Talk Morgan Forums Community The Malvern Arms EV article from Rowan Atkinson

Some may find this article of interest - it makes sense to me and further reassurance that leaving the jump into EV is a wise move for many reasons.

Well balanced article

Yep that about sums it up

An interesting read. I see it has also been linked to on a photo forum I'm a member of

Is this a well-written article? I'm not so sure. The whole issue of whether Lithium Ion based EV vehicles are 'good' for the planet is perhaps a little more complex than Rowan's admittedly eloquently overview. For example:

1. Rowan argues that Lithium Ion batteries are bad, because the amount of CO2 produced during their manufacture is high, and thus outweighs the reduction in CO2 of the vehicle they power. But that is only true because the mining of Lithium requires large amounts of energy that is currently based on fossil fuels (See: Crawford, I. (2022, March 1). How Much CO2 Is Emitted by Manufacturing Batteries? Department of Mechanical Engineering. Retrieved November 25, 2022, from <https://meche.mit.edu/news-media/how-much-co2-emitted-manufacturing-batteries). It's not that mining lithium is a process that intrinsically generates a large amount of CO2. Use green energy to power the mining and the problem then may be largely solved. And of course, once you have mined it and put in batteries, there is then the opportunity to recycle the lithium when the battery life is complete - that may or may not be possible with acceptable levels of CO2 generation.

2. He argues that most people sell their cars on after 3 or 5 years. Again that may be true, but is there a big pile of unused cars sitting around as a consequence of this? Are people scrapping such useable cars - don't they just get used by those of us who buy second-hand? My ICE Seat Leon at 10 years old is pretty much as good as new - and I might expect that someone will be using it for the next 10-20 years. Rowan states: "The first owners of new cars just kept them for five years, on average, instead of the current three, then car production and the CO2 emissions associated with it, would be vastly reduced." Surely this is not a valid argument, as subsequent owners will use the car - and consequently, the total number of cars in use does not increase simply because some folks sell after a few years.

I would regard this article as falling into the entertainment category than scientific or economic analysis. (Sorry, Rowan).

https://www.iea.org/data-and-statis...ssions-of-a-mid-size-bev-and-ice-vehicle

suggests that, taking into account manufacturing costs and lifetime running costs, but not eventual recyling costs then an EV vehicle produces 50% less greenhouse gases than the comparable IC vehicle:







[img]https://www.tm-img.com/image/LA5QW[/img]

Struck me as a well-balanced article - perhaps light on science, but then it's in a daily newspaper.

I can see that as the volume of synthetic fuel rises, its cost will fall. You'd think that production would be relatively local to consumption, so the distribution footprint would be lower than that of petrol - there's no need to move unrefined oil around the planet on highly polluting ships. And if the carbon footprint of the manufacturing process is less than the process to produce petrol, then it's an all-round win. (Even if the main source of pollution from cars are already the tyres & brakes.)

An aside, on battery life. The owner of an i8 had his battery capacity tested as it came up to 8 years old, at the end of the manufacturer's warranty. The car's been used per BMW's guidance, and plugged in when not in use. He found negligible deterioration in the capacity, which is very encouraging. The eight year warranty is apparently a consequence of international legislation and has nothing to do with the inherent physical properties of the battery. Which indicates that the battery likely has a longer life in the car than might have been expected. That's a good thing.

Will

I read the article.
Well written, but some of the logic doesn't flow, mostly because no one seems to have hard, reliable data on the real CO2 burden from mining lithium to complete battery.
Also, the debate is infested with opinion and emotion and greenwash, so getting to the truth is hard.

I put my toe into the EV furnace, but pulled it out after a year, before I became burnt because the EV didn't match my retired lifestyle and after a couple of long trips I lost faith in the availability of charging points.
So I a year ago bought a late 2016 Porsche Boxster S with 10,500 miles or so on the odometer: the result was the sale of the Morgan, because a 6 year old Porsche seemed to me to be a better prospect than a new Plus Four.
Would I buy a new EV? Not at the moment: charging infrastructure is the main stumbling block, followed in second place by way EVs perform, a consequence of their weight.
I wouldn't buy a NEW ICE car either, there are plenty of good used cars on the market.

Synthetic gasoline will be available almost everywhere by 2030 and that, with hydrogen fuel cells, change the dynamic of change. It will be interesting.

I like the term Greenwash. Last week in Scotland, the hotel in Fort Augustus has charging points, but up at the Kylescu Hotel there are none, and the lack of a car park won't make it easy to install. Our hotel in Aboyne is having one fitted, but need a three phase metered supply for the high delivery spec charge point, but the installation engineer didn't mention that until he'd installed everything, except the three phase meter.

EVs were rare beyond Inverness. Motorhomes are the vehicle of choice. I can't see that changing any time soon either. Even caravans were rare in May.

I like the article as it is written in a non emotive style although it will of course produce emotive responses. There is an uprising over here in the State of Colorado as the populace is beginning to revolt against paying more for taxes and electricity to cover the costs of the charging stations and free electricity to the EV owners who are the more wealthy who can afford their own electricity, vehicle taxes and the infrastructure. Things are so fluid and unproven at this time I am going to wait and see what pans out over the next 5-10 years as all my vehicles are over 10 years old except my M3W.