Innovation in E-mobility
Cars are bad for the environment… This realisation was made in the 1950s by a Californian researcher who determined that the smoggy skies over Los Angeles were a direct result of pollutants from traffic emissions.
On an annual average, a passenger vehicle emits roughly 4.6 metric tonnes. On the assumption that every UK household has at least one car, the overall CO2 emissions would amount to an annual output of around 127,880,000 metric tonnes.
This is equal to around 78,453,987 round trip flights from London to New York.
To combat the downside of internal combustion engines (ICE), car manufacturers have raced to develop and manufacture electric powered vehicles (EV) in the hope that these would significantly reduce the devastating impact of cars.
While electric vehicles require a lot less parts than ICEs and do not emit any greenhouse gasses as a direct result of driving, they were and still are heralded as the future of transportation, but how sustainable are they really?
In contrast to ICEs which rely on fossil fuels or natural gas to operate, EVs rely on electricity which is generated by powerplants. Powerplants can vary in design and type but overall the most common types of non-renewable plants are still coal, diesel, gas with the main sustainable/renewable plants being solar, wind, hydro and nuclear.
Unfortunately, sustainable/renewable energy production has not reached the levels where EVs are mainly if not only powered by green electricity. Until green energy becomes the predominant source of energy, EVs will still have a long way to go in replacing ICE powered vehicles. While the individual pollution output of ICEs may be significantly higher than that of EVs, the electricity supply needed to power the large volume of cars will even out the scales between EVs and ICEs.
As soon as we manage to make the switch from fossil fuels to renewables like nuclear fission and fusion which can yield tremendous amounts of energy, EVs will become a significantly more sustainable means of transport compared to ICEs.
Another factor that needs to be evaluated is the battery production and disposal. While ICEs mainly consist of purely mechanical components machined out of metals or plastics, EV batteries are comprised of lithium, cobalt, nickel, and other metals which are primarily mined in African countries with 50-60% of the global cobalt supply for example originating in the Democratic Republic of Congo.
Aside from the human rights violations in the mining of some of the materials required for batteries, the environmental impact is equally devastating. Batteries are made of hazardous materials that need to specially disposed of to ensure no negative impact on the environment.
While ICE powered vehicles may be more complex in parts, and the potential for having to replace individual parts may be higher, but ultimately, most parts of an ICE powered car can have a longer lifespan than EV batteries.
Ultimately though, there have been positive developments in the EV industry including the introduction of a battery which a longer lifespan and greater charge capacity. Some EV manufacturers like Tesla have even started to pull out of Africa for battery material mining and began sourcing the required materials in the United States.
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