Absolute proof that EVs pollute less no matter what their source of electricity

Ok Ken, you win. That study shows absolute proof that a “Zero Emissions Vehicle” (ZEV) will emit 30.82 metric tons of CO2 over its lifetime compared to an ICE vehicle that averages 25.4mpg, which would emit 68.38 metric tons of CO2.

68.38 is more than 30.82, by a lot. Interestingly, the ZEV would still emit 6.3 metric tons of CO2 when all of our electricity needs are met by renewables. Both 30.82 and 6.3 are more than Zero, by a lot.

Thanks for providing us with information that absolutely proves that Zero Emissions Vehicles are not Zero Emissions Vehicles.

Now who wants to take action against all the manufacturers, activists and politicians who have been feeding us the Zero Emissions lie for so long? And while we’re at it let’s find who’s behind the term Partial Zero Emissions Vehicle. They should be made to sit down and think about the words they’ve chosen.
 
ZEV refers to tailpipe emissions, and is the result of terminology chosen by California Air Resources Board (along with PZEV, TZEV, etc).
I don't know of anyone that has claimed that electricity production is zero emissions, only that using electricity as a fuel creates far less greenhouse gas than burning gas in your vehicle. This is a point you seem to concede. Not sure why the vehicle category names chosen by a pseudo governmental committee are relevant to the discussion.
 
Landshark said:
...they are being used in the discussion.
Click to expand...
Huh what? The first mention of those terms was by you.
If it makes you feel better, we can henceforth refer to "Zero Emissions Vehicles" as "Vehicles That Pollute Elsewhere (VTPE's)" and Partial Zero Emissions Vehicles" as "Vehicles That Pollute Less Here and Sometimes Elsewhere (VTPLHSE's)"
The label you place on a vehicle doesn't change how much it does - or does not - pollute (which is the title and subject of this thread). If you want to rant about terminology chosen by various agencies, perhaps another thread would be appropriate? Keep this one at least sort of on subject?
 
And while we’re in the debunking business, here’s an article disputing some of the EV detractor’s false claims about the Lithium in car batteries. What say the Clarity Brain Trust on this?

Here’s a short excerpt for those without time to peruse the full article below.

In a recent conversation with Tagesspiegel Background, the battery researcher stated that the production of electric car batteries is not as extreme as what EV critics would suggest. To produce the lithium needed for a 64 kWh battery pack, for example, Fichtner stated that about 3840 liters of water are evaporated according to usual calculation methods. This is roughly comparable to the production of 250 grams of beef, 30 cups of coffee, or half a pair of jeans, according to the researcher.

Reference article:
https://www.teslarati.com/tesla-model-3-batteries-less-polluting-than-30-cups-coffee-researcher/

And I apologize for using the superlative “absolute” in the thread title. I think I got giddy with excitement and got a little carried away. “Definitive” would have been a better choice of words. Mea culpa.
 
All these articles prove the exact same thing. Overpopulation of humans is the root cause of most problems. So the answer IMO is obvious. Determine an exact number for a sustainable and healthy worldwide population of humans, then determine what percentage of males need to be castrated, and get it done. I'm assuming the number will be somewhere in the 95% range for maybe the next 30 years or so to get our current population whittled down to a sustainable level, then we can later allow more males to keep their testicles, but I bet we still need to keep it at 70% or so long term.

It will be a living/breathing number as the black market for healthy sperm will cause variations, so it will require constant government regulation. I'm pretty sure Trump can come up with a good implementation plan to get this started. He's good at most everything.
 
craze1cars said:
All these articles prove the exact same thing. Overpopulation of humans is the root cause of most problems. So the answer IMO is obvious. Determine an exact number for a sustainable and healthy worldwide population of humans, then determine what percentage of males need to be castrated, and get it done. I'm assuming the number will be somewhere in the 95% range for maybe the next 30 years or so to get our current population whittled down to a sustainable level, then we can later allow more males to keep their testicles, but I bet we still need to keep it at 70% or so long term.

It will be a living/breathing number as the black market for healthy sperm will cause variations, so it will require constant government regulation. I'm pretty sure Trump can come up with a good implementation plan to get this started. He's good at most everything.
Click to expand...

Just pull everyone out of the Middle East and stop sending billions to countries our government feels it has the need to support. It won't take long for a few million people to die. And not too much longer for the area to be glassed over. Problem solved. And Trump is only good at Tweeting. Everything else he does is a disaster.
 
Tek_Freek said:
Just pull everyone out of the Middle East and stop sending billions to countries our government feels it has the need to support. It won't take long for a few million people to die. And not too much longer for the area to be glassed over. Problem solved. And Trump is only good at Tweeting. Everything else he does is a disaster.
Click to expand...

A few million is nowhere near enough to save the world. Add some zeros. We need to cut population by a few BILLION. But I drift off topic.

So I will attempt to steer us back to the original topic: Using Google to seek and find articles that blindly support what each individual believes, while ignoring all refuting articles. Here’s one from me:
https://www.worldpopulationbalance.org/3_times_sustainable

And I broke my rule. I said earlier I would bow out of this conversation. I didn’t. oops. Just found a rare day where I had some time to waste chatting online again lol. Kinda fun. But fear not, I’ll be too busy to post much more for the rest of the week...
 
The consumption problem is not due to the vast numbers of people, but the fact that a few of us (the western world, or even more specifically North Americans) use a vast amount of resources. You could measure it in many ways, but just looking at CO2 emissions per person we use about 16 tons per year, and people in Europe and China are about half of that, and less affluent societies in South America and other parts of Asia use a much smaller fraction, and people in Africa use a tiny sliver of our resource use.

Population is already under control. Most of the worlds countries has <2.1 babies / woman that is needed to sustain the population, and the only ones that have more than say 2.6 babies / woman are in Africa and war torn parts of Asia/Middle East. The fact is that there is more worldwide health and thus kids are surviving childhood and resulting in more people overall. The number of kids born per year has already leveled off and is starting to fall.

The late great Hans Rosling explains it best:


My point is that we are the primary problem. We use too much, we eat too much meat, we waste too much food, we buy crap we don't need, we travel at will, we use too much energy, our cars are way bigger than they need to be, etc. - that said, we are improving things but not nearly as fast as we need to.
 
DucRider said:
Huh what? The first mention of those terms was by you.
If it makes you feel better, we can henceforth refer to "Zero Emissions Vehicles" as "Vehicles That Pollute Elsewhere (VTPE's)" and Partial Zero Emissions Vehicles" as "Vehicles That Pollute Less Here and Sometimes Elsewhere (VTPLHSE's)"
The label you place on a vehicle doesn't change how much it does - or does not - pollute (which is the title and subject of this thread). If you want to rant about terminology chosen by various agencies, perhaps another thread would be appropriate? Keep this one at least sort of on subject?
Click to expand...

Forgive me. I never imagined that mentioning the absurdity of the term Zero Emissions Vehicle in a thread about vehicle emissions would be considered off topic.

And how, exactly, is it that you, telling others what they should or shouldn’t post is relevant to the subject or even appropriate?

ZEV is part of a much larger discussion than this one. Eleven states are considered to be ZEV states. There are government programs designed to encourage production and sales of ZEV’s. Some people actually believe they own a vehicle that creates no emissions. Some of those people exhibit signs of arrogance when discussing the matter. Perhaps you have witnessed such behavior.

Yes, calling it by a different name doesn’t change the amount of emissions it creates. Calling it a Zero Emissions Vehicle allows non thinking people to believe a lie.
 
You got a point. Perhaps a more honest and descriptive term would be ZTEV or Zero Tail-pipe Emission Vehicle.

The take home for me is that it is zero emission in the location it’s driven in, which is great for congested cities. But the reality that you pointed out is that it may mislead people who don’t realize it just shifts it’s emissions to whatever and wherever it’s power comes from. In the case of the Clarity BEV, that would be grid generation source(s) and for the fuel cell Clarity, the hydrogen source/delivery. But in any case it’s still better than gasoline and diesel vehicles. But there’s no such things a free lunch. You can reduce but never eliminate the environmental costs of personal transportation.
 
There’s nothing like a sore winner.

I’ll read the arstechnica article later.

Is anyone really surprised that a site called teslarati would barf out a warm fuzzy perspective on lithium production?

I haven’t produced lithium, manufactured a LiFePo battery or been in a Turkish prison, but I’ll go out on a limb here and suggest that there is at least one more step required to produce a 64kWh battery after one evaporates 3840 liters of water.

It is quite possible that Mr Fichtner consumed at least a 10oz steak, more than 30 cups of coffee and wore out a pair of jeans and a lab coat while compiling this useless data.
 
Landshark said:
There’s nothing like a sore winner.

I’ll read the arstechnica article later.

Is anyone really surprised that a site called teslarati would barf out a warm fuzzy perspective on lithium production?

I haven’t produced lithium, manufactured a LiFePo battery or been in a Turkish prison, but I’ll go out on a limb here and suggest that there is at least one more step required to produce a 64kWh battery after one evaporates 3840 liters of water.

It is quite possible that Mr Fichtner consumed at least a 10oz steak, more than 30 cups of coffee and wore out a pair of jeans and a lab coat while compiling this useless data.
Click to expand...

Hey, don’t shoot the messenger! (Although that seemed to be the policy at the establishment I retired from.)
However please do apply critical reasoning to the message and know that I am looking forward to it.
 
craze1cars said:
This is just yet another article and study focused on propulsion fuel during ownership only, while completely ignoring the emissions involved in obtaining the raw material, and production, and transportation costs, of the giant battery needed to propel the electric car, the lifespan of that battery, the recycling/disposal costs and risks of said battery, etc...
Click to expand...


Think you are wrong there. I don't have access to the journal article, but the abstract says they are comparing "lifecycle" emissions, which would include emissions during manufacture.
 
KentuckyKen said:
However please do apply critical reasoning to the message and know that I am looking forward to it.
Click to expand...

My take on the arstechnica article is that there is either some “goal post moving” or “let’s keep testing until we get the desired (matches the consensus) results” going on, or both.

First, they completely eliminated previous emissions estimates from recycling.
Second, they briefly described different methodologies without explaining which ones they used.
Third, they mentioned both, changing battery chemistries and cleaner energy sources but failed to explain if they reached their conclusions by using current chemistries and energy sources or projected, hypothetical future technologies.

Interesting, but far from conclusive or even convincing.

This discussion has inspired me to do some independent research, and quite possibly assist you in taking your own thread off topic. This research has revealed that my EPA certified, high efficiency wood burning fireplace insert is actually considered carbon neutral. This is because the trees being burned have already absorbed an amount of CO2 equal to what they emit while burning. I don’t know who has time to figure this stuff out, but it is tremendously rewarding to know that not only have I reduced my electricity costs, I’ve reduced the amount of CO2 that electricity would spew out into the atmosphere. And I’m using a renewable resource.

Now, before anyone jumps on me about cutting down the forests, I have lost about 20 trees, mostly firs, out of more than 350 trees on my property over the past 10 years. I do purchase Madrone that I mix in with the fir. Larger branches from limbing up operations are also used in the fireplace. This produces fuel without sacrificing a tree. It also reduces the chances of a grass fire turning into a wildfire. New trees pop up everywhere, we’ve planted more than a dozen fruit and nut trees and we buy 2 living trees for Christmas each year and plant them in the spring.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top