Let’s talk efficiency, or apples first, and you’re making me kick poor dead horses now. Electric motors simply are more efficient and more powerful than ICE powered by gas, or diesel by a long shot. EV’s are 65-70% efficient ICEVs in the 30’s. Simple enough? Now let’s talk oranges, or power supply. How the power is generated has nothing to do with the efficiency of the vehicle, as you incorrectly stated. It does affect how clean an EV will be overall, but not it’s efficiency, so you are once again mistaken. You mentioned all the resistance in the electrical charge chain. You’re correct, there is power loss in transmission lines, etc., and you even forgot one. There is 10-15% loss just going from the charger to the EV. Once again, it’s nothing to do with the efficiency of moving the vehicle. You picked on electric power generation, but conveniently didn’t mention at all what it takes to produce gasoline and diesel fuel. First you have to drill for it. Then you have to pump it out of the ground, transport it to the refineries, refine it, deliver it to the gas stations, and finally pump it into your car. All these processes generate pollution before the fuel even gets to the vehicle. Now I have a surprise for you. Guess what is needed to produce all that fuel. Electricity, and lots of it! Here’s some math for you. Petroleum refineries consume 4% of all the electricity generated in the United States, and 15% of all industrial electricity. Simple enough math?
Mr. Wronka, yeah, we still “burn stuff” to charge many EVs, but not all, and as I said before, there goes another dead horse, even EVs charged by coal fired power plants are cleaner than ICEVs, and I reiterate that existing EVs on the road will become cleaner over time as power sources become cleaner, which they are. BEVs are themselves zero emissions. BEVs charged by nuclear, hydro, wind, and solar, are complete zero emissions. You scoff at solar? The vast majority of EV charging is done at home. Many homes have solar now and more every day. BEVs living at those homes are green. Solar charges storage batteries during the day, the batteries run the house and charge the EV overnight.
Hybrids are actually the worst of both worlds. You have two complete drive trains to maintain, very costly, and they still pollute. That’s a long story. You mentioned hydrogen. Hydrogen doesn’t directly power vehicles. It’s used to generate electricity. Hydrogen powered vehicles are EVs, but it’s prohibitively expensive for cars and difficult infrastructure. Another long story.
Please do come back with more doublespeak numbers that don’t mean anything at best, or are incorrect at worst, that I can correct, and myths I can dispel. So much in this subject hasn’t been discussed yet. I’m enjoying this. It’s a good thing to educate the public.
Peter Bremy
Stanhope