Electric cars, would they really help stop pollution?

[Gracin]

OP, I would give my left nut for the world to switch to ANY type of 'fuel' other than buring oil/gas. It's just so...archaic. But as long as they're making money on it, it's not going away. Any time someone comes up with an amazing idea for clean energy sources, they get shut down or fade away completely. I'll give you one guess as to who's behind that ><

Yea, totally cool with your attitude of destroying the countless thousands of jobs that people who actually WORK in the oil and gas business just so you don't feel so "archaic".

[saberon]

well,yes even thought to build them you need to create pollution :P and the materials needed still cause pollution,the final product will be pollution free.
its like this

If a conventional car does 10 points of pollution to make and 10 points of pollution to operate.
the elecric car is somewhere at <10 points of pollution to make and 0 points of pollution to operate.

Except that's not what the OP is saying.

Electrical cars require electricity. That electricity needs to be generated. The majority of that electricity is generated via oil and coal. Therefore, your car still pollutes.

The keyword you need to recognise OP is efficiency. Power Plants are far, far more efficient in their conversion of electricity, and thus create less pollution per unit of electricity than cars or generators.

It's better... it's just not the final solution.

---------- Post added 2012-02-18 at 08:05 AM ----------

Well, even nuclear energy is just a fancy way of boiling water. Solar is really the only one to me that smacks of the "clean, space-agey energy source"

Solar, Wind, Geo-thermal, Tidal and Hydro. That's 5.



The problem is that people are selfish assholes. Oh, and hippies. Dirty, dirty hippies. Every time someone brings up building wind farms, people complain it ruins the landscape. Every time someone wants to build a Hydro-Dam (which would solve two problems for us Aussies...), hippies come out of the woodwork and complain that it would decimate some rare ant that nobody gives a shit about anyway.

And then those people also complain we're not saving the environment. Go figure.


TLDR - There are alternatives. People just don't want them. Oil might be bad... but at least we don't have to look at the effects. And if we do, we don't have to accept responsibility for them ourselves. "Sure, I drive my car... but so do 99 million other people, so it's more their fault than it is mine".
If people accept alternative sources of energy, they also have to accept the price with which that energy come.

[Kaleredar]

Solar, Wind, Geo-thermal, Tidal and Hydro. That's 5.

Wind, Geothermal, tidal, and hydro power all spin turbines (which is all that coal, natural gas, and nuclear eventually do anyway.) That is why I excluded them in my quip.

TLDR - There are alternatives. People just don't want them. Oil might be bad... but at least we don't have to look at the effects. And if we do, we don't have to accept responsibility for them ourselves. "Sure, I drive my car... but so do 99 million other people, so it's more their fault than it is mine".
If people accept alternative sources of energy, they also have to accept the price with which that energy come.

Unfortunately, we have to feel the effects of oil... every one of us, everywhere around the world. It just isn't an instantaneous cause and effect.

[Deleted]

Ultimately yes. If they replaced them today, no. They are already building fusion power plants and one should be finished by 2030 that actually gives out more power than in draws. If it is successful and not delayed, they could basically make insane amounts power out of water once perfected. Fortunately oil is running out anyway so it's either alternative energy or no cars.

[Kaleredar]

Ultimately yes. If they replaced them today, no. They are already building fusion power plants and one should be finished by 2030 that actually gives out more power than in draws. If it is successful and not delayed, they could basically make insane amounts power out of water once perfected. Fortunately oil is running out anyway so it's either alternative energy or no cars.

I'm not 100% sold on the notion that there will be a smooth transition from oil to whatever form of alternative energy comes next, unfortunately. While I don't exactly think wars will break out between world superpowers, I think economic tremors are a likely event... Countries that depend on oil for their primary source of revenue will likely be plunged into economic chaos.

That is, unless oil companies have been developing alternative energy sources that they're ready to whip out to maintain their energy empire, which in the long run would likely be the smart thing to do. Unfortunately, they seem more content to squeeze out every last dime, stifle all competition and any technological developments pertaining to them, and pretend like nothing is wrong.

[Deleted]

There's two big advantages to a switch to electric cars.
-they're way more efficient in urban areas, where there's a lot of idle time. An idling electric car uses way less energy than an idle petrol/diesel car.
- of the 3 fossil fuel groups, oil is most likely to run out first, AND its the most useful for things other than power generation and motor transport. For example, plastics and air travel. So saving it for those things makes sense.

I was about to say that it would be more efficient to "transport" electricity to your car rather than having petrol delivered to your local service station and then you driving your car there to fill up, but I'm not really sure how much electricity is lost through transmission lines.

[Mister K]

Electric is the future, Fusion/Hybrid or w/e else is probably the next step but we most likely be using electric in 50 years... Or if actual development starts now we can have electric cars in 5-10 years which are faster and more effective then the current cars.

Why is solar power, wind etc... and electric cars not very effective? It did not have enough development, we have the knowledge and the resources to build fully functional energy cycle that is free of coal/oil now. The process would probably take 5 years or so (for everyone to switch over). Only reason why oil/coal is more effective right now is because it had over 90 years of development

[Deleted]

Also shameless plug time. If you enjoy looking at wars to deal with a future energy crisis and/or global warming, check out this game.
http://fateoftheworld.net
You can get it on steam fairly cheap I think, and it covers a load of different areas over the years 2020 to 2200.
-global warming and emissions control
-overpopulation and food/water shortages
-fossil fuel shortages and the transition to more advanced power generation(3rd gen biofuels, fusion power, renewables)
-space exploration

---------- Post added 2012-02-18 at 10:38 AM ----------

Also shameless plug time. If you enjoy looking at wars to deal with a future energy crisis and/or global warming, check out this game.

WAYS! I MEANT WAYS!
Interesting typo there, heh.

[Mister K]

Yea, totally cool with your attitude of destroying the countless thousands of jobs that people who actually WORK in the oil and gas business just so you don't feel so "archaic".

Yes well, they will have to switch within next 10 years or so when peak oil/coal reaches and people will loose jobs anyway and the world will go into chaos. I can tell you, there will be less and less jobs in future due to automation. Even retail stores are going to see this due to online shopping. Majority of factories can already be automated.

Robots are cheap and way more effective then humans, this will only improve over time with better technology.

[Jackmoves]

Maybe not in the US, since you guys rely on coal powerplants, saw a docu on that last week called The Last mountain(pretty good), you got some 600 powerplants burning coal so... not very good for the environment.

In my country it would deffo be good for the environment though, half our power comes from hydro(water).

You need to get rid of the powerplants that burn coal first of all imo.

[Grimbold21]

Isn't the problem the lack of funding / development?

I thought a lot of people turn way from electric cars because at their current condition they're unsuitable for long distance travel.

[crica]

well...

two ppl are polluting by driving gas cars

if one stops polluting by driving an electric car instead, of course there will be less pollution then if both continued to drive gas cars...

simple math

[Khalahn]

The math has been run many, many times by many, many different groups. Until we move away from burning fossil fuels for energy, electric cars will have minimal, if any, effect on total emissions. Once the last coal power plant shuts down, however, electric cars would make quite a difference in total emissions.

---------- Post added 2012-02-18 at 12:32 PM ----------

well...

two ppl are polluting by driving gas cars

if one stops polluting by driving an electric car instead, of course there will be less pollution then if both continued to drive gas cars...

simple math

And the coal burned to produce electricity to charge the electric car is nearly equal to the emissions from the gas car (unless your area is powered by the far less common nuclear/solar power plants).

[Ghul]

i think hybrids would already be enough

electricity isnt infinite either. you have to produce a lot more electricity if every car suddenly starts running on it. we will need alot more nuclear power plants to support this extreme demand in electricity. why nuclear power you say? its the cheapest form of a power plant and people in general dont want to pay too much for their stuff ~~

renewable energy is still very expensive, for both the customer and the producer.

fuel has just way more power per unit to give than everything else we currently have.

[Jackmoves]

Isn't the problem the lack of funding / development?

I thought a lot of people turn way from electric cars because at their current condition they're unsuitable for long distance travel.

You will need duel engine cars, Volvo is developing one atm, so the idea is to use the electrical engine for traffic in urban areas and short distance travels and then go with the diesel engine(which will be very very fuel effeciant) for long distance traveling.

[crica]

And the coal burned to produce electricity to charge the electric car is nearly equal to the emissions from the gas car

the coal is going to be burned by making EITHER car...

however NO pollution will come from DRIVING the electric one..

[Jackmoves]

the coal is going to be burned by making EITHER car...

however NO pollution will come from DRIVING the electric one..

Some countries rely on coal powerplants, so they would need to burn coal to produce electricty for the car to be driven, so there is pollution.

[Fiana]

People usually overestimate the impact that cars do to pollution.
The amount of smoke they produce is really minor comparing to world ecology.
They pollute the air in the city, but thats basically the only harm they do.

So yes, we will get better air in cities, but global ecological situation will not change.

[crica]

Some countries rely on coal powerplants, so they would need to burn coal to produce electricty for the car to be driven, so there is pollution.

driving is the key word...

driving...

if you drive a gas car you are polluting the ENTIRE time you are driving...

if you drive an electric car, you are NOT polluting at all while driving...

[Walkingsteak]

You're forgetting that batteries aren't clean too produce of get rid off.

Same as those damn windmills everyone here in dk loves, they take a full 15 years of running before they've earned the CO2 back, at tyst point its time too take it down again.

Battery cars arent the answer, while power plants burn better than the average engine (80% energy lost too heat instead of propulsion) the battery's we have are just too bad too be viable.

In my opinion the only real solution are the hydrogen cars.

(that said giving the cars all the blame for pollution is just retarded, everyone seems too forget the planes, ships, and millions of cows worldwide, the cows produce more co2 than all our transports combined last I heard)