The Environmental Benefits of Driving an Electric Vehicle: A Personal Experience

Given the many reactions also about the relevant emissions involved in driving an EV, I will share my N=1 experience. I try to charge as much as possible when sustainable energy is available. So last Sunday half battery fully charged, for an average of 89gr CO2 eq per kWh (see https://app.electricitymaps.com/zone/NL).
I charged 35.5 kWh. Because I generate solar power myself, the actual amount of clean energy will be even higher, but I cannot measure that separately (too old inverter). Assuming the average for NL is most realistic.

For those 35.5 kWh, my battery percentage has gone from 35% to 80%. Because this is the percentage that the car measures and therefore probably does not include charging losses, I assume that I actually consumed 10% more, so 39kWh.

My average gross consumption (so driving and climate control, etc.) is 180Wh/km (due to a lot of 130km/h driving to and from vacation, consumption is a bit higher than I usually have. For that 35.5kWh net in the battery I can therefore cover 197km to ride.

For those 197km I have a CO2 emission of 39*89 = 3471 grams of CO2. That is 17.6 grams of CO2 per km. Even if you manage to match the factory values ​​of a modern car, you will soon be over 100 grams of CO2 per km. This makes my car up to 5x cleaner than a clean diesel I drove before (Volvo V40). If I were to compare it with a comparable car in terms of size, this would be even better.

In winter, the amount of CO2 per kWh is a lot higher. Then it can be equivalent in the worst case, I have also seen values ​​of 400-500 grams of CO2. On average, it keeps getting better. Previously an average of 450+ grams of CO2 per kWh, in 2022 it had already dropped to 380 grams per kWh. And this will fall further every year in a row in the coming years. So even if you don’t pay attention to anything and don’t have solar panels, an EV is soon less polluting than if you only look at the consumption and generation of electricity.

The production and distribution of petrol/diesel is not yet factored into this, so the story for the EV is only more positive. Now only the emissions from production have to be reduced, which is still significantly higher. But sooner or later every EV passes the tipping point where it becomes less polluted. That differs from study to study and country to country, but somewhere between 30,000 and 150,000 km is realistic with data from previous years.

[Reactie gewijzigd door The__Virus op 19 juli 2023 15:39]

2023-07-19 12:25:06
#EVs #outsold #diesel #cars #time #June