Summary: Electric vehicles (EVs) coupled with low-carbon electricity sources offer the potential for reducing greenhouse gas emissions and exposure to tailpipe emissions from personal transportation. In considering these benefits, it is impor tant to address concerns of problem-shifting. In addition, while many studies have focused on the use phase in comparing transportation options, vehicle production is also significant when comparing conventional and EVs. We develop and provide a transparent life cycle inventory of conventional and electric vehicles and apply our inventory to assess conventional and EVs over a range of impact categories. We find that EVs powered by the present European electricity mix offer a 10% to 24% decrease in global warming potential (GWP) relative to conventional diesel or gasoline vehicles assuming lifetimes of 150,000 km. However, EVs exhibit the potential for significant increases in human toxicity, freshwater eco-toxicity, freshwater eutrophication, and metal depletion impacts, largely emanating from the vehicle supply chain. Results are sensitive to assumptions regarding electricity source, use phase energy consumption, vehicle lifetime, and battery replacement schedules. Because production impacts are more significant for EVs than conventional vehicles, assuming a vehicle lifetime of 200,000 km exaggerates the GWP benefits of EVs to 27% to 29% relative to gasoline vehicles or 17% to 20% relative to diesel. An assumption of 100,000 km decreases the benefit of EVs to 9% to 14% with respect to gasoline vehicles and results in impacts indistinguishable from those of a diesel vehicle. Improving the environmental profile of EVs requires engagement around reducing vehicle production supply chain impacts and promoting clean electricity sources in decision making regarding electricity infrastructure.
Keywords: batteries, electricity mix, global warming, industrial ecology, life cycle inventory (LCI), transportation
Check also China’s booming electric vehicle market is about to run into a mountain of battery waste. By Echo Huang. Quartz, September 28, 2017. http://www.bipartisanalliance.com/2017/10/chinas-booming-electric-vehicle-market_14.html
And How many electric vehicles can the current Australian electricity grid support?, Li and Lenzen, International Journal of Electrical Power & Energy Systems, Volume 117, May 2020. https://www.bipartisanalliance.com/2020/01/how-many-electric-vehicles-can-current.html
And Leading scientists set out resource challenge of meeting net zero emissions in the UK by 2050. National History Museum, Jun 5 2019. https://www.bipartisanalliance.com/2019/06/to-replace-all-uk-based-vehicles-today.html:
my summary: To replace all UK-based vehicles today with electric vehicles would take near 2 times the total annual world cobalt production, nearly the world's neodymium & dysprosium, 3/4 the world’s lithium & at least 1/2 the world’s copper in 2018
Also: "The worldwide impact: If this analysis is extrapolated to the currently projected estimate of two billion cars worldwide, based on 2018 figures, annual production would have to increase for neodymium and dysprosium by 70%, copper output would need to more than double and cobalt output would need to increase at least three and a half times for the entire period from now until 2050 to satisfy the demand."
How much are electric vehicles driven? Lucas W. Davis. Applied Economics Letters, Feb 20 2019. https://www.bipartisanalliance.com/2019/02/the-prospect-for-electric-vehicles-as.html
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