on the order of 100 that all come to the same conclusion, making different assumptions about the electric grid used to charge EVs. You will find that the newer studies will be even more positive than the older ones because the grid has and continue to get cleaner.
Cars have catalysators and much stricter emission rules than powerplants. The emissions of coal plants are dirtier than modern cars. Coal powerplants even produce **radioactive** emissions. Everyone can google it in seconds.
**Significantly more radioactive emissions than there is radioactive waste from nuclear power plants** (which is stored and not throw into the air as well) per the same amount of energy produced.
Coal plants are about 65% efficient
ICE engines about 25% and vary between millions of ICE vehicles. Some without cats, some rolling coal, and some driving in the city where it is even less efficient.
Coal plants do need to step it up though
Oil also needs to be transported, then refined and then gas transported again for distribution before it can be burned in that low efficiency ICE engine. That's 3 extra steps with significant emissions and efficiency loss. I feel like not many people ever even stopped to think how complex and inefficient the whole process behind fueling vehicles with ICEs is, because we've had the infrastructure for it our whole lives.
Energy grid, charging and EV engine itself are very efficient so aside from energy production itself there's not much losses.
Copypasta from a prior discussion on this same topic.
Tl;Dr even accounting for externalities EVs are significantly less harmful to the environment, in most cases, compare to ICE vehicles.
In fact, Paltsev says, it’s difficult to find a comparison in which EVs fare worse than internal combustion. If electric vehicles had a shorter lifespan than gas cars, that would hurt their numbers because they would have fewer low-emissions miles on the road to make up for the carbon-intensive manufacture of their batteries. Yet when the MIT study calculated a comparison in which EVs lasted only 90,000 miles on the road rather than 180,000 miles, they remained 15 percent better than a hybrid and far better than a gas car.
Source: MIT
It's an interesting read that looks at the nuances of EV emissions where you live. The predominant method of power generation in your area has a big impact on the lifetime carbon emissions of a vehicle.
For most places though, ICE is the worst, Hybrids are better, and EVs are the best and expected to get even better.
Most of these articles actually do tend to account for electricity generation; as it turns out, even if an EV is exclusively charged with coal-fired electricity, it still comes out ahead of internal combustion engines.
https://www.reuters.com/business/autos-transportation/when-do-electric-vehicles-become-cleaner-than-gasoline-cars-2021-06-29/
This shouldn't be a huge factor to consider anyway. We can get electricity from a multitude of places. If we get EVs before full clean energy, then we just need to make a bigger push for clean energy.
Nuclear energy might win big from EVs. The more demand for electricity, the more they'll need to produce. Nuclear energy is perfect for extremely high amounts of power since it takes up such little space and produces large amounts of power consistently.
In my area, we get all of our power from nuclear energy, and then any fluctuations in power are accounted for by gas power plants. If I charge my EV at night, I'll be using 100% clean energy. I can track that and reduce my own emissions. You can't do that with gas powered cars.
The "batteries r bad for environment" argument is the same. We're working on the tech, it's at a very young age and there are many ways to make batteries. They can be made cleanly, they can be more efficient, they can be engineered to meet whatever criteria. Petrol powered cars are at their limits. You can never get a petrol powered car anywhere near EVs.
They're very much in their early stages of development and they're still doing better than most petrol cars.
They are usually fairly simple, comparing production of the ev to tailpipe emissions of the ice vehicle. Because that's the majority players.
But adding other factors like energy generation, production of the ice vehicle, production and transport of the fuel, really only tips the scales more in favour of the ev.
If We're looking at pure electricity, the refining of gas and diesel uses about half the electricity an ev uses, usually on the same grid. Then there's the fuel consumption of tankers transporting fuel from the refineries, and crude oil to the refineries, increasing the total fuel used. And then there's all the energy that goes into extracting the oil whether it's electricity or diesel powered vehicles.
[This study](https://theicct.org/publication/lca-ghg-emissions-hdv-fuels-europe-feb23/) is specifically about heavy duty vehicles, so very large batteries, and long mileages, but the general concept is perfectly transferrable to other vehicles. And as you can see the difference in life time emissions is enormous.
there's a large swing in CO2 output based on where the electricity is generated - a 100kWh battery used for a full cycle in las vegas won't have the same equivalent emissions as the same battery used for a full cycle in laramie
and the electric grid is getting greener all the time, with shifts to renewables and natural gas over coal
the funniest thing is that most of these ppl straight up don’t really care about the environment and just use that false argument because evs are some type of threat to them for whatever dumb reason
You do you, but as a counterpoint I really don't like driving ICE cars anymore, especially modern ones. They're all full of various lag sources, fake noises, and other such nonsense. Many are basically trying to be BEVs at this point, in a way - auto transmissions only, start/stop to eliminate idling, low NVH, etc.
I'm not gonna tell everyone what they "should" drive, but I personally have no desire to go back. The experience of smooth, uninterrupted torque and lots of it is just too good to give up. Charging at home, the lack of oil changes, not having to worry about warming up before flooring it and so on are nice too.
Sound, the vibration of the engine, etc. it varies from car to car and just makes the experience of each car you drive different and more exciting from an enthusiasts perspective. ICE cars just have more to them than just hur durr fast in straight line
Ngl I thought I’d miss that switching to an EV but really all I miss is a stickshift and my ability to track my car (which I’ve never done anyways).
My car is fun as hell to drive and I’m coming from a Veloster N which is both fun and loud.
Apparently my flair didn’t update, but I have a Mach-E GT
Edit: I’ve *never tracked a car
My issue with EVs is two fold. First all of these articles is astroturfing between EV and oil companies. Tesla and other manufacturers are not saints here.
Second what I really dislike is that responsibility is shifted on consumers to “save the planet”. Now I have to buy an EV and I have to spend money, while other industries and companies pollute 10x more. If we truly gave a shit about pollution, then maybe we would stop building the country to be 100% dependent on cars?
Like I love my M2, but i shouldnt be forced to own a car just to exist. EV solve none of these problems. You dont think maintaining roads and replacing asphalt affects emissions? This is why all i see here is just positive propaganda to get consumers to spend money on EVs to feel like they are contributing to eliminating emission….
It’s a problem here in Germany too - very car-centric. There is more of an emphasis on trains, subways, busses, and bike lanes but it’s still not enough. Nonetheless EV makes sense for so many reasons it’s easy to understand why governments are nudging it forward so that their Industries and workforces don’t get left behind, they have less dependence on foreign oil, better local air quality, climate gas goals, etc…
All research points to it, however in a developing country such as mine, there's the problem of electrical infrastructure and worse, the problem of electricity generation when it's not renewable.
The idiot politicians in my country insist on burning friggin coal and fuel oil to generate electricity when we have an abundance of renewable green energy.
I love EV's. Driving them without preconceived notions opens your eyes to the undeniable fact that it's more efficient and the future, but the legislative agenda has been faster than the infrastructure and energy production, mining can keep up even with massive investments.
It is however necesary for change to happen.
EVs are for upper class and rich people only, and they're more of a status symbol or "luxury playtoy" than anything else
Wake me up when working-class/everyday average people can afford an EV 🥱💤
When we see high school teenagers driving used "hand-me-down beater" Teslas and such for their first car, ***then*** we'll know it's actually gone mainstream (affordable by the masses)
Until then, these EV people/shills need to shut up and go away. Regular gas vehicles are still the only reliable transportation for working-class/poor people to get to work, run errands, drive their kids around, etc - just stop with all the demonizing of the regular/working-class people that keep society humming along
Not everyone can be rich or upper class to afford a Tesla, sorry
Exactly, well said. Where does the single mom with 2 kids that lives in an apartment charge her car? Go sit at Walmart for 45 minutes in the car with her kids and hope the charger isn't broken or there is a line. Could you imagine a time when ICE cars are illegal and everyone in a 300 unit apartment complex is trying to charge their car. People don't realize the infrastructure that is need to charge all those cars? They just think oh I just call the electrician and he puts a cord on my house and charges me $2k and all is well.
Let’s put it this way both side of this argument are putting out false information.
I work in the mining industry and yes you can make the numbers look very pro battery but your cherry picking numbers if you look at the whole extraction process and refining of the ore the reality is that the process leaves a bigger carbon foot print then building a internal combustion engine.
Don't forget the oil refinement industry is the third largest industry that relies on rare earth's (roughly 20% of the rare earth production) only science/medical, and cel phones are greater.
Granted EVs are rising fast, but the highest I've seen is somewhere around 5%.
The impact of fueling many EVs is less than just the impact of refining the gasoline burned in an ICE vehicle. Drilling, transporting, and refining oil to produce gasoline typically uses 20-25% of the energy in the final product
No one is saying it doesn't. They're saying that mining and processing the materials and building batteries is much much less than the impact of mining and refining and burning the 25 tons of petroleum the average ICE vehicle will burn in its lifetime. Yes even accounting for the impact of producing the electricity EVs use.
Nobody is denying that producing a battery means more ghg than producing a combustion engine.
But the problem is that producing the car is only about 10% of the emissions of an ICE car, and over 50% for a bev.
So even with a pessimistic double the production ghg, bevs come out far ahead.
They make some good points but hoping for less human rights violations from the Congo and china, is hopeless. I also seriously doubt that any of these cleaner mining methods will be used because it eats into profits. It’s much cheaper to pay slaves a dollar a day
Eh, europe, us australia and China are all currently in an arms race on who can get geothermal lithium mining up and running fastest. Essentially a zero emission lithium mining process as a by product of zero emission geothermal heat or energy generation.
As for the actual conflict minerals like cobalt, current nmc chemistries have reduced the cobalt content in the cathode from 30% to 10%, lfp chemistries don't use any cobalt at all, and China are putting sodium batteries in cars this year with no cobalt.
And for the cobalt we need, there's loads of it in other places. For example sweden is prospecting a cobalt/nickel mine that would cover all the needs of EU.
And of course in the end, the cobalt coming from so called "artisinal mining" is 0,4% of the supply. And all major car manufacturers are part of the ethical mineral alliance or some such that says they won't buy it.
Gasoline and diesel refineries however also use cobalt in the process, and they are not part of any ethical alliance. I wonder where the conflict cobalt ends up.
And ofc, over 95% of the minerals going into a battery are extracted in recycling when it reaches end of life some day in the future. So it can be used again and again.
I’m willing to accept i could be wrong about China, but even if the batteries stop requiring cobalt mined from the backs of slaves, there will still be a market for it in countries that don’t have this developed technology
LFP batteries usually don't use Cobalt. Tesla Model 3 standard range batteries are Cobalt free, the shift away from Cobalt in batteries and rare earths in motors is happening.
It’s gotten to the point where if your issue with EVs is cobalt you are a fucking idiot. Cobalt is a widely used element. Oil refinement uses cobalt.
I can guarantee you didn’t give a rats ass for all the “slaves” mining cobalt for your consumer electronics batteries or gas for your car until Big Oil started to link cobalt to Tesla.
Really look at what you are saying and when you started saying it.
Cobalt is being phased out of battery chemistries across the industry. Tesla has zero cobalt in the base 3 and I think base Y.
Apple phones use cobalt too, and a huge amount of cobalt. No peep from "human rights" activists until electric cars gained popularity. Currently other industries use more cobalt than batteries.
https://www.iea.org/data-and-statistics/charts/total-cobalt-demand-by-sector-and-scenario-2020-2040
The debate is fine, but the insults and incivility needs to stop in this comments section.
I'm searching through the article and cannot find where they define "lifetime" of a vehicle. Wouldn't that graph change quite a bit between lifetime of 6 years and 12 years?
Looks like they use 124k miles as lifetime
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If you make it to 1116000 will you call it the cat mobile?
124k when most manufacturers test and rate ICE cars to 200k
The longer the mileage the more the EV pulls ahead. The EV's impact is frontloaded compared to the ICE.
2nd battery on teslas by browsing the owner forums is around their life for the article
My car is 25 years old and currently sits at 150k. An EV would need at least 2 batteries by then. Not sure if it’s a huge difference environmentally but it definitely is financially for anyone who’s not rich
From the article: >A typical passenger vehicle like the Toyota Camry emits about 68 tons of CO2 in its lifetime, compared to 15 tons of CO2 emitted for an electric Tesla Model 3 It would take 5 lifetimes of a Model 3 to reach parity with a Camry's CO2 emissions. That's assuming the battery needs changing at 125,000 miles, which it doesn't. In reality, it would take more like 15 lifetimes of a Model 3 to reach parity with a Camry's pollution level.
Not even close. My i3 is nearly at 80k and shows 0% degradation. There are i3s out there on 300k and over 90% capacity. And when cells do go (which is rare) they can be replaced in segments rather than swapping the whole thing.
>My car is 25 years old and currently sits at 150k. An EV would need at least 2 batteries by then. Where do you get that idea from? High powered lithium batteries have a life time of 1500 full charges. If a charge holds 300 miles, that would be 450.000 miles before the battery would reach its second life. Lower powered lfp batteries, such as in the model 3 standard in europe has a life time of 3500 recharges. That will put them on more than a million miles before the battery is dead. Didn't Tesla also said they would give 1 million miles of warranty on their semis? My motor and battery warranty on my Tesla was 8 years or 192.000 km. Whatever comes first
> An EV would need at least 2 batteries by then. A quick google shows that less than 15% battery degradation after 200k miles seems typical
The delta of degradation likely increases for those facing cold winters.
Cold doesn't increase degradation. It just makes the battery less efficient so you get lower range.
I’m not Google but irl, the battery of my hybrid went from 46km to 24km (on a good day), after 80k kms
Hybrid battery packs get a lot more charge cycles than Ev packs, they also are discharged from full to empty more often. Depth of charge plays a huge role in degredation,which is also why cellphones and laptops die so fast. Whereas a Ev with a 300 mile range pack generally doesn't drained to the bottom very much, so it lasts many more cycles.
There’s zero data suggesting that you need “at least” 2 batteries to do 150k miles. Zero. You’re suggesting that batteries would need to be replaced at 75k miles max, meanwhile the warranty covers to 100k miles, and the battery actually last *much much* longer. Actual data shows that batteries retain about 80% capacity after 200k miles. You’d still be on the original battery with plenty of miles left in it. Even at 80% it is still usable.
Definitely not. It completely depends on the vehicle, and how it was taken care of. If you only ever used "super-charging" from empty to full, over the entire ownership, then maybe. Even then today's battery packs can be recycled or reused in stationary energy supplies as well.
I have only had one car in my life with less than that distance on the clock. Everything under 200 000km is what I would call low mileage.
Unopopular opinion: when comparing EVs to gasoline cars, *hybrids* should be the basis of comparison rather than non-hybrid ICE. Why? Because hybrids have a fairly small price difference, no range anxiety, and don't depend on being able to charge at home or extra infrastructure. They are a drop-in replacement for ICE. Hybrids should have been the standard years ago. No doubt EVs still come out ahead, but it does shrink the gap. Best I can find: https://www.carboncounter.com/#!/explore
Idk why people get mad at electric suvs and sedans and stuff, it’s fine. But why take away stuff like the V12 and W16. Literally under 1% of the population drive those cars.
You know what else is cleaner than personal EVs and ICE vehicles? It's called using public transportation such as bus or rail. Walking. Cycling/biking. Micromobility such as e-scooters. It's a shame North America is built around this highly inefficient mode of transportation (personal cars).
Biking would be great for me if I didn’t live in Minnesota. I should get one to do little trips near home.
True. Bold of you to step into the Cars subreddit. EV’s in the meantime, city zoning and planning changes in the long game.
I'm cool with EV's, but new cars as a whole are ugly soulless appliances. the good EV's are hypercar price. I'll keep my 20-30 year old ICE until they make decent EV's for decent prices and I'll keep my ICE cars forever for weekend joy rides/etc
Try a BMW i4 or Taycan
That'd be a pretty big fuckup if this wasn't the case
People complain about mining for battery material like they forget where oil comes from, the processes to turn oil into petrol, and then the fact you have to fill a car with petrol indefinitely throughout the car's life.
My FIL worked for big mining here in Australia. Guess what? If there's a cheaper way for mining companies to do their job they'll do it - and that includes using electric vehicles (for reliabilities sake - a broken diesel engine can lose the company hundred of thousands). There are big mines that already use solar energy and self-driving trucks.
People see a meme on Facebook and their mind is made up for eternity
I see that everywhere nowadays in nearly every community and on nearly every topic. Complete lack of desire to think critically. And how short is people’s attention span? Half the time articles are posted here people don’t even get past the headline lol
> Complete lack of desire to think critically Because thinking critically sometimes mean you have to learn new information that change your mind, or find out that reality aren’t decided by your personal preferences. In contrast, it’s much easier and feels better to just keep believe in something because you *want* it to be true. And Social Media has only made that so easy these days.
There's a significant subset of the population that seems to think staunchly maintaining objectively untrue beliefs in the face of evidence is "integrity," and that changing one's mind to more closely align with new data is "hypocrisy."
as evidenced by the upvote/comment ratio of this very post!
It drives me crazy. Some people just don't like EVs so when they see any out of context negative factor they jump on it. Like lithium mining. All of a sudden anti-EV people become super environmentalists against mining and speculate that we can't possibly grow lithium refining to match demand. But a quick search confirms that lithium is extremely plentiful and even when mining grows to support the needs of world wide battery storage that it would be TINY compared to all the other mining that anti-EV people conveniently forget about. Iron mining alone is 3 BILLION tons a year, while lithium mining at its peak will only need to be around 4 million tons a year (40x current levels).
Or people will come up with absurd qualifications, saying that you won't be able to drag a 50 year old EV out of a barn and get it working with a few simple tools, or load up an EV truck with a few thousand pounds and drive a thousand miles on one charge, as if that fully negates any positives.
People also seem completely unaware that the majority of refined fuels are trucked into their final destinations; they don't just magically appear at the gas station. At least electric distribution has minimal losses in comparison...
Then the fact those gas stations leak and our tax dollars go into repairing the leaks.
And what is not trucked is instead flowed through massive pipelines in the most fragile areas (Deepwater Horizon, Keystone pipeline, Keystone pipeline again, Keystone pipeline for a third time...).
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They're also far riskier in many ways. A truck can only spill so much oil from an accident, a pipeline can spill several orders of magnitude more
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It's all about deciding what you value in transport accidents. [Which Is Safer For Transporting Crude Oil: Rail, Truck, Pipeline Or Boat? (Forbes, 11-Oct-2018)](https://www.forbes.com/sites/jamesconca/2018/10/11/which-is-safer-for-transporting-crude-oil-rail-truck-pipeline-or-boat/?sh=63dac7257b23) >So which mode is safer? For oil, the short answer is: truck worse than train worse than pipeline worse than boat (Oilprice.com). But that’s only for human death and property destruction. For the amount of oil spilled per billion-ton-miles, it’s truck worse than pipeline worse than rail worse than boat (Congressional Research Service). Even more different is for environmental impact (dominated by impact to aquatic habitat), where it’s boat worse than pipeline worse than truck worse than rail. Point is, compared to electrical distribution, oil distribution for a car's energy source is much, much worse.
People also forget that the raw materials for each battery are only mined once. Recharging the battery does not require further mining. People also forget that the batteries are very recyclable.
Fuel refining is an energy intensive process, even more so with the type of crude Canada(well just Alberta mostly) produces. Tar sand are pipelined all the way to Texas to be refined into their products, and that's a very, very long distance to say the least. Unlike "sweet light" crude that the Middle East is known for, relatively easy to refine compare to tar sands. Well-to-wheel efficiency is often no quoted in critical pieces against EVs. It assumes gasoline or diesel is produced at the pump itself magically.
You might want to back up on the light sweet crude from the middle east. The middle east crude is heavier now as there supply has dwindled they can no longer just open the tap more to produce more. Those wells are starting to play out.
Fun fact- Canada has refineries entirely capable of refining tar sands. but the waste is so horrific they won't allow it in their environment. The US, on the other hand, will allow anything for its fossil fuel masters.
Oh and don’t forget that the oil needs to be transported across the globe and moved to any and every location it’s needed. The marginal cost of “moving” electricity from the generation sites to the demand sites is effectively zero.
>like they forget where oil comes from, From the gas station of course! Clean unadulterated gas right out of the pump
People also seem to absolutely ignore that: - most countries do not have an electric grid ready for the insane electricity demand of EVs. People act as if every country is Sweden where 90% of energy is clean (and abundant). - most places in the world produce electricity with gas or coal
The demand isn't insane, FYI. It's about a 10% addition to total electricity demand, and it generally comes at times when the grid is not at peak capacity, so it will often require no increase to peak load at all. The UK national grid did a big investigative study into this and found that everyone could switch to an EV overnight and we'd basically be fine in terms of stability and generation. With a few policies to incentivise using EVs as grid storage, they would actually make the grid far greener and enable more renewable installation.
Even if coal was used for 100% of electricity, that’s *still* more efficient than ICE cars.
Sure, they are. But why are middle-class consumers supposed to fix the world when governments and corporations aren’t doing enough? The top 15 largest shipping vessels create the equivalent of one billion ICE cars. There’s no regulation on that.
> But why are middle-class consumers supposed to fix the world when governments and corporations aren’t doing enough? Governments are mandating energy transition and corporations are following suit. Middle class consumers on reddit are complaining about government overreach and car manufacturers going all in on electric motors, while also complaining that governments and corporations are not doing enough. > The top 15 largest shipping vessels create the equivalent of one billion ICE cars. There’s no regulation on that. 1. Not true. If we're strictly talking about CO2 emissions, pollution from passenger transport is [significantly higher](https://ourworldindata.org/co2-emissions-from-transport). 2. It's easy to electrify cars. It's not easy to electrify bulk shipping. 3. What do you think those big ass shipping vessels are doing? They're hauling all the stuff that middle-class consumers consume. Including fossil fuels.
There is no way in hell to get an accurate figure on emissions from shipping. The amount of Chinese, Russian, and other shipping vessels burning heavy fuel oil (bunker fuel) is impossible to count with zero reliable statistics coming from their companies. Source: Worked with these companies for several years in a supply chain job.
That's just not true. You're comparing other types of emissions to CO2. ICE cars produce a fuck ton of CO2. "There are 760 million cars in the world today emitting approx 78,599 tons of Sulphur Oxides (SOx) annually. The world's 90,000 vessels burn approx 370 million tons of fuel per year emitting 20 million tons of Sulphur Oxides. That equates to 260 times more Sulphur Oxides being emitted by ships than the worlds entire car fleet. One large ship alone can generate approx 5,200 tonnes of sulphur oxide pollution in a year, meaning that 15 of the largest ships now emit as much SOx as the worlds 760 million cars."
Wrong. The 15 largest shipping vessels emit the nitrous and sulphuric oxide pollution of one billion cars. Cars emit far, far more CO2, the thing that's relevant to climate change. Nox pollution sucks, but oceanic pollution affects almost no people, and is also a much less significant threat to ocean life than climate change. Under capitalism, there is no solution other than people buying different stuff. There is no fairness, there is only profit. Don't like it, change the system.
Locally, it's up the middle class to fix pollution. Looking at pollution levels in larger cities, it's due to millions of cars driving around. The government could do better with public transit, but cars are now so ingrained in our culture that EVs are really the most realistic scenario to reduce local pollution in cities. Globally, yeah it's going to take a much larger effort though.
This is only the 500th time this is confirmed. I know there is some oil funded research claiming different, but amongst adults it’s pretty clear
Even if it wasn't true its like not like it wouldn't improve over time. It's like telling Karl Benz "Your 'automobile' isn't as fast as horse. Give up."
No no, you don't understand... EVs have already peaked, the power grid can not be upgraded, and no new battery technologies that improve energy density, lifespan, cost, and use better materials could ever be found. /s
This. Exactly this.
people will continue to ignore this and push the whole bullshit “evs are worse for the environment” not because they care about the environment and what’s best for it, it’s because evs threaten these peoples already fragile masculinity
And yet look at the 30% downvote… I wonder if those “adults” don’t believe in these studies, or if they just don’t *like* the conclusion of such studies.
> amongst adults it's pretty clear You could have fooled me, looking at the state of r/cars.
>amongst adults >well yeah but look at Reddit!
well yeah but look *anywhere else* where you can read comments from the general public and it's even worse
I just moved from germany to Ohio. Living in conservative germany to hillbilly usa, I can tell you adults who don't use reddit aren't more mature than people on reddit or any other place. The most insane person I know is a german, lived in munic, worked as an engineer at audi, lived in Czech at a machine manufacturer, lived two years on Texas and now in Ohio. He denies climate change, he thinks by 2030 people in germany have to move out of their houses because the "greens" passed a bill for that, and while climate change is a hoax and we actually live in an ice age, ICEs are still greener and emitt less co2 than EVs
This sub and Reddit as a whole skews young.
I don't think the Facebook memes I see about how much fun it is to roll coal past a Prius are coming from 14 year olds. The people involved are only adults in the chronological sense.
Only old people on fb now. Younger people left
Well as a petrolhead we don’t like this change off course. But as a member of society I don’t want to be a science denialist and I have to admit things need to change urgently.
There's been a wave of Joe Rogan viewers disagreeing with this because they recently learned that cobalt mines are bad for the environment.
Man, just wait until they found out how oil is produced lol.
Of course the use of cobalt in the refinement of that gas never seems to be mentioned.
Yeah :-) and they would have never ever cared about this, but now it’s an argument they can use
All mines are bad for the environment. All farms are bad for the environment. All Wal-Mart's are bad for the environment. Human civilization is bad.for the environment.
It's like the opposite of that "repeat the lie until it becomes the truth thing". You have to keep confirming the science again and again until people finally move on. At least in this particular case, EV adoption and other green tech is happening regardless. I really don't think we are going to see something along the lines of "JK EVs don't work ICE forever lol" in the coming decades.
And people are still arguing against it in this thread.
The question for EVs is longevity and cost to repair. I have to say Hyundai and Kia have nice EV designs, however, their track record of reliability is a major detractor for me. The Ioniq 5 and 6 are great looking.
EV makers have 100,000 mile battery warranties. So we can assume they will last at least 100,000. After that when you get to the end some makers will swap the battery and some will swap specific cells. Obviously swapping batteries or cells will be expensive but it’s relative given the only maintenance prior was tires and breaks so small price to pay. As EVs are more common the cost to swap batteries or specific cells will go down
There’s not tons of real-world results at this point. Manufacturers rate mileage for things all the time. Hyundai and Kia have 100k warranties and their engines blow up as early as 20-30k (Theta 1, 2, and Taos) miles. Sure it might be under warranty but it’s a major inconvenience no one wants to deal with.
> There’s not tons of real-world results at this point. Geotab. They have a lot of real world data from fleet EV's and the data shows very high sustained battery health.
I’ve done 38k miles in 14 months in an MG5 EV. At the last service battery SoH was 98%. At this rate I will blow past the warranty within two years. I’ll see how the car is then but besides having 6 new tyres everything is still looking nearly new at this point.
Batteries loosing health when new is normal, it wont loose 2% every 38k miles.
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The "cost" will go down in a financial sense, but not environmental sense. This article is about how clean they are, and requiring a battery swap (ie. More resources to be used), effectively doubles the sarbon footprint of the car.
Not even necessarily double. What's the refurb/recycle process like with those batteries? Do they just junk the whole thing?
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A recent article in ARS Technica said that one of the major problems with recycling is that the batteries are lasting way longer than people anticipated.
The break even point for carbon footprint of gas vs EV is within 2 years of hitting the road on average. The EV will already be years better than gas for carbon footprint if it was trashed at that point. Throwing in a new battery and keeping it going is even better. Any argument otherwise is severely misinformed
Did you read the article? No matter how you slice it, over the lifetime of the vehicle EVs come out ahead so they are more environmentally friendly. Issues with extraction of lithium and cobalt mining are well known and documented and no one disputes the higher carbon emissions associated with ev production, this is accounted for and despite this, EVs come out ahead
Yes, I just said the carbon footprint will double, not that it will surpass gas powered cars.
why is every anti-EV person willfully ignorant of battery recycling?
Surveys suggest reliability is about as varied as ICE vehicles, and it should improve because there’s far fewer parts in an EV. Manufacturers haven’t been making them for nearly a century though. The concern about batteries isn’t as relevant anymore with active battery management. The current batteries are good for 250,000+ miles I think.
The other big question I have is how recyclable are current EV batteries. Extracting things from the ground is always bad for the environment but if materials going into batteries can be recycled then maybe it’s cleaner than oil long term. I think of I get an electric commuter car in the near future it will be an EV or a PHEV with a modestly sized battery.
I saw somewhere that the batteries can be recycled into solar storage batteries, as they won't need to handle a high draw in that kind of configuration. I am not sure about actually breaking them back down into raw materials though.
The numbers I've seen suggest they can reclaim about 98% of the materials in batteries.
I don't understand why being for EVs and being a car enthusiast have to be exclusive. In fact, wouldn't you be more of a car enthusiast to be enthusiastic about EVs in the same way as rotary engines or other types of unconventional engineering?
I think largely the hate for EVs comes because of the upcoming ban on combustion cars, there would be way less hate for EVs if governments would stop the plans to ban sale of combustion vehicles and let consumers choose how their car is powered. If EVs are the way forward people will adopt them naturally, and if they aren't the governments are shoving them down everyones throats not recognizing the fact that combustion cars and EVs can co exist
Not necessarily because a lot of car enthusiasts are attached to the visceral experience of an ICE. I don't care how fast an EV is it'll never beat the feeling of driving an ICE vehicle. That's not even factoring in a manual transmission that you can't get with EVs. It's really a work of art aesthetically and mechanically. On an extremely basic level it's like an electric powered fireplace vs a wood fireplace. They both give off heat but that's about where the similarities end. Wood fires are always far more enjoyable as they stimulate more of the senses.
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I was never excited about EVs until I drove one. I became a mechanical engineer because of how fascinating Turbo ICE is, but I've been there, done that and EVs are so much more fun to daily drive. EVs and car enthusiast definitely go together.
Evs are more in the realm of appliances so naturally car people think they are boring.
haha, thank you! I'm *very* enthusiastic about EVs. Last time I checked, those are cars! So I think that makes me an enthusiast of a specific subset of cars, or, if you will, a car enthusiast! lol The first time I charged my EV6 at an Electrify America Level 3 fast charger, it was like experiencing what I imagine the car culture of the '50s and '60s could have been like. Lots of interesting models pulling in and out with drivers who were more than happy to talk shop about their car and what they like about it. Plus, with fast charging taking at least 15 minutes, usually more, you were kind of forced to wait around anyway--why not socialize while you do so? It was really exciting. Kind of like a miniature, impromptu, relatively-budget-friendly "Cars and Coffee" meet up. Every one of us was a car enthusiast at that EA station, and I'm happy to be a part of this new flavor of car culture!
If you like the sound of an engine specifically a v8 then you wouldn’t really be interested in the electric ones because they make little to no sound
I've always been interest the most in the engineering, design, and driving experience of a car personally.
Yea me too. The sound is just the cherry on top. It’s also really personal preference too but in my opinion I love when I hit the gas and hear the engine because I really like how some engines sound.
EV production emissions will continue to improve. It is hard to say this as a ICE enthusiast, but people need to really stop fighting the movement towards EVs.
Quick math, i replaced my diesel van with an electric van of the exact same model. my old diesel van ran at 8L/100km. I drive 30k km per year. So 2400 liters of diesel. At 2,7kg co² that's 6,5 tons of co² in a year. Producing a lithium battery creates 61-106 kg of co² per kWh according to Google. My battery is 75kwh, so 4,5-8 tons of co². Even with the worst case battery production my ev is greener than the diesel in just over one year. And that's ignoring the co² from the production and transport of the fuel, and the production of the ice power train, when compared to buying a new diesel van. It's also ignoring the production of the electricity, but i'm running on 100% wind/solar. So it's a drop in the sea.
This is all assuming that CO2 is the only negative environmental impact of either one.
Of course. The local environmental impact of oil drilling, the huge oil spills every now and then and [the human rights violations](https://www.unepfi.org/humanrightstoolkit/oil.php) in oil drilling definitely also have an impact. Ofc lithium has issues too. Older methods were quite disruptive with open pit mining. Modern geothermal lithium extraction on the other hand is cheaper, more efficient, essentially carbon free, and also supplies geothermal heat or electricity to local communities, with no negative impacts on ground water levels or quality. The big issue is always cobalt. It makes up about 1% of the total battery pack with current nmc batteries, and ofc lfp and sodium batteries use none. There are a lot of projects looking at opening cobalt mines in non-conflict areas like a big mine in sweden that could supply all europe's needs. And ofc manufacturers have significantly reduced the amount in batteries, even going as far as switching to cobalt free chemistries despite Slightly lower energy densities.
>Ofc lithium has issues too. But the lithium and cobalt is recyclable, so unlike oil you only need to mine it once.
I didn't know that part, that's a big factor
There's big plants going up in us and europe, so far it's not taken off yet because batteries are lasting longer than expected though. So only a small portion of the 10+ year old batteries are reaching end of life. And ofc modern batteries are expected to last 30+ years, so it will be even longer before we reach a real circular economy where we don't need to mine more, but we will get there eventually. https://www.fortum.com/services/battery-recycling/lithium-ion-battery-recycling-technology Currently We're getting over 95% of the valuable minerals back. Not quite 100%. But 100% will probably always be unattainable.
Battery recycling plant is gonna be $$$. If I had the capital that’s where I’m going all in
Plus gas production uses cobalt as well. Not as much as batteries but uses it and it is not recyclable from gas production
CO2 is the largest component driving climate change currently, so that's generally what people are concerned with
Even with the worst case that you worked out there, you didn't include the CO2 production of making and transporting the diesel. This is something that people always leave out and it gives an "unfair" advantage to ICE. A more "fair" comparison, which I'm going to make as unfair as possible would be charging emissions vs fuel emissions. Going on Poland which has some of the highest CO2 emissions per kWh of electricity generated in Europe of 635g per kWh. Going on 5km/kWh, which is pretty bad for an EV, over the course of that 30k km you drive per year, it's going to produce 3.8 tons of CO2 charging that van. Going on Norway which has the lowest CO2 emissions per kWh of electricity generated in Europe of 26g per kWh, the same distance with the same efficiency, you're going to produce 156kg of CO2.
I can’t wait to get an EV
This isn’t news, but more confirmation is always welcome.
Honestly that much should be obvious with just some rudimentary research. Beyond just the emissions that result directly from internal combustion, ICE cars also generate a constant stream of petroleum waste in the form of used motor oil, brake fluid, transmission fluid, gear oil, etc. Battery components are also highly recyclable meaning that worn cells that have reached their EOL can be broken down and processed into new ones. Then there is the corollary development of technologies accompanying EV's. Increasing electrical efficiency, distributed storage of electrical energy, electrical transmission, etc. are all things which are not only necessary for the mass market adoption of EV's but also critical in the development of a robust electrical network that can make the best use of renewable/green energy production.
Definitely. Good points.
Cool. Now price one affordably that's reliable that I can work on and I'll buy it.
Agreed. There's way more to affordability than just what a new car is priced at. I've never bought a new car in my life and I'm sure I'm not alone in that. There is no way in hell I'm buying a used vehicle that I know has a huge lump sum cost coming down the pipe. I'll gladly shell out $1000 here and a $1000 there to keep my car going. And sure, maybe at the end it costs just as much as a battery replacement for some of these vehicles. But I can't afford the huge one time bill I'm seeing for some of these battery replacements.
And make it a diesel manual wagon used from factory that has a handbrake and priced so it’s a complete loss for the company and I might ponder buying it
miat
Only if it's brown.
Mg 4 is really affordable
I'm in the US though.
Oh, thats unfortunate. I believe the bolt is pretty good too?
The Bolt is a dreadful shitbox.
I love that your user flair is still the stock custom flair. Pretty funny actually.
That last one is the biggest imo and why I hate current and upcoming EVs. proprietary everything, everything linked to the cloud, and non existent 3rd party repair. Just turning these cars into black box pieces of tech
This isn't an EV-exclusive problem. You can't buy a new car with a carburetor anymore either, it's as chock-full of electronics as EVs are.
I’m definitely a car enthusiast. Just ordered my first EV and I’m excited for it. I find it so odd people cling on so hard to what powers their vehicle. I own a manual brz,2 pickup trucks and a diesel 3500 ecoline van. The cost to fuel these vehicles skyrocketed in Canada to almost 3$ a litre. it’s what tipped the scale for me to switch. I live 30 minutes outside of a small town (1500 people) and 2 hour drive north of Toronto. If I can daily a EV with home charging and Canadian winters(just got 30cm, 12” in freedom units) most of the world can as well. I understand not adopting a electric vehicle if it’s your only vehicle but I don’t understand the hate it gets.
I think it's due to the mandated sunsetting of ICE vehicles. Maybe we'll achieve proper infrastructure by then but it's hard to see that happening everywhere, and that's scaring people into thinking EVs will have to be their only vehicle before that becomes a practical or realistic option for them. If we let the market decide when EVs completely replace ICE then there wouldn't be nearly as much pushback.
Big problems require big solutions which is why we have governments. I’m glad our governments are making these big moves even if it’s very late. EVs still aren’t great for road trips and you need a charger near work or home but those are the only two big problems at this point. By 2040 when people in the used car market start getting pushed to WV those problems should be solved (think of where tech has come in the prior 20 years)
I cling to the ICE because it actually feels interesting and engaging to drive. show me an EV competitor to the BRZ
Most definitely are none yet. Il keep my brz as long as I can ( full stainless exhaust from headers to tips and ecu tuned) but i don’t dislike electric vehicles just because they’re electric. I wouldn’t trust one as an only vehicle but as a daily/winter vehicle with a ICE backup vehicles I’m in a unique position to finally try owning a Tesla.
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Nearly all studies include that and the article includes emissions related to electricity production. You can read the pdf they cite that the article links to right there.
I know I am a minority but my house's solar panels provide most of the electricity for my car. It's nice this is an option.
These articles are just writing about studies that look at the full life cycle of a product or service called life cycle assessment (LCA). If you haven't heard about that methodology yet, your program maybe needs a bit of improvement. Since you're a student, you probably have access to most academic journals through your library and should have learned how to do research in them. If you search for life cycle assessment studies on electric vehicles, you should find on the order of 100 that all come to the same conclusion, making different assumptions about the electric grid used to charge EVs. You will find that the newer studies will be even more positive than the older ones because the grid has and continue to get cleaner.
A coal plant is cleaner than a Ice engine tho, proportionally of course
And many have mandated scrubbers. They don’t get rid of the issue entirely but it doesn’t go into the air
Cars have catalysators and much stricter emission rules than powerplants. The emissions of coal plants are dirtier than modern cars. Coal powerplants even produce **radioactive** emissions. Everyone can google it in seconds.
**Significantly more radioactive emissions than there is radioactive waste from nuclear power plants** (which is stored and not throw into the air as well) per the same amount of energy produced.
True. Redditors don't want to hear that though...
Coal plants are about 65% efficient ICE engines about 25% and vary between millions of ICE vehicles. Some without cats, some rolling coal, and some driving in the city where it is even less efficient. Coal plants do need to step it up though
Or maybe we just build nuclear power stations instead of beating around the bush
Oil also needs to be transported, then refined and then gas transported again for distribution before it can be burned in that low efficiency ICE engine. That's 3 extra steps with significant emissions and efficiency loss. I feel like not many people ever even stopped to think how complex and inefficient the whole process behind fueling vehicles with ICEs is, because we've had the infrastructure for it our whole lives. Energy grid, charging and EV engine itself are very efficient so aside from energy production itself there's not much losses.
Yep - while I want to reduce dependencies on coal, it’s far easier to scrub pollution at the scale power plants produce it than cars.
Exactly
Copypasta from a prior discussion on this same topic. Tl;Dr even accounting for externalities EVs are significantly less harmful to the environment, in most cases, compare to ICE vehicles. In fact, Paltsev says, it’s difficult to find a comparison in which EVs fare worse than internal combustion. If electric vehicles had a shorter lifespan than gas cars, that would hurt their numbers because they would have fewer low-emissions miles on the road to make up for the carbon-intensive manufacture of their batteries. Yet when the MIT study calculated a comparison in which EVs lasted only 90,000 miles on the road rather than 180,000 miles, they remained 15 percent better than a hybrid and far better than a gas car. Source: MIT It's an interesting read that looks at the nuances of EV emissions where you live. The predominant method of power generation in your area has a big impact on the lifetime carbon emissions of a vehicle. For most places though, ICE is the worst, Hybrids are better, and EVs are the best and expected to get even better.
Most of these articles actually do tend to account for electricity generation; as it turns out, even if an EV is exclusively charged with coal-fired electricity, it still comes out ahead of internal combustion engines. https://www.reuters.com/business/autos-transportation/when-do-electric-vehicles-become-cleaner-than-gasoline-cars-2021-06-29/
This shouldn't be a huge factor to consider anyway. We can get electricity from a multitude of places. If we get EVs before full clean energy, then we just need to make a bigger push for clean energy. Nuclear energy might win big from EVs. The more demand for electricity, the more they'll need to produce. Nuclear energy is perfect for extremely high amounts of power since it takes up such little space and produces large amounts of power consistently. In my area, we get all of our power from nuclear energy, and then any fluctuations in power are accounted for by gas power plants. If I charge my EV at night, I'll be using 100% clean energy. I can track that and reduce my own emissions. You can't do that with gas powered cars. The "batteries r bad for environment" argument is the same. We're working on the tech, it's at a very young age and there are many ways to make batteries. They can be made cleanly, they can be more efficient, they can be engineered to meet whatever criteria. Petrol powered cars are at their limits. You can never get a petrol powered car anywhere near EVs. They're very much in their early stages of development and they're still doing better than most petrol cars.
I'd like to see the refinement of gasoline as a comparison to the generation of electricity added as well.
They are usually fairly simple, comparing production of the ev to tailpipe emissions of the ice vehicle. Because that's the majority players. But adding other factors like energy generation, production of the ice vehicle, production and transport of the fuel, really only tips the scales more in favour of the ev. If We're looking at pure electricity, the refining of gas and diesel uses about half the electricity an ev uses, usually on the same grid. Then there's the fuel consumption of tankers transporting fuel from the refineries, and crude oil to the refineries, increasing the total fuel used. And then there's all the energy that goes into extracting the oil whether it's electricity or diesel powered vehicles. [This study](https://theicct.org/publication/lca-ghg-emissions-hdv-fuels-europe-feb23/) is specifically about heavy duty vehicles, so very large batteries, and long mileages, but the general concept is perfectly transferrable to other vehicles. And as you can see the difference in life time emissions is enormous.
there's a large swing in CO2 output based on where the electricity is generated - a 100kWh battery used for a full cycle in las vegas won't have the same equivalent emissions as the same battery used for a full cycle in laramie and the electric grid is getting greener all the time, with shifts to renewables and natural gas over coal
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the funniest thing is that most of these ppl straight up don’t really care about the environment and just use that false argument because evs are some type of threat to them for whatever dumb reason
And? I still don't want one.
And I'm fine if other people do
This, exactly this People are free to choose what they drive (terms and conditions apply from 2035)
You do you, but as a counterpoint I really don't like driving ICE cars anymore, especially modern ones. They're all full of various lag sources, fake noises, and other such nonsense. Many are basically trying to be BEVs at this point, in a way - auto transmissions only, start/stop to eliminate idling, low NVH, etc. I'm not gonna tell everyone what they "should" drive, but I personally have no desire to go back. The experience of smooth, uninterrupted torque and lots of it is just too good to give up. Charging at home, the lack of oil changes, not having to worry about warming up before flooring it and so on are nice too.
I love my EV, but I kinda also want a stupid V8 that rattles at stop lights.
Thanks for letting us know. We were all wondering about you when we read the article.
Seconded
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What do you believe brings a “soul” to a vehicle?
Sound, the vibration of the engine, etc. it varies from car to car and just makes the experience of each car you drive different and more exciting from an enthusiasts perspective. ICE cars just have more to them than just hur durr fast in straight line
Ngl I thought I’d miss that switching to an EV but really all I miss is a stickshift and my ability to track my car (which I’ve never done anyways). My car is fun as hell to drive and I’m coming from a Veloster N which is both fun and loud. Apparently my flair didn’t update, but I have a Mach-E GT Edit: I’ve *never tracked a car
My issue with EVs is two fold. First all of these articles is astroturfing between EV and oil companies. Tesla and other manufacturers are not saints here. Second what I really dislike is that responsibility is shifted on consumers to “save the planet”. Now I have to buy an EV and I have to spend money, while other industries and companies pollute 10x more. If we truly gave a shit about pollution, then maybe we would stop building the country to be 100% dependent on cars? Like I love my M2, but i shouldnt be forced to own a car just to exist. EV solve none of these problems. You dont think maintaining roads and replacing asphalt affects emissions? This is why all i see here is just positive propaganda to get consumers to spend money on EVs to feel like they are contributing to eliminating emission….
It’s a problem here in Germany too - very car-centric. There is more of an emphasis on trains, subways, busses, and bike lanes but it’s still not enough. Nonetheless EV makes sense for so many reasons it’s easy to understand why governments are nudging it forward so that their Industries and workforces don’t get left behind, they have less dependence on foreign oil, better local air quality, climate gas goals, etc…
All research points to it, however in a developing country such as mine, there's the problem of electrical infrastructure and worse, the problem of electricity generation when it's not renewable. The idiot politicians in my country insist on burning friggin coal and fuel oil to generate electricity when we have an abundance of renewable green energy. I love EV's. Driving them without preconceived notions opens your eyes to the undeniable fact that it's more efficient and the future, but the legislative agenda has been faster than the infrastructure and energy production, mining can keep up even with massive investments. It is however necesary for change to happen.
Hydrogen Combustion: "am I a joke to you?"
EVs are for upper class and rich people only, and they're more of a status symbol or "luxury playtoy" than anything else Wake me up when working-class/everyday average people can afford an EV 🥱💤 When we see high school teenagers driving used "hand-me-down beater" Teslas and such for their first car, ***then*** we'll know it's actually gone mainstream (affordable by the masses) Until then, these EV people/shills need to shut up and go away. Regular gas vehicles are still the only reliable transportation for working-class/poor people to get to work, run errands, drive their kids around, etc - just stop with all the demonizing of the regular/working-class people that keep society humming along Not everyone can be rich or upper class to afford a Tesla, sorry
Exactly, well said. Where does the single mom with 2 kids that lives in an apartment charge her car? Go sit at Walmart for 45 minutes in the car with her kids and hope the charger isn't broken or there is a line. Could you imagine a time when ICE cars are illegal and everyone in a 300 unit apartment complex is trying to charge their car. People don't realize the infrastructure that is need to charge all those cars? They just think oh I just call the electrician and he puts a cord on my house and charges me $2k and all is well.
How about a Chevy Bolt for $20,000?
Let’s put it this way both side of this argument are putting out false information. I work in the mining industry and yes you can make the numbers look very pro battery but your cherry picking numbers if you look at the whole extraction process and refining of the ore the reality is that the process leaves a bigger carbon foot print then building a internal combustion engine.
Platinum, Palladium and Rhodium is used in catalytic converters also require a good bit of mining and refining though.
Don't forget the oil refinement industry is the third largest industry that relies on rare earth's (roughly 20% of the rare earth production) only science/medical, and cel phones are greater. Granted EVs are rising fast, but the highest I've seen is somewhere around 5%.
The impact of fueling many EVs is less than just the impact of refining the gasoline burned in an ICE vehicle. Drilling, transporting, and refining oil to produce gasoline typically uses 20-25% of the energy in the final product
No one is saying it doesn't. They're saying that mining and processing the materials and building batteries is much much less than the impact of mining and refining and burning the 25 tons of petroleum the average ICE vehicle will burn in its lifetime. Yes even accounting for the impact of producing the electricity EVs use.
Nobody is denying that producing a battery means more ghg than producing a combustion engine. But the problem is that producing the car is only about 10% of the emissions of an ICE car, and over 50% for a bev. So even with a pessimistic double the production ghg, bevs come out far ahead.
But with an EV you only needs to mine the ore once.
They make some good points but hoping for less human rights violations from the Congo and china, is hopeless. I also seriously doubt that any of these cleaner mining methods will be used because it eats into profits. It’s much cheaper to pay slaves a dollar a day
The largest miner of Lithium is Australia. And Batteries which don't use Cobalt make up already 1/3rd of BEV sales.
Eh, europe, us australia and China are all currently in an arms race on who can get geothermal lithium mining up and running fastest. Essentially a zero emission lithium mining process as a by product of zero emission geothermal heat or energy generation. As for the actual conflict minerals like cobalt, current nmc chemistries have reduced the cobalt content in the cathode from 30% to 10%, lfp chemistries don't use any cobalt at all, and China are putting sodium batteries in cars this year with no cobalt. And for the cobalt we need, there's loads of it in other places. For example sweden is prospecting a cobalt/nickel mine that would cover all the needs of EU. And of course in the end, the cobalt coming from so called "artisinal mining" is 0,4% of the supply. And all major car manufacturers are part of the ethical mineral alliance or some such that says they won't buy it. Gasoline and diesel refineries however also use cobalt in the process, and they are not part of any ethical alliance. I wonder where the conflict cobalt ends up. And ofc, over 95% of the minerals going into a battery are extracted in recycling when it reaches end of life some day in the future. So it can be used again and again.
Maybe more relevant is that newer generations of these batteries will no longer require rare earth materials
I’m willing to accept i could be wrong about China, but even if the batteries stop requiring cobalt mined from the backs of slaves, there will still be a market for it in countries that don’t have this developed technology
LFP batteries usually don't use Cobalt. Tesla Model 3 standard range batteries are Cobalt free, the shift away from Cobalt in batteries and rare earths in motors is happening.
Sure, change takes time. It was the same with things like leaded fuel.
It’s gotten to the point where if your issue with EVs is cobalt you are a fucking idiot. Cobalt is a widely used element. Oil refinement uses cobalt. I can guarantee you didn’t give a rats ass for all the “slaves” mining cobalt for your consumer electronics batteries or gas for your car until Big Oil started to link cobalt to Tesla. Really look at what you are saying and when you started saying it. Cobalt is being phased out of battery chemistries across the industry. Tesla has zero cobalt in the base 3 and I think base Y.
Apple phones use cobalt too, and a huge amount of cobalt. No peep from "human rights" activists until electric cars gained popularity. Currently other industries use more cobalt than batteries. https://www.iea.org/data-and-statistics/charts/total-cobalt-demand-by-sector-and-scenario-2020-2040