The environmental performance of electric motorcycles is different than cars:
- Cars need ancillary services like heating, increasing battery size
- Motorcycles have no real chance at regenerative braking
- Motorcycles are driven fewer kilometers than cars, making the impact of the vehicle more important (as opposed to the fuel).
Currently, we estimate that battery motorcycles are preferable across a variety of environmental indicators, though results differ for small and large motorcycles, which have very different usage patterns.
Feel free to contact me directly if interested in discussing or collaborating on open source life cycle assessment code or data (https://brightwaylca.org/, https://chris.mutel.org/).