Hacker News Reader

Comment by tmalsburg2 | Hacker News Reader

Two independent studies in Germany recently found that the expected reduction in CO2 due to electric cars will be very moderate over the next two decades even in the best case scenario. The electricity just needs to come from somewhere and that somewhere is not going to be 100% renewables. We need to end this narrative that driving a Tesla or similar car somehow is a heroic act and helping to save the planet.

View on HN

The greatest threat to human survival comes from the political and economic clout of petrochemical companies. Buying gasoline powered cars perpetuates that. Using electricity as an energy source for transportation means that wealth is no longer being sent to Saudi Aramco, ExxonMobil, Rosneft, etc. This decreases the ability of those companies to fund anti-global warming propaganda, bribe, encourage/wage war, undermine democracies, and cause humanity's eventual extinction.

So yes, I firmly believe that purchasing EVs is not just a heroic act, but one that is unquestionably necessary.

About half of all crude oil is turned into gasoline (and that's only an indirect indicator of where the profits are). A world without ICE engines will still have an oil industry, but it will have an almost unrecognizably different one.

[0] https://www.eia.gov/tools/faqs/faq.php?id=327&t=9

> About half of all crude oil is turned into gasoline

That is honestly less than I expected.

This link is telling us the yield of gas from oil, not the total amount of oil which is refined into gas or diesel worldwide.

The same can be said about plastic, waste, recycling, water quality, air quality, ...

The general public is rarely the biggest cause, and even the best intentioned personal initiative like becoming vegan can fail to have any positive impact down the line.

That said, in democracies, personal attitude matters to politicians. Being associated to poluting industry become a career terminating scandal waiting to happen in a society composed of vegan, composting, plastic avoiding, electric car driving, eco-home living population. Similarly poluting companies become easy targets for a new generation of politicians.

"Being associated to poluting industry become a career terminating scandal waiting to happen in a society composed of vegan, composting, plastic avoiding, electric car driving, eco-home living population. Similarly poluting companies become easy targets for a new generation of politicians."

In society there are, however, needs that have to be covered by the said poluting companies, and I've encountered plenty individuals oblivious to the fact that we don't have working alternatives yet, unfortunately. I understand why the struggle against polution trend had to adopt religious attitude, but I'm a bit worried about the (current cultural stigma) collateral damage and especially about its eventual long term fallout.

Well, BMW's bosses' motives are probably profit/thriving as a car company (well maybe they'll pivot to something else?), so, if the customers are deluded that buying electric cars will save the planet, they'd be stupid to keep selling steam-engined cars and not offer electric cars.

Tragically even if you think you're helping with recycling, apparently that trash just gets shipped to Asia and be incinerated..

Care to site/link these two studies?

Not only energy production is an issue. Electric cars also have a larg ecological debt at start. Nobody has anything on battery refurbishment and recycling.

One one hand you are lying to yourself if you think your new electric car is more environmental friendly, on the other hand you have to start somewhere perhaps.

"Nobody has anything..." is plainly not true. Li-ion battery used in most e-cars is so easy to dismantle to individual cells which can be easily resold, that it actually incentivizes theft. Legal refurbishment is equally easy plus there is huge demand for electricity storage which will keep for decades siphoning off any refurbished cells not suitable for vehicle use.

Battery recycling and reprocessing is already mandatory in many countries, to avoid contamination by landfill leaks. It is just question of scale.

I meant to refer to today's costs. There are different studies with different conclusions. This article references a number of them.

https://www.carbonbrief.org/factcheck-how-electric-vehicles-...

T̶h̶e̶ ̶a̶r̶t̶i̶c̶l̶e̶ ̶i̶s̶ ̶o̶l̶d̶e̶r̶ (didn't read the date correctly), but the inconclusiveness of the battery factor remains. Driving in winter with all electric gadgets turned on and you get additional numbers that are totally different compared to summer.

And dependable numbers on battery refurbishment will only be available in a decade or so. It is not just "easy".

I have had a tesla since 2012. it's fine in the winter. I go probably 15 weekend trips to ski areas around seattle. Don't forget that electric cars charge the battery when they come down that big hill. tesla's heat the battery which reduces the amount the range decreases significantly. It's not like the range goes away in some unknown schema.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com