Why do people think that electric cars will reduce air pollution?

Question

If we're talking about conventional electric cars that have to be plugged in, you have to consider how that electricity is being generated. The majority of power plants in this country are COAL-POWERED. If we all had electric cars, we wouldn't have any exhaust coming out of the cars, but there would be a lot more coal being burned to generate the electricity to charge the cars' batteries. So how does that reduce pollution?

Answer 1

Although Electricity may be produced by burning fossil fuel an electric motor is far more efficient compared to conventional gasoline engine inside a car.

Also when an electric vehicle is not running its not consuming fuel (while gasoline engine is still burning gas)

Finally when an electric vehicle stops some of the electricity is put back into battery.

So overall its much more efficient utilization of fuel (even when you burn coal to make electricity to charge car)

Also since big power companies generate electricity at one place its easier to manage pollution and make the plant more efficient.

Finally when you generate electricity using PV its totally emmission free so this is the cleanest method PV+EV

Answer 2

well if you consider the fact that billions of people drive every day.For one thing you dont have worry about gas.and that means that the pollution will decrease tinfold or more withen five years.seconldy most power plants run of off solar energy my friend is the maneger at one.we also dont have to spend a great price on gas. i wish i could get deeper but i have to go.

Answer 3

Well the new ones "hybrid" generate their own, and are kind of dual.

If they go below 40 miles per hour they are using regular gas but if they go above that they are using the electric part.

Answer 4

I have wondered the same question.

Answer 5

Pollutant or not, coal is our most plentiful fossil fuel, and it HAS to be used where it is practical to do so.  Stack scrubbers, coal gasification, and re-burning of sulfurous gasses as turbine fuel are all excellent anti-pollution technologies that are either in place, being mandated as pre-conditions for new coal-fired power plants and often  required by state authorities as retrofits for existing facilities.  

Check out your nearest coal-fired power plant and you will probably be unable to see anything coming out of the stack, unless the weather is cold enough to condense the water vapor.

Answer 6

If you can get people to believe in an idea, would you tell them all the facts or just enough to get them to do what you want them to do? They want you to spend that hard earned cash on them and not on someone else. They don't care about the rest. Just the part that matters to them.

Answer 7

Electricity need not be produced by coal.  Nuclear power and hydro-electrical power are two current technologies that can provide adequate electricity with no air pollution.  There are other technologies that either can produce or may soon be able to produce sufficient power

Answer 8

My province's power is provided 50% by nuclear and growing, little or none by coal.  Don't blame electric cars for coal fired plants, those dinosaurs (both the coal fired generating stations and the politicians who support them) were around long before the electric car.

Answer 9

The people who think that are correct.  

"EVs reduce CO2 by 11%-100% compared with ICEs and by 24%-54% compared with HEVs, and significantly reduce all other greenhouse gas emissions, using the U.S. grid mix. If all U.S. cars were EVs, we’d reduce global warming emissions."

http://www.pluginamerica.com/images/Emis...

I've got a discussion with further details in the link below.

Answer 10

Actually, I think that solar panels at home to charge the electric car would make a difference.

I suspect that the inefficiencies in electric power generation due to generation loss and transmission loss may well result in more CO2 emissions if we rely on the exisitng electric generation system than if we just used gasoline powered vehicles.

Since we have no new nuclear plants and most of our rivers have already been dammed for hydro, incremental electricity for the electric car will undoubtedly come from coal fired plants.  There is better coal plant technology that reduces CO2 dramatically, but it is not manatory and is not the method of choice for power plant construction due to higher costs.