Electric cars create more carbon dioxide than diesels.

[K78]

Probably not what Herr Merkel wants to read. 

 

https://www.instituteforenergyresearch.org/international-issues/electric-vehicles-in-germany-emit-more-carbon-dioxide-than-diesel-vehicles/?fbclid=IwAR08t4pCGKvbhFkeqgrcvEYlBVCwJO57CTuIr6RVWRpUS8qE4hVOrK0mXE0

 

[Dreadnaught]

Ah, the German electricity mix seems to be key and "Germany’s growing reliance on coal for electricity generation".

[K78]

Hydrogen makes a more compelling case than batteries if we can find a way to store it safely. 

[Vijay]

Did anyone watch the Top Gear thing where they messed with making electric cars the other week? The worrying thing that stuck in my mind was the Nissan Leaf that was 8 years old and could only do 35 miles on a full charge, so was ready for scrap. What is the future for electric car owners when batteries start failing and you get a hefty bill for replacement batteries or have to purchase a new car. Also how good for the environment is recycling batteries and manufacturing so many new ones? 

[Onoff]

19 minutes ago, K78 said:

Hydrogen makes a more compelling case than batteries if we can find a way to store it safely. 

 

Even better, generate at point of use from good old H2O.

Edited July 7, 2019 by Onoff

[Jeremy Harris]

4 minutes ago, Vijay said:

Did anyone watch the Top Gear thing where they messed with making electric cars the other week? The worrying thing that stuck in my mind was the Nissan Leaf that was 8 years old and could only do 35 miles on a full charge, so was ready for scrap. What is the future for electric car owners when batteries start failing and you get a hefty bill for replacement batteries or have to purchase a new car. Also how good for the environment is recycling batteries and manufacturing so many new ones? 

 

Usual Top Gear claptrap, I'm afraid.  A friend of mine has a 2013 Leaf and it still does pretty much the same range now as it did when new.

 

My BMW i3 has now done a bit over 12,000 miles and is still delivering about 20 miles more than the specified range, and shows no sign of the range decreasing at all.  Same goes for a friend who has a three year old Tesla, it seem to have pretty much the same range as it did when new.  My 5 year old Prius Plug-In that had done around 50,000 miles when I traded it in was still delivering exactly the same battery range as it did when it was new.

[Vijay]

8 minutes ago, JSHarris said:

 

Usual Top Gear claptrap, I'm afraid.  A friend of mine has a 2013 Leaf and it still does pretty much the same range now as it did when new.

 

My BMW i3 has now done a bit over 12,000 miles and is still delivering about 20 miles more than the specified range, and shows no sign of the range decreasing at all.  Same goes for a friend who has a three year old Tesla, it seem to have pretty much the same range as it did when new.  My 5 year old Prius Plug-In that had done around 50,000 miles when I traded it in was still delivering exactly the same battery range as it did when it was new.

 

I do hope that's the case but I do wonder what sort of prices replacement batteries will be when they need doing?

[Ed Davies]

First non-ad search result for “tesla battery embodied co2“ says otherwise (once you finish playing whack-a-mole with the pop-ups):

 

https://www.forbes.com/sites/quora/2016/04/22/the-carbon-footprint-of-tesla-manufacturing/#46e009466096

 

I wonder what the background of the “Institute for Energy Research” is.

 

A couple I spoke to last summer had just driven up from Edinburgh (240 miles) in their few year's old second-hand Leaf (so 24 or 30 kWh, I forget which, but definitely not one of the newer ones with bigger batteries) with one stop to fast charge at Aviemore. Seriously considering a second-hand Leaf once my house is done as I hope they'll be fairly cheap as newer, longer-range, BEVs are available. Biggest downside is the inability to tow a trailer.

 

Discussions like this are one of the reasons I'm so in favour of a significant carbon tax. Let the market sort it out.

[Dreadnaught]

34 minutes ago, Vijay said:

The worrying thing that stuck in my mind was the Nissan Leaf that was 8 years old and could only do 35 miles on a full charge, so was ready for scrap.

 

Elon Musk has said that Tesla batteries will soon be rated at 1 million miles. Even with Mr Musk's tenancy towards heroic exaggeration, it does suggest that EV batteries may have long serviceable lives. And, indeed, he has also said that the various other parts of Tesla cars are similarly rated. 

 

Take from that what you will.

 

Edit: to add news source: https://electrek.co/2019/04/23/tesla-battery-million-miles-elon-musk/

Edited July 7, 2019 by Dreadnaught

[Jeremy Harris]

10 minutes ago, Vijay said:

 

I do hope that's the case but I do wonder what sort of prices replacement batteries will be when they need doing?

 

The history so far shows that no EVs have needed replacement batteries as a consequence of normal wear and tear.  I believe that some Tesla's are well over 100,000 miles and still absolutely fine, and arguably Tesla's don't have the best battery chemistry for a high cycle life, as the pack chemistry was really optimised for high performance.  As a rough guide, the cycle life to about a 30% capacity reduction is around 2000 cycles.  Taking my car as an example, it has a nominal range of 120 miles (in reality I get around 140 miles).  It's done around 95 charge cycles so far (a fair few of those have been zero CO₂). At a guess I'd say it will perhaps use maybe 150 charge cycles per year, probably less.  2000 cycles would be a life of around 13 years to a 30% reduction in capacity.  At 13 years old the car most probably isn't worth enough to warrant replacing the battery pack, but a pack with 70% of it's capacity remaining would still be very useful for something like home battery storage.

[K78]

I personally wouldn’t consider one until they become mainstream. 

 

I’ll enjoy the joys of the ICE while i still can. If I was Elon musk my name would be on the list for the new Aston Martin Valkyrie. 

[Jeremy Harris]

I've put a deposit down on a VW ID.3...

[AliG]

It is a horrendously inaccurate piece of research using numbers that are wrong with even a few minutes research.

 

Clearly EVs are not zero emission, but they are definitely lower assuming that you are comparing similar sized cars.

 

https://www.transportenvironment.org/news/electric-car-‘hatchet-job’-debunked

[jack]

3 hours ago, Vijay said:

Did anyone watch the Top Gear thing where they messed with making electric cars the other week? The worrying thing that stuck in my mind was the Nissan Leaf that was 8 years old and could only do 35 miles on a full charge, so was ready for scrap. 

 

I believe this is classic TG-BS. I seem to recall that Nissan has said that they've been surprised at just how long the first generation batteries have lasted (once they fixed some problem with a subset of them, from memory). They're so good that they're recycling them out some of the cars as they're scrapped and repurposing them into domestic battery storage systems.

 

I think a lot of earlier electric cars - and maybe current ones - have very conservative charge and discharge settings to ensure the batteries last.

[K78]

54 minutes ago, JSHarris said:

I've put a deposit down on a VW ID.3...

 

‘That will be the first of the breed that will kill Tesla imo. The camper van they have in the works is v cool. 

[SteamyTea]

3 hours ago, K78 said:

Hydrogen makes a more compelling case than batteries if we can find a way to store it safely. 

Not sure it does.  I has a refueling time advantage, but that is about it.

3 hours ago, Vijay said:

Did anyone watch the Top Gear thing where they messed with making electric cars the other week?

I think even a new Leaf would not last for many miles driven flat out.  Would be good to see some data on this aspect.

I improved the fuel consumption of my car last week, went from 32 MPG to a shade under 50 MPG now.  Had a tuppence ha'penny turbo boost pipe replaced.

3 hours ago, Dreadnaught said:

Even with Mr Musk's tenancy towards heroic exaggeration

I find that he generally does what he says, just usually takes a bit more time than we think it should.

2 hours ago, JSHarris said:

At a guess I'd say it will perhaps use maybe 150 charge cycles per year

I do about 2 1/2 times your milage, so that would be 375 charges a year, or 5 years 4 months.

My car is already over 13 years old.

36 minutes ago, AliG said:

It is a horrendously inaccurate piece of research

Not read it, but it just sounded wrong.  Kind of thing that petrolheads like spouting as truth.

3 hours ago, Ed Davies said:

Institute for Energy Research

Must be these people.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Institute_for_Energy_Research

[Jeremy Harris]

Charge cycling depends very much on total battery capacity.  My car only has a rated range of around 120 miles, so 375 charge cycles per year would be around 45,000 miles per year.  In reality I find that the range is closer to 140 miles, so 375 charge cycles per year would be around 52,500 miles per year.  There aren't many cars that would last for 5 years doing that sort of annual mileage.  Perhaps some diesels, but I'd suggest that many ordinary cars would be on their last legs after a quarter of a million miles.

 

The VW ID.3 looks as if it's going to give well over 200 miles per charge, so for a 2,000 cycle usable battery life it should last for around 400,000 miles, which is way over the life of most conventional cars.

[SteamyTea]

True, but I would probably go to more places if it was cheaper to do so.  Motoring distance is often set on a price point, rather than an absolute milage.

It is why mean annual mileage has dropped.

ONS figures for all 4 wheel cars.

 

[Temp]

Am I right in thinking the early Nissan Leaf didn't have battery cooling?

[Temp]

The history so far shows that no EVs have needed replacement batteries as a consequence of normal wear and tear.

 

Perhaps because the warranty isn't that great? It has to be below 66% within 8 years to qualify on the leaf..

https://electrek.co/2018/03/26/nissan-leaf-battery-pack-replacement-program/

 

 

[TerryE]

@K78 You need to be careful with sources.  The Institute for Energy Research is an NFP funded largely by Charles Koch and oil industry money.  A quote from the WP article: "IER was among the most prominent organizations questioning the existence and extent of anthropogenic climate change". 

 

I wonder why they conclude that diesel cars are greener than EVs?  Humm.  The large majority of studies which have also cranked the numbers come with the opposite conclusion.

[K78]

45 minutes ago, TerryE said:

@K78 You need to be careful with sources.  The Institute for Energy Research is an NFP funded largely by Charles Koch and oil industry money.  A quote from the WP article: "IER was among the most prominent organizations questioning the existence and extent of anthropogenic climate change". 

 

I wonder why they conclude that diesel cars are greener than EVs?  Humm.  The large majority of studies which have also cranked the numbers come with the opposite conclusion.

 

‘I don’t believe anything I read. They are all funded by someone. 

 

Im not a green type tbh. I drive a pick up. 

Edited July 8, 2019 by K78

[Onoff]

7 hours ago, JSHarris said:

many ordinary cars would be on their last legs after a quarter of a million miles.

 

My VW Golf is holding on at +200K! ? Mind you I struggle to let go of things and think anything can be repaired. Hence the cars I drive ending looking like Trigger's broom! The same age / mileage Focus hasn't fared so well due the dreaded tin worm. For all that I prefer the Ford all day long for most things from handling to comfort. Many things on the VW make it easier to service for the most part though. 

[Jeremy Harris]

6 hours ago, Temp said:

Am I right in thinking the early Nissan Leaf didn't have battery cooling?

 

The current Nissan Leaf doesn't have active battery cooling, instead Nissan have opted to manage battery charging to limit temperature, something that backfired big time with the #rapidgate fiasco.  Nissan have released a firmware update because of #rapidgate, but that has the unfortunate side effect of allowing the battery temperature to rise during fast charging, so those who choose to do repeated fast charges may now find their cars suffer faster battery degradation.  Some owners are reporting battery temperatures of up around 50°C during fast charges, which is an uncomfortably high temperature for the cells IMHO.

 

Whether this is a real issue or not no one yet knows, but their is a growing weight of circumstantial evidence that suggests that vehicles that have active battery thermal management systems tend to have a lower rate of battery capacity degradation.  It's all a bit iffy, though, as I believe that the worst degradation seen on any older EV so far is only around 20% or so.  This is complicated by the fact that those older, higher mileage, cars are using older battery chemistry in the main, so may well tend to suffer a bit more from degradation than newer cars. 

 

The Nissan Leaf is fairly unusual in not having a battery thermal management system.  Most EVs have some form of active cooling/heating system to keep the pack at a fairly constant temperature.  My car, like the Tesla, has a liquid cooled/heated battery pack, and this seems to play a fairly big part in ensuring the longevity of the pack, albeit at a small cost and weight penalty.

[scottishjohn]

13 hours ago, Vijay said:

 

I do hope that's the case but I do wonder what sort of prices replacement batteries will be when they need doing?

I was considering an Ev for daily use as my daily run is very short --so i looked at  a citreon ev car and after a big struggle i found out battery replacement cost --£7k

that put the lid on it for me --can buy a lot of fuel for that money and buy a car to same job at a 1/3 of the price .

Its still not a sensible option for most people --yet.

I looked to do a 3 year lease package --cost i was quoted was about same as bmw 5series  diesel for citreon c1 ev puddle jumper

my guess because they think resale values will be poor 

try it your self and see --maybe its changed --but doubt it