Auto industry how green are evs

Published on February 4th, 2012 | by Charis Michelsen

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Green Electricity + Electric Cars = Win (Clearly)

How Green are EVs? Super Green.Electric cars are a symbol of green transportation – no emissions, no reliance on fossil fuels, no noise pollution, even. And then, inevitably, someone raises a hand and points out that EVs really aren’t that green after all, because manufacturing them still requires CO2 emissions and the source of the electricity driving them is coal and nuclear power and totally not clean at all.

Just to be very clear on the matter, let me reassure you that this person is totally full of it.  It’s not like we need a federal study to tell us that the more clean electricity is used the power an electric car, the smaller its tire-track of a carbon foot print is – except apparently somebody does.

Not the Newspapers Again

The German newspaper taz caused quite a stir by reporting just such reservations on the green-ness of electric cars, adding the word “eco-deception” to the mix and citing a study published mid-January by the Institute of Applied Ecology in Freiburg. According to the paper, the Institute said that EVs were not nearly as protective of the environment as a mythical everyone claimed. The Institute itself couldn’t distance itself from the claim fast enough (and this is why newspapers are dangerous and unreliable, but that’s another matter entirely).

The Institute of Applied Ecology’s report of their research, undertaken at the behest of the German Federal Ministry of Environment to evaluate the benefits of the potentially reduced carbon footprint provided by driving electric cars, focused on renewable energy. Federal Minister of the Environment Norbert Roettgen pointed out that not only do EVs have lower emissions while driving, but that the use of additional renewable sources of energy would drive down emissions associated with EVs even more.

Going from Dirty to Renewable

The crux of the matter, in Germany and worldwide, is the source of power for electric cars (and anything else you may use to cart yourself and your family around). Of course the source of electricity for an EV is directly related to its carbon footprint, but the recent re-emergence of the electric vehicle into the popular consciousness of the worldwide consumer base is coupled with an even stronger push toward generating more renewable energy. Even the shipping industry is getting in on it.

A switch from coal or nuclear powered electricity to greener renewable sources (sun, wind, geothermal, to name a few – all of which are the source of some really neat breakthroughs and pieces of new and awesome tech) is already imperative to help protect the environment and reduce the amount of waste generated. When that shift is combined with electric cars running on that green energy, there’s a vision of a really bright possible future.

Change isn’t easy – making a shift to green sources of electricity is hard enough, but adding in a fundamental alteration of how personal transportation works makes many people incredibly nervous. Don’t be – electric cars are super neat in so many ways.

Questions? Opinions? Let us know in the comments below.

Source: Autobild | Image: Wikimedia Commons.



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About the Author

spent 7 years living in Germany and Japan, studying both languages extensively, doing translation and education with companies like Bosch, Nissan, Fuji Heavy, and others. Charis has a Bachelor of Science degree in biology and currently lives in Chicago, Illinois. She also believes that Janeway was the best Star Trek Captain.


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  • Paul Scott

    I completely agree with the author’s sentiments. As one who has been driving an EV for 9 years and 101,000 miles, and generating my kWh from sunlight falling on my roof, it’s quite easy, and cost-effective, to eliminate virtually all of the pollution associated with running your home and car.

    The argument that EVs are clean because of the resources and energy that go into the manufacturing of the vehicle is a straw man. There is virtually no difference in resources and energy manufacturing either EVs or ICE. The big difference is in the energy the respective vehicles use for their lifetimes driving around. Our grid, during the three years of Obama’s tenure, has gone from 53% to 45% coal. As we continue to shut the older coal plants, and prevent new ones from being built, we’ll eventually have a coal-free grid. Some good estimates conclude we can do this within 20 more years.

    In the past three years, we’ve installed 27 GW of wind energy and 2 GW of solar. This is enough renewable energy to power over 25 million EVs. We currently have about 20,000 in the U.S. We won’t reach one million EVs till 2015 or 2016. By then, we’ll have installed another 30-40 GW of renewable energy and closed several more coal plants. So, it’s clear the grid will get cleaner in spite of the introduction of demand from EVs.

    Further, as more EVs replace ICE, eventually we’ll reduce gasoline demand enough to close some refineries. Refineries are some of the most polluting industries on the planet. They also consume massive amounts of electricity and natural gas that could be used to generate electricity more cleanly than coal. Then there’s the national security and health benefits getting off of oil will bring.

    • http://winlow.co.uk Martin Winlow

      Whilst I agree with your points in general (I am also an EV driver – 2 years, 14k miles – ’till my van was rammed and written off by a fleeing looter last August) I have to take you up on the issue of EVs using the same amount of energy to build as ICEVs. Most production EVs use an AC drivetrain with only one gear. The motor is much smaller than an ICE and has less than 2% of the number of moving parts which, in an ICE, are all manufactured to exacting tolerances. I would be very surprised if an EV motor/gearbox uses more than 10% of the energy to manufacture than a comparable ICEV one. You would have to add the energy used to make the battery pack of course – and the controller. It would be very interesting to see how it all breaks down.

  • http://www.counterpunch.org Will Wilkin

    This article only states the obvious, and in such a facile way as to be useless for anything except tracing the origins of a german study minimizing EV’s green value.

    I was hoping to find more on the role of EV’s in solving the energy storage problems of a grid substantially supplied by intermittent sources. Will the USA ever rebuild the electric grid with such a comprehensive view of solving problems of energy source, energy storage, and pollutions?

    • http://importantmedia.org/members/joborras/ Jo Borras

      I’m a big fan of flywheel energy storage for what you’re describing, but EVs? Seems like PR-spin to me, as I really can’t see this whole “electric car powers electric grid” thing being more than a clever way to lobby for more federal funding and grabbing a few more headlines.

  • http://winlow.co.uk Martin Winlow

    … and I forgot to mention the fact that *never* gets mentioned… how much electricity it takes to *make* petrol and diesel… around 7kWh per gallon, apparently. Which, as it happens, is enough electrical energy to take an EV further than a comparable ICEV will go on a gallon of fuel! So, EV nay-sayers, stick that one in your pipe and smoke it!

    As for the ‘smart grid’ thing, there may be a need to improve or modernise grids but generating power locally by PV and/or wind sounds much more sensible in several ways – particularly efficiency – than what we have now. Add the possibility of the power utilities to tap into all those plugged in EV’s battery packs (particularly during times of peak demand) to reduce brown-outs and it all seems such a no-brainer to me. MW

    • http://importantmedia.org/members/joborras/ Jo Borras

      OOh … never heard that one before. Do you have a source you can link to? Would be MOST appreciated. :)

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