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Comment by smarterchild | Hacker News Reader

The keyword for the problem you're talking about is the "long tailpipe theory." [1] I was just reading Wait But Why's article [2], which concluded that the overall greenhouse impact will still be lessened by using electric cars over internal combustion.

I didn't dig into the sources enough to conclude that it's truly a better option, but those articles are a good place to start.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_long_tailpipe

[2] http://waitbutwhy.com/2015/06/how-tesla-will-change-your-lif...

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Do those analyses also account for the energy needed to build the batteries? From the wikipedia link, it looks like they don't.

How big is that fixed cost in proportion to the fuel energy? Also, how much energy does it take to make a combustion engine?

It's not really a fixed cost. Batteries aren't good for forever. They have a limited lifespan.

An electric car could be thought of as a gas car with a very, very large, magical fuel tank. If a battery costs $20k (like a Tesla) and I spend $200/mo on gasoline then that's 100 months (simple interest) or about 8 years, before we even talk about the cost of the car or the cost of the electricity.

I know that this doesn't feel good to talk about, but economics is more about numbers than feelings.

That economic analysis is flawed because you're ignoring the externalities of burning gasoline (health costs, climate change). Only if there were high enough taxes on gasoline to mitigate those effects, then you could accurately do that sort of dollar-cost analysis.

Sure but then every analysis is flawed because everything has some kind of externality that's hard to measure and account for.

How much fuel is burned to make the cells? How much pollution happens to mine the rare earths for the cells and the motors? It's super easy to poke holes in both sides of the argument because building a car is so damn complicated whether it's an ICE or electric.

I didn't downvote you but I really don't think it's hard to measure and account for the externalities in fossil fuels.

1. Calculate the dollar amount per pound of CO2 released that pays for enough tree planting or subsidizes enough renewables to offset the emissions.

2. Apply it as a tax to all fossil fuels and imports from countries without a comparable tax scheme.

Right but that's incredibly naive and uncreative. It presumes that fossil fuels are the ONLY way to do certain things, unless you can spend millions of dollars proving otherwise.

For example, right now most steel is made in electric furnaces which can be powered by coal, nuclear, gas, oil, solar, hydro, etc. What's the right tax for imported steel then?

Let me now make a list of a bunch of other things that are in a similar category: aluminum, most other metals, rubber, plastics, glass, etc.

Machines that are used to process raw materials may themselves be made of raw materials which are sourced in various ways. And those machines may be powered by dirty fossil fuels or clean renewables. Which means that components -- as opposed to raw materials -- are also going to be very difficult to properly classify and tax.

The same for subsystems and full assemblies and entire products.

It's a lot more complicated than "do some math and then apply a tax"

> If a battery costs $20k (like a Tesla)

That's not nearly the asymptotic price, though. Tech is still developing.

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