Today’s Solutions: November 02, 2024

With fossil fuels driving the climate crisis, the switch to electric vehicles (EVs) has obvious benefits for the environment. With that said, there are still people who claim that’s not the case, arguing that the energy used to make the batteries, plus the emissions associated with producing electricity, make the total footprint of EVs more polluting than that of gas-guzzling cars.

That argument, however, has just been put to rest by a new study whose findings show that over the life cycle of an EV — from mining the materials needed to build it to the end of its life — it will release fewer greenhouse gas emissions than a gas-powered car. Those findings hold true globally, whether an EV recharges from a grid in Europe with a larger share of green power or a grid in India that is still heavily reliant on coal.

While the study results shouldn’t come as a surprise, it was carried out to debunk the long-standing myth that EVs are only as clean as the grids they run on — which are now still primarily based on fossil fuels in most parts of the world.

“We have a lot of lobby work from parts of the automotive industry saying that electric vehicles are not that much better if you take into account the electricity production and the battery production. We wanted to look into this and see whether these arguments are true,” says Georg Bieker, a researcher at the International Council on Clean Transportation (ICCT), the research group behind the report.

As part of the study, the researchers estimated the emissions from medium-sized EVs registered in 2021 in either India, China, the US, or Europe — countries that makeup 70 percent of new car sales globally.

The findings show that lifetime emissions for an EV in Europe are between 66 and 69 percent lower compared to that of a gas-powered car. In the US, an EV is responsible for between 60 to 68 percent fewer emissions. EVs in China, which uses more coal, produce between 37 to 45 percent fewer emissions, and that number is between 19 to 34 percent in India.

The authors of the ICCT report hope that their findings will help policymakers make more informed decisions about making the future of transportation more sustainable.

Study source: ICCT — A global comparison of the life-cycle greenhouse gas emissions of combustion engine and electric passenger cars

Solutions News Source Print this article
More of Today's Solutions

This heartwarming Danish ad breaks down the ‘Us vs Them’ narrative

It’s rare that we publish a story about an advertisement, but then again it’s rare that an ad stirs so much emotion within its ...

Read More

NOAHs: Charlotte has a formula for long-lasting affordable housing

We recently shared how empty retail space could be the solution to California’s affordable housing crisis. Across the country in North Carolina, the city ...

Read More

A seat at the table for underrepresented communities

Climate change is already affecting all of us—however, those that bear the brunt of these consequences are predominantly from low-income, marginalized, BIPOC communities. So ...

Read More

Expanding democracy: Michigan opens new doors for formerly incarcerated voters

Malijah Gee's path from incarceration at the age of 17 to imminent freedom reflects the longing for a voice that has been suppressed for 36 years. ...

Read More