Plug-In Cars Could Actually Increase Air Pollution

The expected introduction of plug-in hybrid electric vehicles could cut U.S. gasoline use but could increase deadly air pollution in some areas, two reports say.

That's because a plug-in's lower tailpipe emissions may be offset by smokestack emissions from the utility generating plants supplying electricity to recharge the big batteries that allow plug-ins to run up to 40 miles without kicking on their gasoline engines. Plug-ins, called PHEVs, are partly powered, in effect, by the fuel used to generate the electricity.

About 49% of U.S. electricity is generated using coal, so in some regions a plug-in running on its batteries is nearly the equivalent of a coal-burning vehicle. The trade-off is one that even plug-in backers acknowledge. It could undercut the appeal of vehicles that appear capable of using no gasoline in town and hitting 50 to 100 mpg overall fuel economy.

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Comments

[lvogt]

Look at the huge power outages that occur when centralized power systems go down. They make us more vulnerable.

See the NOVA documentary online
Saved by the Sun
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/solar/index.html

[rh654]

Dang - there goes another shot at a free lunch...

[teacake]

We should NOT depend on coal as our main source of electricity. We should deploy other greener and safer technology to generate power. And this is NOT impossible. It's the greedy oil and coal scumbags who are blocking the 'greener' options.

One thing I am sure of is those greedy assholes in the oil and coal industries (George Bush, Dick Cheney et al are included) would be sent straight to hell when they are expired. This is because they are turning this planet into hell.

[teacake]

This argument is offered or, at the very least, promoted by the evil oil companies.

Look! The fact of the matter is electricity is NOT generated by coal exclusively!!

There are other cleaner and safety source of electricity and we do NOT have to increase the burning of coal to meet the electricity demands.

Shame on those who even try to inject this 'fear' and mis-leading conjecture in the pubic. These are the kind of people I wish to see get choked up by the exhaust from their own tailpipe!

[Neocon187]

The assumption of course, is that there will be no alterantive means of producing electricity, and that the engines will never become more efficient than they are now, at their realative infancy. And the utilties are placing themselves as the sole source of generated power as opposed to solar panels, wind, etc., which would cut into the demand for Exxon's $100 a barrel oil.

Exxon and the rest of the industry are addicted to their multibillion dollar profit quarters, and will do anything to hold on to them.

[TrevorAlan]

I don't think plug-in cars are the magic solution some people tout, but this is practically propaganda written by Exon or BP. An electric car won't slowly start to burn MORE oil during its life the way my Saturn did (it started out an efficient, clean machine and became dirtier over time).

If all the power generation and battery production is centralized into a few places we can use laws and tax policy to encourage those central facilities to become cleaner, whereas the Millions of points of polution that individual internal combution engines represent will always be impossible to completely clean up.

This is a good example that you have to think several layers deep when proposing a solution, but it is less damning of fully electric cars than the headline suggests.

[BlackbirdHighway]

So, coal plants are perfectly clean and pollution-free when producing electricity for homes, but when making power for charging electric cars, they suddenly start belching out huge amounts of pollution?

How does the coal plant know where the electricity is going? Once it travels from the plant to your home, how can the plant tell what you're using that electricty for?

Or maybe, even though the article never mentions it, coal plants produce lots of pollution all the time, no matter what we use the electricty for. But that would make the coal plants the problem, not the cars, which doesn't fit well with the authors agenda.

There are lots of other ways to produce electricty; solar, wind, nuclear, hydro, natural gas, oil. Just about all of the are cleaner than coal. We don't get choices with gasoline.

There are no panels I can put on my roof that can turn sunshine into pollution-free gasoline.

[lvogt]

Of course, coal plants aren't "perfectly clean" no one has claimed that but running an electric car off the grid is cleaner than a running gasoline car. Alternative renewable sources to produce electricity are far superior.
Solar panels would produce electricity to power an electric car.

[ErnestineBass]

BOLLOCKS!

Oh, this article came from USA Today?

Piffle...

[lvogt]

There are now companies like SunEdison and CitizenRe that will put a solar system on your home with no upfront cost to you. You agree to pay for the electricity it produces at your current local rate for a specified period. Plug your car into that system and there are no emissions.

[RTIII]

What nobody has mentioned (yet) is that stationary power stations _can_be_ vastly easier to clean up than mobile sources. We need to push for Clean Coal technologies - JFK Moon-Shot style (or even faster).

We also need to be sequestering the carbon! We need to get to a net REDUCTION in atmospheric CO2 ASAP, not merely slow the rate of increase. If we don't do this within about 10 years, we may blow it forever because CO2 rises and once it leaves the troposphere (close to the earth), we'll likely never be able to capture it...

[inkabinkaboo182]

Yes, doctordawg. Gasoline is less efficient than coal, and even if the grid were 100% coal, a plugin hybrid would be more efficient than a gas car.

[doctordawg]

What a bag of hot air! No, it is not the same as a coal powered car. What a moron. Incredible efficiencies are attained through recapturing kinetic energy with back-emf braking, and virtually no wasted energy when sitting still in traffic jams and stop lights.

Further, when charging at night, power is stored that would otherwise be generated for nothing, as they don't shut off plants from 9pm to 6am. Electricity that is not consumed the instant it is generated is lost, unless captured by, oh, say, a battery.

Moronic journalism.

[Dendroica]

It isn't "back emf" braking. Just running a secondary generator. Back emf happens when motors run faster than their starting speed, reducing dramatically their inrush current.

[KPinSEA]

Yes, plug-in hybrids will require supply from the electrical grid.

However, *when* they tap that supply is just as important. Mostly people will be recharging their vehicles at night, right? When existing electrical grids have surplus capacity. You have to include this in any calculation of whether PHEV's will reduce, increase, or have very little effect on national emissions levels.

Personally, I'll prefer to have solar panels on the garage roof and a little wind turbine in my back yard charging up a deep-cycle battery bank in the garage whenever they can, and then plug my PHEV into that battery bank when I get home, and keep my vehicle off the grid entirely as long as I'm only commuting in pure-electric ranges. A host of alternatives like this are sure to be available in the market once PHEV's are a significant percentage of cars on the road.

There is no "magic bullet" to get us off the Persian Gulf oil tit ... hydrogen, fuel-cell, ethanol, biodiesel, PHEV's ... these are all clubs that a country needs to have in its energy bag. Some will work better in the sunny southwest, others in the grain-rich midwest. Let's use what works best where it works best, and not let one special interest group try to pound a square peg into a round hole coast-to-coast.

[Christian]

If it gets us off oil to any degree, it is worth it to start down this road and the power plants will slowly get better at burning coal or whatever they use. Electric is the way to go, period!

[mrdontplay]

answer

> Plug in cars

> Solar panel houses