Study: Tesla battery production releases as much CO2 as 8 yrs of driving on gas | Hacker News Reader

Study: Tesla battery production releases as much CO2 as 8 yrs of driving on gas

climatechangedispatch.com

24 pointsdanjoc28 comments

What are the CO2 emissions of the mining, refining, and delivery of 8 years worth of gas?

The link is from an anti-renewables propaganda website. See for instance this article with the title: We pay a fortune for renewable energy when we should be exploiting fossil fuels

http://climatechangedispatch.com/we-pay-a-fortune-for-renewa...

Your argument is invalid. Ad hominem. Attacking the source doesn't make the reported 17 tons of CO2 per battery incorrect.

But it makes the article a lot more likely to use biased sources and present the argument unfairly

Overlooked in a lot of discussion of the CO2 impact of Tesla vs ICE is the effect of the added weight of the batteries on the amount of road damage a car will cause. A study in the 1950's showed that road damage is proportional to the third power of the axle weight of the car. If the Tesla weights 1/3 more that a similar ICE vehicle it will cause (4/3)^3 or about 3 times as much damage to the road a similar ICE. Replacing the fleet of ICE cars with Tesla type cars would lead to the road being replaced 3 times as often. Note concrete production is large CO2 emitter.

My friend who is a highway engineer would disagree with you. He says that roads will last a very long time as long as the shear limit of the road is not exceeded, but that once the maximum shear is exceeded the road will deteriorate. So, semis that do not exceed their weight limit are not a problem, but hauling a bulldozer around on a flatbed with four axles when it should have six will really do damage. It makes sense to me because my experience has been that when anything is operated within it's design limits it can last a very long time. So, unless the cars you are talking about have very narrow tires, I don't think they will be the problem you propose.

How does asphalt compare to concrete? I would guess that it's worse but I would be coming from a place of complete ignorance.

This is fake news. The people whose instinct told them that a pro-fossil fuel blog was peddling bullshit were correct.

>The headline is based on a Swedish study. It posits that production of a 100 kWh battery—Tesla's biggest—produces 17.5 tons of carbon dioxide. We'll take that at face value so we can dig into it here.

The link you provide does not dispute the 17.5 tons of CO2 per 100 kWh battery. Here's a figure for you. Cars produced in 2015: 68,560,000

http://www.statisticbrain.com/cars-produced-in-the-world/

If 100% of those cars were Teslas, that would be 1.2 Gigatons of CO2 from battery production alone. For reference, CO2 contributed by the burning of all fossil fuels combined is around 4-5 Gigatons annually.

http://soilcarboncenter.k-state.edu/carbcycle.html

1.2 gigatons is not a small number and that's before the cars even hit the road. Sweden must have realistic numbers. They pledge to reach carbon neutrality by 2050. Popular mechanics have pledged nothing.

Genuine question but I'm assuming making the power train for a normal car releases greenhouse gasses too.

The totals for both should be released for a fair comparison

Sure but I bet all the fiddly bits of an ICE car take as much CO2 as the battery. Not only that, manufacturing thse batteries at scale is a relatively new process that's bound to improve with time. Mechanical engines, not so much.

Where is the report? Which journal is the study published in?

You didn't even read the submission, did you?

>IVL The Swedish Environment Institute has, on behalf of the Swedish Transport Administration and the Swedish Energy Agency, investigated the climate impact of lithium-ion batteries from a life-cycle perspective.

This is Sweden, the country that has pledged to be carbon neutral by 2050.

This is fake news. I actually read the study, and it's not even close to supporting what the author wrote.

Tesla has pledged that the Gigafactory would be net zero: https://www.treehugger.com/renewable-energy/teslas-gigafacto...

If this is accurate and comes to pass, then assuming like the Swedes did that the batteries would have 50% fossil fuel sources for production wouldn't apply.

http://www.greencarreports.com/news/1105404_tesla-gigafactor...

Last I read, no panels.

It's not even a third complete, I think it's a little premature to be complaining about the lack of solar panels.

https://i0.wp.com/electrek.files.wordpress.com/2017/03/gigaf...

https://electrek.co/2016/07/24/tesla-gigafactory-picture-sho...

The article links to the page from which you can download it.

I read the study. It doesn't support the headline.

Here is the hyperlink to the PDF report:

http://www.energimyndigheten.se/globalassets/forskning--inno...

I skimmed through it and didn't find where they concluded that battery production equaled 8 years of gas emmissions.

According to the article that was a calculation made during interview.

The conclusion is Tesla uses much larger batteries than needed for typical usage. You're driving back and forth to work, not across the country. Emissions grow linearly with battery size. The result is excessive but unnecessary pollution.

Your range anxiety is bad for co2 emissions. If you're not just signalling and actually care about co2 emissions, you choose a car with smaller batteries.

And that conclusion is wrong, because a bigger battery has a longer life... the lifetime of a battery is better thought of as being a number of miles, instead of a number of years.

A bigger battery results in greater co2 emissions. Over 17 tons in the case of a model s. 8.2 year worth. A Tesla battery has an 8 year shelf life based on Tesla's warranty coverage. Nice spin though.

https://forums.tesla.com/forum/forums/battery-technology-gua...

Here's some longevity data on real batteries:

http://www.greencarreports.com/news/1110149_tesla-model-s-ba...

As you can see, the actual lifetime is projected to be a lot more than 8 years for a typical car.

Also, please don't post insults like "Nice spin" on Hacker News. Data works a lot better.

You're still spinning. Your argument is invalid. You're not making a direct comparison. A direct comparison would ask how much CO2 is generated in the production of an internal combustion engine vehicle. A quick search tells me a similar sized sedan, a Ford Mondeo, produces 17 tons of CO2 in the manufacture process. That's about the same as the battery alone on the Tesla.

https://www.theguardian.com/environment/green-living-blog/20...

You're trying to change the subject. That's what spin doctors do. If you find that insulting, try not spinning instead. I find your anti-science spin insulting. Please don't do that.

I'm pointing out an error in the article about the effect of battery weight on CO2, and also your error about Tesla battery lifetime. I have no idea what you think this discussion is about! Have fun name-calling on HN!

The actual life of the cells is much longer than 8 years. It's probably up to double that. Even after the cells degrade to the point where they are no longer useful in cars, they are still perfectly good for stationary storage.

Why not grow some greenery on the car to offset the larger batteries, a la Chia Pet? Then you would really be signalling you cared!

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