Electric vehicles - total net pollution WORSE than gasoline powered vehicles

[Bob]

Caught me by surprise too.. Thought electric vehicles removing hydrocarbons from running on gasoline was a solution - seems that is not the case..

Study found electric vehicles cause 86 per cent more deaths from air pollution than do cars powered by regular gasoline - People who own all-electric cars where coal generates the power may think they are helping the environment, but a new study finds their vehicles actually make the air dirtier, with a higher carbon dioxide output from the power plants.

Ethanol touted as a carbon solution, isn’t so green, either. The source of the electricity electric vehicles (EVs) use is what is the concern.

If the power to charge the batteries comes from coal, the electric cars that use of energy made that way shows that 3.6 times more soot and smog deaths than running a vehicle on gasoline, because of the pollution made in generating the electricity, according to the study just published by the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

Excess carbon dioxide is also produced by coal burning. The study examines the environmental costs for the entire life cycle of EVs, including where power comes from and the environmental effects of building the batteries that run the EVs.

In the US, the states with the highest percentage of electricity coming from coal, according to the United States Department of Energy (DOE), are West Virginia, Wyoming, Ohio, North Dakota and Illinois.

The study finds EVs cause 86 per cent more deaths from air pollution than do cars powered by regular gasoline. The ethanol cycle is no salvation - ethanol isn’t pollution free, with 80 per cent more air pollution mortality, according to the study.

Coal produces 39 per cent of the country’s electricity, according to the U.S. DOE.

The only SILVER LINING is if the power plants switch entirely to NATURAL GAS, dumping COAL as the power source, that the EV's would produce half as many air pollution health problems as gasoline-powered cars do.

And if the power comes from wind, water or wave energy, it produces about one-quarter of the air pollution deaths. There are still batteries to be made, the metal for the vehicle, the factory process.. so even going "free energy" if such actually were being produced, would have a health penalty.. Reducing the damage, means one needs to look at the FULL CYCLE, amount of energy consumed to create a PRODUCT, and see if the whole cycle is beneficial or wasteful and unhealthy.

When you see, that pollution is cleaned up by some novel power source the point of the STUDY is to say one MUST look at the FULL production cycle, not just a selling point like a "pollution free" electric car - full cycle viewing shows it (from manufacturing to power charging, to battery manufacturing and recycling) is FAR from pollution free or free from damage to health and environment.

(One of the study's co-authors is Julian Marshall, an engineering professor at the University of Minnesota. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences is where the study was published. Article source: http://www.canadianmanufacturing.com/environment-and-safety/electric-vehicles-powered-coal-dirtier-gasoline-study-claims-143850/)


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[DeDukshyn]

Well, unless you live in British Columbia, Manitoba, Newfoundland and Labrador, Quebec or Yukon; all those places source 90%+ of all their electricity from hydro, with BC also integrating wind and potentially tidal generated electricity. So until we can get off burning coal and oil for electricity, electric cars a notion in the right direction at best. Merely a tool for opportunists to make money on well intending individuals at worst.

[Tesseract]

Might be worth mentioning: hybrid diesel electric buses produce 90% less particulate emissions than a regular diesel bus, since they accelerate using electricity instead of diesel. If you've ever been behind a bus you will have noticed most of the black puffs come out during acceleration. The electricity the buses use comes from the deceleration of the bus, which also uses around 30 to 50 % less diesel than a normal bus. At no point does it need to be plugged into a power point for charging.

[DeDukshyn]

Might be worth mentioning: hybrid diesel electric buses produce 90% less particulate emissions than a regular diesel bus, since they accelerate using electricity instead of diesel. If you've ever been behind a bus you will have noticed most of the black puffs come out during acceleration. The electricity the buses use comes from the deceleration of the bus, which also uses around 30 to 50 % less diesel than a normal bus. At no point does it need to be plugged into a power point for charging.

That's true, but "recollected" electricity is a fraction of what is put out, so we will always run into the fact that certain amount of combustion will be required to produce electricity, and due to losses in the conversion (most all energy produced by a combustion energy is wasted as heat and is never used) at best this works out to about 30-40% reduction per vehicle. Just think of any hybrid vehicle - same system, but I will admit a turbo diesel would be the powerplant of choice for a hybrid, but then you have to overcomplicate the engines to reduce emissions (to comply with clean air regs) reducing the efficiency by quite a bit. Take a heavy duty diesel pickup - then go to the diesel engine specialist and have him remove everything that is on it to help with emission, and you will gain about 10-20% more power and about the same in fuel efficiency.

[grannyfranny100]

I believe it was Einstein that basically said that you can't create a solution with the same mind set that created the problem.

[Bob]

More on the researchers findings and conclusions

"Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences" general summary as interpreted by Popular Science journal

The Argument

Advocates alternative energy vehicles point to their positive environmental qualities, such as reducing carbon emissions from the tailpipe.

Their opponents point out the hidden (environmental costs), such as the fact that the energy for electric cars comes largely from burning coal.

In other words, the pollution IS still there, just moved to a different location and NOT being seen coming out of the tailpipe. (out of sight out of mind logic)

The Scientists wanted to attach some hard numbers to this debate.

And so a team led by Christopher Tessum, an environmental engineer at the University of Minnesota, Minneapolis, set out to study the effects on human health of various alternative ways to power a car. Their findings are presented today in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

The researchers investigated ten alternatives to gasoline.

They included:


diesel,
compressed natural gas,
ethanol derived from corn, and
ethanol derived from cellulose, as well as
electric vehicles powered in six different ways: by electricity from coal,
natural gas,
corn leaf and stalk combustion,
wind,
water,
(hydro-electric) and
solar energy.


They then carefully and scientifically modeled the effects of replacing 10 percent of U.S. vehicles that currently run on gasoline by 2020.

Jason Hill, study co-author and environmental engineer at the University of Minnesota, says it's important to note that this is a study about pollutants and how they affect human health—not about climate change.

"We looked all the way from all the stages of production and use of a fuel, such as:

extracting,
refining and
transporting it,
to the way it changes ozone levels and
atmospheric pollutant concentrations


"We also looked at where people live in the United States.

"We also used meteorology and chemical transport models to see how often and how much people would be exposed to pollutants, calculated damage to health, and the economic costs associated with this damage."

RESULTS
The findings showed a dramatic swing the positive and negative effects on health based on the type of energy used.

Internal combustion vehicles running on corn ethanol and electric vehicles powered by electricity from coal were the real sinners; according the study, their health effects were 80 percent worse compared to gasoline vehicles.

However, electric vehicles powered by electricity from natural gas, wind, water, or solar energy might reduce health impacts by at least 50 percent compared to gasoline vehicles.


"We were surprised that many alternative vehicle fuels and technologies that are put forward as better for the environment than conventional gasoline vehicles did not end up causing large decreases in air quality-related health impacts," Tessum says.

"The most important implication is that electric vehicles can cause large public health improvements, but only when paired with clean electricity.

Adapting electric vehicles without taking steps to clean up electric generation would be worse for public health than continuing to use conventional gasoline vehicles."

EV batteries are a problem, too, but a changing one.

According to Tessum, previous studies have suggested that emissions from electric car battery production make such vehicles worse for public health than gasoline vehicles, even when the electricity to power them comes from non-polluting sources. (Possibly the new lithium carbon nano-tube technology for batteries would be a solution here).

"However, battery technology is evolving quickly," he explains." Using updated estimates of emissions from battery production, and accounting for the fact that much of the pollutant emissions from the battery production supply chain occurs in remote areas far from people, we found that the health impacts of electric vehicle battery production are much lower than previously estimated."

In the future, Tessum says, the team wants to explore the potential impacts of alternative fuel use outside the United States.

"We can also investigate if some areas might benefit more from electric vehicles than others, to know if there are ways to deploy electric vehicle fleets for optimal impact," Hill says.

(reference: http://www.popularmechanics.com/cars/alternative-fuel/electric/electric-cars-pollute-more-than-gasoline-cars-17535339?click=pm_news)

(Abstract reference: http://www.pnas.org/content/early/2014/12/10/1406853111.abstract National Academy of Sciences)


Our approach combines spatially, temporally, and chemically detailed life cycle emission inventories; comprehensive, fine-scale state-of-the-science chemical transport modeling; and exposure, concentration–response, and economic health impact modeling for ozone (O3) and fine particulate matter (PM2.5).

We find that powering vehicles with corn ethanol or with coal-based or “grid average” electricity increases monetized environmental health impacts by 80% or more relative to using conventional gasoline. Conversely, EVs powered by low-emitting electricity from natural gas, wind, water, or solar power reduce environmental health impacts by 50% or more.


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