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A new study from North Carolina State University indicates that even a sharp increase in the use of electric drive passenger vehicles by 2050 would not significantly reduce emissions of high-profile air pollutants carbon dioxide, sulfur dioxide or nitrogen oxides.
For Immediate Release
Release Date: 01.21.14
A new study from North Carolina State University indicates that even a sharp increase in the use of electric drive passenger vehicles (EDVs) by 2050 would not significantly reduce emissions of high-profile air pollutants carbon dioxide, sulfur dioxide or nitrogen oxides.
“EDVs” is a catch-all term that includes hybrid, plug-in hybrid and battery electric vehicles.
“We wanted to see how important EDVs may be over the next 40 years in terms of their ability to reduce emissions,” says Dr. Joseph DeCarolis, an assistant professor of civil, construction and environmental engineering at NC State and senior author of a paper on the new model. “We found that increasing the use of EDVs is not an effective way to produce large emissions reductions.”
The researchers ran 108 different scenarios in a powerful energy systems model to determine the impact of EDV use on emissions between now and 2050. They found that, even if EDVs made up 42 percent of passenger vehicles in the U.S., there would be little or no reduction in the emission of key air pollutants.
“There are a number of reasons for this,” DeCarolis says. “In part, it’s because some of the benefits of EDVs are wiped out by higher emissions from power plants. Another factor is that passenger vehicles make up a relatively small share of total emissions, limiting the potential impact of EDVs in the first place. For example, passenger vehicles make up only 20 percent of carbon dioxide emissions.
“From a policy standpoint, this study tells us that it makes more sense to set emissions reductions goals, rather than promoting specific vehicle technologies with the idea that they’ll solve the problem on their own.”
The energy systems model also showed that key factors in encouraging use of EDVs are oil price and battery cost. If batteries are cheap and oil is expensive, EDVs become more attractive to consumers. “That’s consistent with results from other studies,” DeCarolis says.
The paper, “How Much Do Electric Drive Vehicles Matter to Future U.S. Emissions?,” is published online in Environmental Science & Technology. Lead author of the paper is Samaneh Babaee, a Ph.D. student at NC State. The paper was co-authored by Dr. Ajay Nagpure, a former postdoctoral researcher at NC State who is now at the University of Minnesota. The research was supported by National Science Foundation grant CBET-0853766.
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The study abstract follows.
“How Much Do Electric Drive Vehicles Matter to Future U.S. Emissions?”
Authors: Samaneh Babaee and Joseph F. DeCarolis, North Carolina State University; Ajay S. Nagpure, University of Minnesota
Published: online January 2014 in Environmental Science & Technology
DOI: 10.1021/es4045677
Abstract: Hybrid, plug-in hybrid, and battery electric vehicles—known collectively as electric drive vehicles (EDVs)—may represent a clean and affordable option to meet growing U.S. light duty vehicle (LDV) demand. The goal of this study is twofold: identify the conditions under which EDVs achieve high LDV market penetration in the U.S. and quantify the associated change in CO2, SO2, and NOX emissions through mid-century. We employ the Integrated MARKAL-EFOM System (TIMES), a bottom-up energy system model, along with a U.S. dataset developed for this analysis. To characterize EDV deployment through 2050, varying assumptions related to crude oil and natural gas prices, a CO2 policy, a federal renewable portfolio standard, and vehicle battery cost were combined to form 108 different scenarios. Across these scenarios, oil prices and battery cost have the biggest effect on EDV deployment. The model results do not demonstrate a clear and consistent trend towards lower system-wide emissions as EDV deployment increases. In addition to the tradeoff between lower tailpipe and higher electric sector emissions associated with plug-in vehicles, the scenarios produce system-wide emissions effects that often mask the effect of EDV deployment.
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SideShowBob says:
So that’s the main disadvantage however the cost advantage is that they are so much simpler, than car cars, just one moving part effectively, easier to build and service, dirt cheap to run and due to the low centre of gravity the driving performance is actually better. Batteries need to half in price and/or double in density and that’s not far away from here.
———————————————————————
huh? That’s very far from here. Lithium -Ion battery chemistry has been around since the late 80’s. Just because people like you are just becoming acquainted with them in EV’s doesn’t mean that some hitherto unprecedented increase in capacity is just around the bend. There’s not going to be any drastic decrease in price for these EV batteries. In fact the EV prices are being artificially held low through massive subsidization from tax payers.
A lithium -ion battery system and control circuitry of the size used in an EV is a complicated system and present manufacturing challenges that exceed those of assembly of a conventional gasoline engine. Batteries also have reliability issues, which you won’t find in a conventional car engine. Car/Truck engines can last +million miles. A battery has a very finite lifespan.
You cannot name one aspect of a modern conventional car that presents any more of a maintenance or service burden than an EV. Show me an EV, and I will show you a conventional car that will outperform it in any real world performance category.
Well electric cars don’t put out any pollution do they ? So who would expect them to have any effect on US pollutant emissions.
Are you aloud to smoke if you drive a Tesla ?
[Only if you smoke very, very quietly. Mod]
When you look in the back of a Tesla model S chassis, you see what looks like two electric motors; one for port and one for starboard rear wheel.
Goody goody, no need for a complicated,, heavy, and low efficiency differential..
Well no; there is only one electric motor, and there is a conventional rear end differential; so what gives ?
Evidently, the (DC) batteries, drive a DC-AC rotary inverter, which then puts out three phase AC, presumably at a variable frequency, so the one electric motor, is a nice (very nice) three phase AC motor.
Now how do you generate 416 HP of three phase AC motor torque and power, from a rotary inverter, unless that battery to AC inverter has at least a 416 HP DC motor inside it somewhere; plus a 416 HP three phase AC alternator, some where else in that can.
Surely one can generate 416 HP of three phase AC directly from DC batteries, using efficient semiconductor switching inverters. Don’t PV solar cell panels generate 60 (50) Hz AC to drop on the line, and that has to be phase locked to the grid.
So duz somebody out there really know how Tesla model S drive train really is ?? Some folks would like to know.
Justa Joe says:
January 22, 2014 at 7:09 pm
“There’s not going to be any drastic decrease in price for these EV batteries. ”
I think you’re underestimating price reduction from larger scale production, that and there is a huge amount of research being carried out in battery technology, we’ve had incremental advances over the past decades, it’s not going to take much from here to double energy density.
“Batteries also have reliability issues”,
i think you’re making stuff up
http://wheels.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/10/29/hybrids-and-electric-vehicles-do-well-in-reliability-survey/?_php=true&_type=blogs&_r=0
“You cannot name one aspect of a modern conventional car that presents any more of a maintenance or service burden than an EV. ”
Are you serious? not one component? how about the actual combustion motor itself?
“Show me an EV, and I will show you a conventional car that will outperform it in any real world performance category.”
Really?! is that why the Tesla Model S won car of the year, outperforming all other gas cars !
Besides for most people it just about getting from A to B safely, comfortably and cheaply.
wayne Job says:
January 21, 2014 at 4:13 pm
The only electric vehicles that have thus far been successful and invaluable are personal mobility scooters. I am getting older and my choice of mobility scooter will be a harley powered trike with the special white tyres that do not leave skid marks.
!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Just drive carefully – besides skid marks wash out. 🙂
This is the problem when non-car guys all of a sudden become EV enthusiasts, who usually don’t even own an EV.
“I think you’re underestimating price reduction from larger scale production… it’s not going to take much from here to double energy density.”
———————————————-
The cell used in the Tesla is an off the shelf Panasonic 18650 Li-Ion cell. You cannot get anymore mass production than that. There is no near term projection of that cell doubling in capacity. You’re just spouting uninformed cliché.
Some NYT blog “survey” about reliability is BS. There are hundreds of millions of conventional gasoline vehicles logging ~trillions of miles in every kind of environment. You cannot even compare an EV’s meager track record to that. Look guy, a big Li-Ion battery system is not bullet proof. Cells and battery packs are recalled en masse for various reasons (including safety) annually. The Fisker was brought down in large part because of A123’s battery problems.
“Are you serious? not one component? how about the actual combustion motor itself?”
————————————————–
WTH are you talking about? Just explain what part of modern gasoline powered engine’s service or maintenance presents a problem. Keep in mind that an EV will be spend more time idly charging it’s battery than a conventional car will ever spend idle during routine maintenance or fueling.
“Really?! is that why the Tesla Model S won car of the year, outperforming all other gas cars !”
—————————————————-
Gotta love the exclamation point. Winning car of the year means that you outperformed all other cars? The Tesla won car of the year the same way AlGore, Yasser Arafat, and Obama won Nobel ‘Piece’ prizes. Libtards hand out the rewards to libtard causes célèbre. Think of the Tesla as car of the year as a kind of Special Olympic’s award. Below are some other Cars of the Year award winners… yikes!
1983 AMC / Renault Alliance
1980 Chevrolet Citation
1978 Chrysler, Dodge Omni and Plymouth Horizon
1975 Chevrolet Monza 2+2
Let’s review:
— If EVs didn’t depend upon fossil fuels for charging…
— And if we had battery technology that doesn’t exist…
— And if we had some way to charge the batteries in a timely manner…
— And if we gave up on using the A/C, defroster and the heater…
— And if we had some way to safely dispose of the batteries…
— And if batteries didn’t depend upon rare earth minerals…
— And if the electric grid capacity was increased to handle the increased demand widespread use of EVs requires..
— And if we had every home rewired to include an EV charging station..
— And if we had every parking lot and parking garage rewired for EV charging…
— And if they were only cost-competitive with conventional vehicles…
Then EVs are the perfect form of personal transportation! I’m surprised we haven’t passed a law already that will make all this happen?
All sarcasm aside, does anybody remember the hydrogen vehicle push from last decade? Dennis Weaver (TV’s “McCloud”) spent the last years of his life promoting the vehicle (and energy supply of the future). If the USA would only spend $20 billion dollars, the supporters told us, we would have the infrastructure in place to convert all our automobiles to hydrogen power.
Except that never happened, and not for lack of trying or lack of wishful thinking, The hoped-for breakthroughs never happened. Wishing something to be true is not the same as having the science, technology and production capacity necessary to make things happen.
Don’t get me wrong, I hope that someday we will have cleaner fuels and greater energy efficiency. I wish we could just pull virtual particles out of the the ether like John Galt’s zero-point energy motor. So if that ever happens, you get a practical EV on the market, just ping me and I’ll buy one.
~more soylent green!
more soylent green! says:
January 23, 2014 at 8:15 am
“Let’s review:
…
Then EVs are the perfect form of personal transportation! ”
Yet they work perfectly well already
Justa Joe says:
January 23, 2014 at 6:43 am
The question originally was
“You cannot name one aspect of a modern conventional car that presents ANY MORE of a maintenance or service BURDEN than an EV. ”
Since an EV car does not have an engine the logical answer is an engine..
but now you’ve changed it to
“Just explain what part of modern gasoline powered engine’s service or maintenance presents a PROBLEM”
My answer is I don’t think there is a problem with a gas engine, just that it’s an extra service BURDEN, which was my original point, so after all that we’ve come full circle and you’ve waisted my time, so thanks for waisting mine
SideShowBob:
At January 23, 2014 at 8:15 am ‘more soylent green!’ wrote
At January 23, 2014 at 1:52 pm your reply to that says in total
which, of course, is deluded nonsense for all the reasons listed by ‘more soylent green!’.
And you immediately follow that with a post at January 23, 2014 at 1:52 pm which complains that YOUR time has been wasted!
SideShowBob, read the list from ‘more soylent green!’ and it is clear why the time has been wasted reading your posts by everybody who read them.
Richard
Yes SSB, I did have to re-phrase my question since you so miserably whiffed in your attempt to answer the 1st time.
“Since an EV car does not have an engine the logical answer is an engine..”
Not big on specificity huh?… What maintenance is it that you must perform on “the actual combustion motor itself” as you say that exceeds the maintenance required for the battery system and electric motor(s) of an EV?
“Tesla Model S Service Contract: $600/Year, Or Warranty Voided”
http://www.greencarreports.com/news/1079637_tesla-model-s-service-contract-600-year-or-warranty-voided
To maintain the warranty, the suckers simply have to bring their Model S to a Tesla service facility every 12 months or 12,500 miles for an annual inspection/service. The base fee for this is $600. Who would have thought “maintenance free” would have been so expensive and time consuming.
richardscourtney says:
January 23, 2014 at 2:07 pm
“which, of course, is deluded nonsense for all the reasons listed by ‘more soylent green!’.”
Sure, there are no working EV on the road today, they simply don’t exist /sarc off
Justa Joe says:
January 23, 2014 at 5:06 pm
LOL if you’ve never service a car or are incapable of using google to look up information on servicing a petrol engine I really can’t help your kind of stupid
richardscourtney says:
January 23, 2014 at 2:07 pm
“SideShowBob, read the list from ‘more soylent green!’ …”
I have read them! but let me answer those points more just for fun
– If EVs didn’t depend upon fossil fuels for charging…
So what ! If you don’t believe in global warming whats wrong with extracting and burning fossil fuels, puts mining communities to work and BTW lot of utility people on here would be very happy about that, ridiculous statement
– And if we had battery technology that doesn’t exist…
I’m going to assume you mean advanced battery technology, after all okay battery technology exists today… as I said we just need a doubling in energy density to double the range, and a drop in price, this can be achieved via incremental advances from here on in over the next decade
– And if we had some way to charge the batteries in a timely manner…
Overnight charging is good enough for most people, they don’t need the fast chargers
– And if we gave up on using the A/C, defroster and the heater…
Ridiculous thing so say, EV are very popular in Norway and California
– And if we had some way to safely dispose of the batteries…
It’s called recycling
– And if batteries didn’t depend upon rare earth minerals…
Again it’s called recycling
– And if the electric grid capacity was increased to handle the increased demand widespread use of EVs requires..
Absolute false assumption, the issue that utility provides will face in the future is demand erosion, not excess demand! Heaven forbid they sell too much electricity and need to upgrade the grid, utilities (which make money from grid upgrades) won’t like that at all ! /sarc off
– And if we had every home rewired to include an EV charging station..
LOL ridiculous statement, how on earth are EV charged today?
– And if we had every parking lot and parking garage rewired for EV charging…
You would wire every single one, every single parking spot ??? don’t you think that have just a few is enough for now and expanding as required
– And if they were only cost-competitive with conventional vehicles…
As with any new tech they’ll come down in price, I think they’ll be cheaper in the long run, certainly the cost of ownership is cheaper now in the long run
I obviously know a lot more about cars than you since I’m not on here (like you) suggesting that EV’s or any other complex machine can be maintenance free while also exaggerating the amount of maintenance required by modern internal combustion engine equipped vehicles in an attempt to tout the alleged superior performance of the EV of which only you seem to be aware. You’ve been called out on this thread about spreading a lot of mis-information, and now apparently instead of substantiating the bull you’ve been spreading you want to be a jerk about it. I’ve met enthusiasts of various makes of cars. Some are quite partisan for their favorite car. Most still stay within the bounds of reality when discussing and comparing the relative performance specifications of cars but not the EV nutz
SideShowBob says:
January 23, 2014 at 6:27 pm
“… certainly the cost of ownership [EV] is cheaper now in the long run”
———————————————-
I guess it would be asking too much for any kind of numbers to back this up.
Justa Joe says:
January 23, 2014 at 7:38 pm
Joe I shouldn’t have to get these numbers for you, do a google search yourself, but see here for exmple
http://www.plugincars.com/total-cost-ownership-cheaper-electric-cars-study-proves-127503.html
http://www.forbes.com/sites/tomkonrad/2012/04/18/report-electric-cars-cost-less-but-watch-the-assumptions/
Now look at the first you tube clip…
http://cleantechnica.com/2014/01/23/wheel-electric-motor-company-denmark-ecomove/
Now I want you to look me in the eye and tell me if you think a petrol engine, comprising a
large cooling system
a motor/block/cam/crank/piston/timing bent/cylinders/distributor/ect
fuel injection system
differential/transmission/gear box
exhaust system
does not have any extra maintenance burden than a
small cooling system
and two or four such small and simple in-build electric wheel drives…
If you say that all of those extra components do not have any extra maintenance burden, then I’ll say no more
@Sideshow Bob:
Why haven’t EVs taken over the world? Is it another corporatist conspiracy behind the continued predominance of the internal combustion engine? Even with millions of tax payer subsidies and other price supports, few EVs are sold. The buyers, BTW, are almost universally people with above average means.
And I’m happy you know so well what I need or what the average person needs. It makes you wonder why they don’t sell more conventional cars with 5 gallon gas tanks that can be easily topped off every night when the owners get home? Could it be we actually need vehicles with more than 50 or 100 mile range between recharges? Could it be we actually need to sometimes travel away from home and can’t stop overnight and wait for a recharge after we drive 100 miles?
What about people who don’t own their own homes? How will they possibly recharge their EVs if we don’t rewire the public parking lots?
Then again, if you say we don’t need it, I guess we don’t.