Widespread Adoption of EVs Would Lead to Negative Impact on Environment Due To Dependency on Coal

By Eric Loveday

Eric Loveday

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Eric Loveday is a car enthusiast with a love for everything automotive. He purchased a 1970 Chevelle at age 16, quickly outgrew its dated engineering... More

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What is the environmental impact of widespread use of EVs?  Well that all depends on where you live.

For example, an EV driven in France emits only 15 g/km of CO2, but the same vehicle driven in India would emit a staggering 160 g/km of CO2.  Why such a difference? 

France provides most of their electricity through nuclear power plants which generate very little CO2 emissions where as India still provides most of their electricity through the burning of coal which is extremely high in CO2 emissions.

For comparison purposes, diesel fuel emits approximately 130 g/km of CO2.  With those numbers, you can easily see that converting India from diesel vehicles to EVs would actually have a negative impact on the environment in terms of CO2 emissions, at least until India could find a cleaner method fro producing electricity.

The real problem lies in the old electrical grids and antique methods of supplying electricity.  These methods, such as the use of coal, are still in widespread use today.  Even in China, where they aim to be leaders in EV use and production, 90% of their electrical capacity is generated by coal.

We all hear claims of clean coal technology and other methods of generating electricity with lower emissions, but they are not widespread realities at this point.  EVs would not have a positive overall impact on the environment until the rest of the associated infrastructure moves into the 21^st century and provides electricity through more advanced means.

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