Thursday, January 19, 2012

Are electric cars really better for the enivorment?

Electric cars get their energy from power stations anyway, however I know that normal car motors are very inefficient. How much more efficient are electric cars compared to a standard car.Are electric cars really better for the enivorment?
Yes:

Think about it this way, the internal combustion engine takes its own power plant with it wherever it goes. Now look around you, are there any devices that you use that need to have their own on board power plant?

Also, the car must have a hard to reach, highly refined product to use as its fuel. Power plants can use coal, gas, diesel, nuclear material, or renewable sources of energy. These alternatives are far more abundant and easier to source (read:cheaper) for most countries.
Yes, That's true electric cars are better as compare to other as it produces less emission and are more fuel efficient. http://www.thegreenautos.com

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Are electric cars really better for the enivorment?
We are moving to an age where shortly the internal combustion engine will become obsolete.

Cars of the future will be far better for the environment.

The days of rare metal batteries will end as silicone/polymer batteries will take over.It will mean that the entire car body will become the battery. Short charge times and the ability to be able to drive for distances of more than 500miles on a single charge.Clean nuclear power stations and wind/solar power will provide the electricity so for me that has to be much better than cars polluting the atmosphere and filling it with greenhouse gasses which we have with the internal combustion engine
I believe that the pollution from an electric car is just moved from say the city centres to the source of the power such as a power station. The power generation is also not very efficient as the heat from the oil or coal has then to be converted into steam, passed to a generator and converted into mechanical energy and thence the mechanical energy is converted into electricity. There are efficiency losses every step and there are further losses as the electricity is carried through cables to point of use. Add to all this the manufacturing cost and pollution caused in the process, of the batteries, you end up with a not very efficient system. Only nuclear energy would be more efficient but there are still losses.Are electric cars really better for the enivorment?
Better than some alternatives? Yes. Might they be not as good as some alternatives? This is also a possibility. It depends upon what you are comparing. An electric car can be greater than 6 times more efficient than an internal combustion vehicle.1 There may be times when it is better to walk or take a bicycle than to use an electric car.



Electric cars are not just battery electric vehicles. They could have power transmitted to them as subways do.2 They could make their own power on the vehicle like hybrids, a solar or fuel cell vehicle or even a vehicle with an atomic battery.3 And the power that they use may come from the sun, geothermal or other source of electricity that is not originally a fossil fuel.



In this question, I did a quick back of the envelope style calculation and determined that using the US power grid an electric car may result in 1/3 the CO2 emissions as an ICE vehicle.4
The answer to your question is YES with reservations... There are many ways of generating the electricity needed for an electric car, some of which are environmentally friendly (wave and wind power for instance, even a (gulp) NUCLEAR power station properly maintained)
It depends on who you ask!



In addition to the source of the electricity (coal, gas, nuclear, etc), the production of fuel cells (batteries) produces very high levels of pollution.



So the answer to your question is yes, but in the long run.
When you consider the entire environmental impact - No



The environmental impact of the batteries(and it's chemicals) are the issue...
No but the Tesla is really cool and is worth buying is spite of the environmental claims.
Yes
Yes

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