Time to stop our green worship of the electric car

Started by dsnope, 02/23/2015 06:16PM
Posted 02/23/2015 06:16PM Opening Post
Bjorn Lomborg's op-ed in USA Today:

It is time to stop our green worship of the electric car. It costs us a fortune, cuts little CO2 and surprisingly kills almost twice the number of people compared with regular gasoline cars.

Electric cars' global-warming benefits are small. It is advertised as a zero-emissions car, but in reality it only shifts emissions to electricity production, with most coming from fossil fuels. As green venture capitalist Vinod Khosla likes to point out, "Electric cars are coal-powered cars."

http://www.usatoday.com/story/opinion/2015/02/18/electric-car-benefits-air-myths-pollution-health-column/23641729/
Posted 02/23/2015 08:21PM #1
Those who worship at the alter of electric or hydrogen powered cars have no concept of things beyond the end product. Their thinking is similar to those who think the supermarket is the source of meat. :S :S
Posted 02/23/2015 10:02PM #2
Dave and Dale:
You are correct that the electric car shifts the production to other fuels, with coal being the primary source. However, those production sources vary greatly by state and the efficiencies and production costs of those other fuels vary widely. The big selling point for electric vehicles is the mpg equivalency. For instance the Tesla Model S has an mpge of 89. My 2007 Prius, while a hybrid and not a true electric, gets 53 in the summer and 48 in the winter. There is currently no true zero emission vehicle, but moving away from the insanely inefficient gas powered cars is a better use of resources. Even diesel cars are better alternatives to gas vehicles. If power densities for batteries continues at it's current rate, 500 mile ranges for electric vehicles will be the norm in 5 years. There's no performance degredation either, just do a You Tube search for "Tesla Insane" and see what a 2.9 second 0 to 60 looks like. No one I know is worshipping at any "energy alter", some of us are just looking for a more efficient use of the resources we have.

George