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Posted on 06/25/2009 12:17:11 PM PDT by MaestroLC
(CNSNews.com) – The stimulus law enacted in February promoted the purchase of plug-in electric cars by the federal government and the broader market, but a Government Accountability Office (GAO) report released this month says that the use of plug-in electric vehicles will not by itself decrease greenhouse gas emissions.
To do that, the report argues, the United States would have to switch from coal-burning plants to lower-emission sources to generate electricity such as nuclear power.
“If you are using coal fired power plants and half the country’s electricity comes from coal powered plants, are you just trading one greenhouse gas emitter for another?” Mark Gaffigan, co-author of the GAO report and a specialist in energy issues told CNSNews.com.
The report found that the adoption of plug-in cars could result in benefits, including reduced petroleum consumption and dependency.
But it concedes that in regions of the country heavily reliant on coal for power generation, electric plug-in vehicles will not result in a decrease in green house gas emissions.
“Reduction in CO2 emissions depend on generating electricity used to charge the vehicles from lower-emission sources of energy,” GAO reported.
“For plug-ins to reach their full potential, electricity would need to be generated from lower-emission fuels such as nuclear and renewable energy rather than the fossil fuels--coal and natural gas--used most often to generate electricity today.”
In an attempt to encourage the development and manufacturing of “plug-in” electric vehicles, the government has allocated $300 million from the economic stimulus funding to the General Services Administration (GSA) to acquire fuel-efficient vehicles. These funds must be spent by 2011.
The GAO report pointed out that the stimulus law also establishes a tax credit for consumers for the purchase of plug-in cars--up to $2,500 for two-wheeled, three-wheeled, and low-speed plug-in cars.
But the report cites results from a study showing that “if plug-in hybrids reached 56 percent of the cars on the road by 2030, they would require an increased electricity production, much of which would likely come from additional coal plants.”
The government watchdog said that adjustments would need to be made, such as building new nuclear plants and developing technology so that fossil fuel plants will be equipped to capture and store carbon dioxide (CO2).
“However, new nuclear plants and renewable energy sources can be controversial and expensive,” the report noted.
While not a mandate, goals within President Obama’s executive order (No. 13423) encourage the integration of plug-in hybrid cars into federal vehicle fleets. The GAO report, while remaining supportive of the goal, pointed out the difficulties in achieving plug-in integration.
“Developing policy or incentives to encourage consumers to buy plug-ins only in regions with low-carbon energy sources could be difficult and may not correspond with manufacturers’ business plans,” reported the GAO.
Another impediment to the success of plug-in cars, is the high cost of lithium-ion batteries. The GAO report noted that in order for plug-in cars to be cost effective they must be relatively inexpensive compared to gas.
“Research suggests that for plug-ins to be cost-effective relative to gasoline vehicles the price of batteries must come down significantly and gasoline prices must be high relative to electricity,” the report said.
Gaffigan told CNSNews.com that $2 billion of the Recovery Act funds are being expended for grants to manufacture plug-in batteries, and the money is not limited to lithium-ion batteries.
But Gaffigan also explained that this particular impediment would not go away just because the government threw a lot of money at it.
“At the end of the day, if gasoline is still relatively cheap compared to the other alternatives, there is just not going to be that kind of motivation for the market place to develop something else,” Gaffigan told CNSNews.com.
Furthermore, foreign dependency on lithium could take the place of dependency on petroleum.
“The United States has supplies of lithium, but if demand for lithium exceeded domestic supplies, or if lithium from overseas is less expensive, the United States could substitute reliance on one foreign resource (oil) for another (lithium),” warned the GAO.
“Yes, it is a very real possibility,” Gaffigan confirmed when CNSNews.com asked about the possibility of lithium dependency.
To make matters worse, while lithium-ion batteries are attractive because they produce insignificant levels of toxic waste, the extraction of lithium could have harmful environmental consequences.
“Extracting lithium from locations where it is abundant, such as South America, could pose environmental challenges that would damage the ecosystems in this area,” the GAO report pointed out.
Just wait till the landfills start filling up with old lithium batteries.
Not to mention elecxtric motors produce ozone, which IS a greenhouse gas.
Lithium? More like some kind of chemically altered nickle. Never mind the landfills, look at what manufacturing those batteries does to the environment from the nickle mines to battery plant pollution.
Captain Obvious please...
how many years has FR been saying this? Jeez.
Duh. It is hard to believe has stupid people can be.
But it feeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeels good.And, THAT’S what is really important here.
(Oops, sorry. Didn't mean to be sarcastic. Much.)
Wait a minute. Gasoline and everything made from oil is bad, now the electric cars that the libbies demanded be produced to prevent pollution are bad. The EPA has deemed animal gas-passing to be pollution.
So, we can’t drive any type of automobile and riding horses won’t work because they, well, they might fart. I guess we’re down to riding bicycles or walking but only on days that we don’t consume beans (so as to not add to the pollution our ownselves!). Anybody have any idea how those truckers are going to haul stuff without their trucks? Better be investing in steroid stocks ‘cause those guys are gonna have to bulk up to pull those loads!
Exactly.
And then, after we put in a fee for all mileage travelled, people will drive less.
MA has already floated this idea, and I’ve heard that other states are also thinking the same thing.
Say, 5 cents a mile to start with for every mile driven.
Gonna have to account for the revenue drop from less gas usage.
Lithium is valuable just like lead, it will not be landfilled, it will be reused.
I would be very happy driving a car indirectly powered by domestic coal rather than imported oil!
Bring on the electric cars!
Every cure a new curse.
Don’t worry - the Planners have everything under control.
That alone sells me, I could care less about their environmental impact. Hell I have a V12 BMW I call my “little carbon footprint”...
Electric cars, combined with increased use of nukes for public power, is an excellent idea.
The concern about “greenhouse gases” is misplaced, but the concern about emissions in general is reasonable. The fact that modern power plants hardly pollute at all is the reason that the luddites have had to move the goal-post, but they are going to complain no matter what any of us do or don’t do, so they should be ignored. After promoting solar and wind energy for decades, they are suddenly against both. Now, as in this article, after promoting electric transportation for decades, they are suddenly going to discover that this is bad also.
Luddites suffer from a mental disorder. You can treat these people with kindness especially if you’re related to them, but never, and I mean never, let them enter a voting booth under any circumstance. Never elect them into higher office. Never trust them with anything more than pocket change.
Which, by itself, would decrease greenhouse gas emission, without switching cars, of course.
Actually it's worse then that. Modern steam power plants consume about 7% to 10% of the generated power internal to the plant to power all the pumps, fans, and fuel processing machinery needed to run the plant. You lose energy in transmission from the power plant to your home. Utilities estimate that about 20% is lost to resistance in the transmission lines and the various step and step down transformers along the way. You also lose energy when you convert it to "chemical storage" by charging the car's batteries, regardless of the technology involved. (Some are better and some are worse, with "better" generally costing a lot more!) When you go out for a spin you loose more energy in converting the chemical potential back to electricity. And then of course there is the loss at the electric motor converting the electricity to torque and speed.
Every time energy is "converted" from one form to another, there is a loss because real world devices are not 100% efficient, as a matter of fact some devices are remarkably inefficient and the more of them you stack together the worse the overall efficiency becomes. The overall efficiency being the product of multiplying all of the subordinate efficiencies together. To overcome this it is necessary to burn even more coal to make up for all the losses. You would be further ahead if you had a steam car and burned the coal in a boiler to propel the car.
Also unspoken is the cost of maintaining the storage batteries. All storage batteries have a finite number of charge/discharge cycles before they need replacement. That is a result of the electrochemical reaction that first stores and then recovers electrical energy not being 100% reversible.
Clean energy, green energy, pipe dream...
Regards,
GtG
Reducing our cars, our mobility, our level of production, our level of comfort, and our freedom.
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