Clarkson and others always ask the question, ‘where does the electricity come from?’
There are other stats that say it’s only better after a certain amount of miles driven or that the Lithium quarries produce significant amount of pollution.
What and where do these claims come from, how true are they and how false are they?
In: Engineering
This is an incredibly well studied topic. When brand new, the total environmental impact of producing an EV is a slight negative when compared to a typical ICE. This deficit is attributed almost entirely to the battery.
However, in the span of a few months, an EV will overcome this deficit and rapidly leave the ICE in the dust, because the ICE also has problems like, “Where does it’s fuel come from?” Not only do ICEs produce emissions during operation, but the extraction and refinement of petroleum products is also dirty.
The disingenuous part about the anti-EV argument is that they load up the EV with all the environmental baggage of lithium battery production, then they stack the deck against them by considering only coal sourced electrical power. Meanwhile, when the topic turns to ICEs, they only want to consider tailpipe emissions. It’s just dishonest.
And I am a massive car and motorsports enthusiast. Most of my childhood memories are of working on cars with my dad. I worked as a mechanic right out of high-school. I love cars, I love big V8 engines, and I love automotive racing.
The things is, I’m not a damn dirty liar, and I am capable of accepting that these things I love probably won’t exist forever. I’m just glad for the time that I’ve had with them, and I look for ways to be excited about EVs as well. The more I learn about electric drivetrains, the more fascinated I am by them. Electromagnetic propulsion is cool too!
Latest Answers