Electric cars – we should be careful what we wish for.

With electric vehicles (EVs) we should be careful what we wish for. Recently 79 per cent of panellists surveyed for a newspaper said that more should be done to encourage their use, and the Chief Scientist, Dr Alan Finkel, is an owner and a notable advocate. However, the story is not all good.

Toyota Prius.

Let’s take greenhouse gas emissions. Dr Finkel pointed out that a Tesla, charged at the national average greenhouse intensity of the grid (910 kg CO2/MWh), is responsible for 168 grams of CO2 per km (emitted at the power station), and a Toyota Corolla for 178 grams per km (at the tailpipe). He also mentions one of the smallest EVs in the Australian Green Vehicle Guide, the Renault Zoe, at 121 grams per km.

Read the comment in The Age by George Wilkenfeld - “Electric cars – we should be careful what we wish for.”

(Still, we miss the point - the conversation should not be about the effectiveness of any sort of privately owned vehicle (electric or otherwise) as the energy-rich infrastructure such vehicles demand is prohibitively carbon-costly. We face an energy-scarce future and rather than spending time, effort and innovation on what can be easily shown to be a wasteful pursuit, we should be exploring, creating and building a public transport/transit system that through its sophistication will make the privately-owned car wholly irrelevant - Robert McLean)