

Electric cars neither as useful nor as green as their proponents claim  - tyn
http://www.economist.com/node/17199894

======
Teckla
From the article:

"But that final 1% of journeys presumably includes the summer holiday when
people pile into the car and head off for the coast. Hopping on the train
laden with suitcases and children may not be an attractive alternative."

So the author of the article is advocating against electric cars because 1% of
trips require more range?

Has he never heard of a rental car?

------
stretchwithme
Of course. but they are very fashionable, so we must subsidize them massively.

Of course it might make more sense to tax the pollution than for government to
try to pick the next technology. Didn't George Bush tell us it was going to be
hydrogen cars? Now its supposed to be electric, but who knows what will
actually happen in reality?

When you pick one technology and give it all of the advantages, it makes it
all that much harder for competing technologies to succeed. A level playing
field is best.

We have an entire industry of people trying to figure out what technologies
will win. They compete with each other and have all kinds of different
backgrounds and differing opinions. And they learn as they go, something
Washington seems incapable of doing.

~~~
Luc
> When you pick one technology and give it all of the advantages, it makes it
> all that much harder for competing technologies to succeed. A level playing
> field is best.

Haha, that is exactly what I was thinking - we've already picked combustion
engines, the infrastructure for which is now solidly entrenched. This status-
quo is very unlikely to be broken without additional incentives, so subsidies
seem to me a good way of getting out of a local optimum.

~~~
olefoo
> the infrastructure for which is now solidly entrenched

This is one of the reasons you have for making choices and having mandated
standards for interoperability. Building infrastructure is expensive and if
you do it right it lasts for a long time.

From an infrastructure standpoint electric cars have some serious advantages
over hydrogen, since we already have extensive experience building electrical
infrastructure. And it should be possible to improve batteries without
replacing entire vehicles. And electric vehicles create an opening for small
entreprneurial companies to try out new devices in ways that hydrogen with
it's high barriers to entry and need for a massive infrastructure upgrade do
not.

~~~
stretchwithme
when you do it wrong it lasts for a long time too. especially when government
builds in things that hide the true costs.

electric and hydrogen are only 2 options. We should wait for one that can
actually beat the gasoline engine.

all we need do is make sure that the total costs of using gasoline are paid by
those choosing to use it. That means taxing emissions too.

if another technology can beat gasoline when all costs of both are considered,
it should replace gasoline. And if nothing succeeds at doing that, then no big
change makes ense

~~~
moxiemk1
>> We should wait for one that can actually beat the gasoline engine.

I'd say that motors that are _far_ more mechanically efficient than gas
engines, a fuel distribution infrastructure that's already in place
(electricity mains) and in-car storage of fuel that has made enormous leaps in
the past few years and shows no signs of slowing down pretty much qualifies as
beating the gasoline engine.

With scale, costs will be lower; there are fewer moving parts, all elements of
power distribution and use can be independently upgraded to improve the
efficiency and impact of the car. Gasoline cars cannot do this.

Gasoline looks quite beat to me.

~~~
stretchwithme
then let it beat it. If its so much beater, it should be able to do without
any special help.

we didn't have Steve Jobs going to DC to explain how his product is better
than other phones and therefore needs a subsidy.

new products should prove themselves as they always have. it should not be
whichever product that has presented for it the most widely believed theory
that wins

if its so great, it should be able to garner investment dollars all on its
own.

~~~
moxiemk1
The gasonine subsidy is a non-level playing field.

Dcespite that, the cars being produced by Tesla _are_ price competitive, and
are on track to do just that, despite the subsidies.

------
hristov
I am not sure how they come up with their numbers. Wikipedia says that in the
US an electric car would emit less than half of the CO2 of a gas powered
equivalent.

[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Electric_car#Carbon_dioxide_emi...](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Electric_car#Carbon_dioxide_emissions)

And it seems that the UK uses less coal power than the US. Thus, the emission
reductions in the UK should be even better, i.e. more than 50%. But the
article says the emission reductions are only 20%.

I wish they would tell us more about their calculations. With these types of
estimations, one can bring about drastic changes of the conclusion with subtle
changes of the assumptions in the estimate.

~~~
stretchwithme
Maybe they consider the extra CO2 to build it. Yes, more info would be
helpful.

~~~
moxiemk1
If they do, hopefully they are including the C02 to build the gasoline car, as
well as all emissions in all stages of procuring the fuel for both
drivetrains.

Doing a dust-to-road analysis of impact is _very_ hard.

------
tbrownaw
_First, although electric cars are nippy, stylish and as easy to drive as
conventional vehicles, electric motoring has some distinct disadvantages._

Such as...?

 _Second, they are not really as green as their promoters claim._

So? I care about convenience (less/no trips to the fill-up station) and
overall cost.

 _But that final 1% of journeys presumably includes the summer holiday when
people pile into the car and head off for the coast. Hopping on the train
laden with suitcases and children may not be an attractive alternative._

So rent a gas car. Plan for this when figuring the ongoing costs of your
electric car.

 _And even the relatively short ranges that salesmen advertise may be
optimistic. On a cold, wet night when lots of electrical systems are running
and the vehicle is laden with passengers and luggage, a car may lose around a
third of its supposed range._

So require that this be disclosed, so people know to get something with at
least 1.5x the range they'll need in a day.

I guess those two things were the "distinct disadvantages" mentioned earlier.
Neither is terribly convincing.

 _Although electric cars may not themselves produce greenhouse gases,
generating the electricity they use does. How green they are depends on the
fuel mix at the power plants in the country in which they are driven._

This should solve itself in a decade or two if we stop letting the NIMBYs
block nuclear plants. And all the already-sold electric cars will benefit just
as much as the not-yet-sold ones.

 _The only efficient way to cut greenhouse-gas emissions is to impose a carbon
tax._

And here I suppose we have the purpose of the article. But why not just stop
subsidizing it before adding a tax?

------
Empact
Other points aside, the last point this article makes is a good one: a carbon
tax would be a far more effective way to create a more efficient
transportation system (and broader economy), than attempting to pick the
winner from the start.

It's sort of the "I, Pencil" problem - the interactions in the economy are far
too complex to manage in a centralized manner. In this case, we have
individuals attempting to predict the winner based on very limited information
and applying a subsidy, which may or may not be anything more than arbitrary.

The alternative is to have all the millions of decision-makers be informed and
influenced by price differences emanating from the pollutants themselves,
motivating them to seek more efficient solutions. The effects are far more
wide-ranging and actors are guaranteed to be rewarded in proportion to their
benefit to the environment. The same holds for other subsidies: for solar, for
weatherizing homes &c.

It's a shame our current advocacy & media landscape leaves little room for
someone like me who supports a carbon tax but not cap & trade or direct
subsidies. Here's to hoping <http://votereports.org/>, or something like it,
gets us there.

Actually, I just emailed <http://www.carbontax.org/>, hopefully I can get them
in the system in time for the election.

------
ax0n
Here in Kansas City, 87% of our electricity comes from coal. 11% from nuclear.
Wind makes up the lion's share of the remaining 2%. One of the Sierra Club's
members had his soul crushed when a friend of mine pointed out that he was, in
fact, piloting a coal-powered car.

That's not to say the tech isn't cool. But it's not any more sustainable than
a good high-efficiency gasoline or diesel-only car.

~~~
NickM
It's a common fallacy that electric cars are just "moving the emission source"
and therefore no better than gasoline cars. However, _even_ if 100% of the
electricity is generated from coal, an EV is actually _much_ more
environmentally friendly than any gasoline-powered car.

It all comes down to efficiency numbers. Power plants and electric motors are
just massively more efficient than gasoline engines, and it's much easier to
scrub the emissions on one pipe than many.

Of course, they also make it easier to transition to renewable sources
(replacing one power plant vs. replacing many cars), but that's just icing on
the cake.

~~~
ax0n
How efficient is the transmission of electricity from generation to end point?
How efficient is the charging circuitry? The motors? How many kilowatts need
to be burned in a coal plant to put a kilowatt of energy to the pavement in an
EV? I assure you, EVs themselves may be very efficient, but the archaic
technology that 70% of the US (via coal/NG/oil smoke-and-fire generation) is
using to generate and transfer electricity is not.

~~~
NickM
If you're interested, there's been plenty of research done on the matter.
Search for "well to wheel" studies. You can find a good number of them online
if you look, and electric cars beat the pants off of everything else.

------
rudin
One does wonder if this article was financed by oil companies. Richard Pike,
the specialist the article referred to had a 25 year career at BP [1] and has
put forward arguments that oil shortage is a myth [2]. I am adding The
Economist to my list of untrustworthy new sources.

[1]
[http://www.rsc.org/AboutUs/News/PressReleases/2006/NewCEO.as...](http://www.rsc.org/AboutUs/News/PressReleases/2006/NewCEO.asp)

[2] [http://www.independent.co.uk/environment/climate-
change/oil-...](http://www.independent.co.uk/environment/climate-change/oil-
shortage-a-myth-says-industry-insider-842778.html)

------
shin_lao
They forget to talk about noise pollution. Electric cars are extremal quiet,
that's a huge bonus for big cities.

~~~
theklub
True, but unfortunatly blind people maybe not let the seeing keep the cars
quiet.

~~~
nutjob123
I actually know a blind guy who walk around NYC based on sound. These quiet
cars are going to produce noise soon or else interest groups will force them
to by pushing for legislative action.
[http://money.cnn.com/2010/05/19/autos/electric_car_noise/ind...](http://money.cnn.com/2010/05/19/autos/electric_car_noise/index.htm)

~~~
kaitnieks
Doesn't he hear the tires?

~~~
lurkinggrue
No, they are silent electric tires.

------
lukifer
The fact that such a huge portion of electricity comes from coal is a much
bigger problem than all the commuter cars on the road combined. Switching all
those power plants over to nuclear makes sense environmentally, politically,
and financially.

~~~
Zak
Unfortunately, not politically. Large portions of the general public are still
afraid of nuclear power plants. They often like the idea in principle, but
don't want to live anywhere near one, and will fight tooth and nail to prevent
them from being constructed near their cities.

~~~
lukifer
Er, my bad; I was thinking of terms of international policy, "politically" was
the wrong word choice. Public opinion has been shifting in favor of (or, less
opposed to) widespread nuclear power, but not nearly fast enough to make it a
reality.

------
nutjob123
I would like to see a full carbon cost for some of these "green" cars. I bet
that between manufacturing 5 to 6,000 batteries per car and production of the
additional electronics they are creating a lot more waste than people realize.

------
chrismealy
Shorter Economist: carbon taxes are better than electric cars so let's have
neither.

