Correction to Yesterday's "Green Hoax" Post

After doing a little more research into my post from yesterday regarding electric cars, I discovered that there are some things I need to both correct and clarify. First, when I wrote that post, I was confused about whether the increased carbon emissions for manufacturing and disposing of electric vehicles were included in the overall calculation of carbon use over the vehicle lifetime. I originally thought they were not (based on some rather ambiguous language in one of the links I used), but in fact they were. Obviously, if I had taken more time to research the issue, I would have realized this. So I appreciate the commenter who pointed this out to me. His point was well taken that is always good to go directly to the source if possible.

So here are the baseline numbers, taken from the Low Carbon Vehicle Partnership press release. The study found that from the beginning of manufacture to the end of disposal, an average mid-size gasoline car would be responsible for emitting 24 tonnes of CO2. An average mid-size electric car would be responsible for emitting 19 tonnes of CO2. This is, of course, a carbon emissions savings, but not one I would consider to be all that significant given the hype surrounding electric cars.

However, there is more to the story than just these overall numbers. When you read the full report issued by the LCVP, you find that if you factor in a replacement battery for an electric car, total carbon emissions for the electric car go up significantly to 23 tonnes of CO2, nearly identical to that of a conventional gasoline car. These numbers were the ones used by the two articles to which I originally linked as a basis for the argument that electric cars have little advantage in terms of carbon emissions. Will most electric cars need a second battery after a few years? This has been a problem with electric cars to date. The LCVP argues that in a few years the technology for electric car batteries will have improved enough that replacement batteries will not be necessary. But obviously, that organization is a cheerleader for dramatic reductions in carbon emissions, so it's hard to know who to believe.

There's another thing to consider too. Electric cars, at least so far, are not suitable for long trips because their batteries must be recharged frequently. They are really only feasible for short mileage commutes. Therefore, it is likely that many of them will not end up accumulating a very great amount of mileage over their useful life. This reduces their apparent energy savings. Remember, close to 50% of their total carbon emissions occur at the beginning of their life cycle, during manufacture. They must be driven 80,000 miles just to break even with gasoline cars on total carbon emissions. It is entirely possible that many of them will not pass the 80,000 mileage mark in their lifetime, and therefore will prove to be LESS green than conventional vehicles. This point, coupled with the possible necessity of replacement batteries, helps to explain why the articles I originally linked to can claim that electric cars may be less green than gasoline cars. LCVP's study found that electric vehicles are only marginally greener than gasoline cars, and when you include other factors like the ones I have mentioned which were not factored into LCVP's study, electric cars may not even be greener at all.

So yes, I was confused about some facts in my original post. And I concede that my language about "green hoaxes" was a little over the top. I have no doubt that most proponents of electric cars are sincerely trying to help the environment and are not deliberately trying to pull the wool over consumers' eyes. However, I still think it is far from clear that electric cars will reduce carbon emissions very significantly. And so far, the evidence shows they are both inferior to gasoline cars for many purposes and also significantly more costly. Will the technology improve? Doubtless, but the technology used in the manufacture of gasoline cars is also improving. Furthermore, the whole premise behind radical reductions in carbon emissions is the idea that our emissions are causing global warming. I think it is far from clear that global warming is being caused by man-made activities at all, and highly doubtful that any reduction in carbon emissions will have an impact on global temperatures. So in my mind, the government is foolish to pour millions of taxpayer dollars down the drain to subsidize electric cars. And I stand by my original point about the environmentalist movement as well. I disagree with their values and believe their track record has been very poor.

Another Green Hoax

A new study on electric cars has come out by the Low Carbon Vehicle Partnership, an organization jointly funded by Britain's government and automobile industry. Its findings? Electric cars actually are likely to produce HIGHER CO2 emissions over their lifetime than gasoline cars. The study found that mid-size electric cars produce only slightly less CO2 than their mid-size gasoline counterparts during their lifetime. This is not near enough to make up for the fact that it takes 50% MORE energy to manufacture electric cars in the first place and also 50% MORE energy to dispose of them. Not to mention the fact that most electric cars need a battery replacement after a few years (more carbon emissions!), and that some of the materials needed to manufacture the batteries are only available from countries like China and are difficult to dispose of in an environmentally safe way. And then there's the point that most electric cars are not suitable for long trips because they only drive a short distance on a single charge.

So tell me again: why is our government spending massive amounts of money subsidizing the electric car industry and incentivizing people to buy these very expensive cars?

The environmentalist movement in this country has gotten pretty extreme. Some of their causes, such as banning DDT worldwide and trying to stop industrialization in Third World countries, have left people in extreme poverty and even resulted in loss of life. Environmentalism is more than just a cause – it’s a religion for a lot of people. They worship Mother Earth, which they believe is eternal and is responsible for creating all life through the process of naturalistic evolution. For them, Mother Earth must be preserved in an untouched, pristine condition, no matter how many people must suffer as a consequence. Thus, they pass legislation that costs thousands of loggers their jobs because somewhere deep in the woods there may be a spotted owl somewhere that might have its habitat disrupted. Environmentalist concern for some obscure endangered species caused California to shut off the water supply to the central valley area of the state, one of the most fertile agricultural areas in the country, turning it into a dust bowl and costing thousands of farmers their livelihoods. Environmentalists are obsessed with global warming and are pushing for massive regulation to prevent it that will destroy industry and cost hundreds of thousands of jobs (the Kyoto Treaty for example), even though there is little or no evidence that human activity is causing global warming and even less evidence that scaling back on our activity will prevent it from occurring. (And recent Climategate email leaks have shown how much deception is present in the global warming alarmist camp.) Environmentalists are obsessed with the evils of fossil fuels and want to replace them with “renewable” energy sources, even though there are no such alternative energy sources that can come close to matching the usefulness and productivity of fossil fuels. I have no problem with researching to find better alternative energy sources, but in the meantime we have huge untapped supplies of fossil fuels that will sustain us for hundreds of years. Fossil fuels created the economic productivity that has given us so much wealth. I guess the earth was more pristine back in the days of the cavemen, but I don’t want to go back to that lifestyle just for the sake of being green. Environmentalists are obsessed with population growth and want to dramatically reduce the earth’s population. I watched a documentary on this, and in fact the earth is not overpopulated at all and dramatic reductions in the population would cause tremendous economic harm to our country and our world (and already has contributed to a lot of Japan and Europe’s economic problems).

That doesn’t mean that I don’t care about the environment and think we should just trash it. I don’t worship the earth and I don’t believe I owe my existence to it, but I still believe it is the good creation of God and as such we should seek to take care of it and protect it. A lot of environmental legislation from earlier in our history was good and necessary. It is good that companies are no longer allowed to dump raw sewage into the river. It is generally good that we are recycling. It is good that factories can’t pour out dangerous pollutants unrestricted. It is good that companies are responsible to clean up environmental damage they cause. It is good that littering is a crime. It is good that there are rules preventing the destruction of forests and wetlands. It is good that our national park system is preserving our most special natural landscapes for generations to come. I support all of those things and what they have done to preserve our environment. But the modern environmentalist movement has gone far beyond simple good stewardship and conservation. Now they want to regulate how much water I can have in my toilet and what kind of light bulbs I can use and how much fuel my auto uses. I think that the environmental movement cares more about a pristine earth than about the lives of people, and that's wrong.

I'm sick of all the group think and distortions when it comes to the environment. I want to protect the environment, but I refuse to buy into all the fashionable ideas currently on the market. I want our government to show the same concern for the truth and the facts.