Diesels greener than battery cars, says Swiss gov report

[Peter7307]

Originally Posted by Piwoslaw

Over 90% of Poland's electricity is from coal,

Same for us here in Australia. Virtually ALL our power is coal based.

In any case the infrastructure is so ancient even a small jump in demand causes blackouts and restrictions.
Adding demand for recharging electric cars will cause the thing to collapse completely.

The Swiss have no interest one way or the other so far as I can see.
They import ALL oil and have no car manufacturing volume of any significance.

Peter.

[Ryland]

I did some research and it does appears that the 60mpg mark is about right, coal is pretty much the dirties (air wise) way we can produce electricity, so if you look at it from the point of an electric car is only out done by someone who is getting 60mpg and in the US that is not happening, so of course this is going to be used by people who are getting 20mpg as the reason they should not be driving electric!
From what I could tell the study was not a true study, it was just someone looking up the numbers of co2 released for the different fuels, if it had been better researched then it would have included the refining of the fuels, the shipping and mining of it, but it was just the numbers at the tail pipe or smoke stack.

[meanjoe75fan]

This study is misleading at best, and false at worst. As has become distressingly common, it substitutes "greener" for "produces the least CO2."

For the record, there is far, far more to being "green" than "minimizing CO2." Indeed, sometimes "green objectives" contradict: what might produce more CO, soot, etc produces less CO2 (thinking here about CNG vs diesel in city buses). Which is "greener" is open to debate.

(After all, if CO2 "isn't everything...it's the only thing," I could be "green" by heating my house with my used tires and used motor oil...saves on nat. gas, and avoids burning fuel to get to the recycling drop-off point. The huge plumes of toxic smoke would apparently be beside the point.)

[tumnasgt]

Originally Posted by meanjoe75fan

(After all, if CO2 "isn't everything...it's the only thing," I could be "green" by heating my house with my used tires and used motor oil...saves on nat. gas, and avoids burning fuel to get to the recycling drop-off point. The huge plumes of toxic smoke would apparently be beside the point.)

Burning tires would release a considerable amount of CO2, so it wouldn't be green in any aspect.

[RobertSmalls]

Originally Posted by Ryland

I did some research and it does appears that the 60mpg mark is about right, coal is pretty much the dirties (air wise) way we can produce electricity, so if you look at it from the point of an electric car is only out done by someone who is getting 60mpg and in the US that is not happening, so of course this is going to be used by people who are getting 20mpg as the reason they should not be driving electric!

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People need to know the actual environmental impact of the items they choose to buy, so they can decide whether it's greener to spend $15000 on an electric mower + solar thermal collectors + new appliances + insulation for the house + beer, or if getting the Leaf over the 50mpg Prius is the better choice.

[tumnasgt]

Originally Posted by RobertSmalls

People need to know the actual environmental impact of the items they choose to buy, so they can decide whether it's greener to spend $15000 on an electric mower + solar thermal collectors + new appliances + insulation for the house + beer, or if getting the Leaf over the 50mpg Prius is the better choice.

I totally agree. The trouble is trying to get all the data. I don't think the oil companies are going to be keen to announce how energy is used to find, get, process, and ship oil-based products. Nor are the coal mining companies likely to say how much energy is used to find, mine, process, and ship the coal.

If laws were passed to require that total production energy consumption + CO2 emissions are published, all sorts of interesting things would be revealed.

[Duffman]

Originally Posted by tumnasgt

I totally agree. The trouble is trying to get all the data. I don't think the oil companies are going to be keen to announce how energy is used to find, get, process, and ship oil-based products. Nor are the coal mining companies likely to say how much energy is used to find, mine, process, and ship the coal.

If laws were passed to require that total production energy consumption + CO2 emissions are published, all sorts of interesting things would be revealed.

These numbers are available if you look for them. If I remember correctly, 80% of the energy in the well makes it to the fuel tank for gasoline and 84% for diesel. This was a few years ago so I could be remembering wrong or it may have changed. I have never found anything for coal but then again I haven't looked either.

[roflwaffle]

Originally Posted by tumnasgt

Burning tires would release a considerable amount of CO2, so it wouldn't be green in any aspect.

It's better than using virgin fuels overall, but there need to be good population controls in place.

[ecofreak]

Diesels can easily be run on refuse. That's my two cents. Truthfully, reducing carbon emissions is important, but only marginally. We have to first create "green" infrastructure, which could be diesel and then electric trains, planting forests, and then getting our act together with electric power.

[Duffman]

Refuse can be turned into Ethanol as well.