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28 Feb ’12
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I would like to know what the cost and environmental impact is of the electricity used to power the Volt and Leaf? Would it be better to just have a crappy, slow and tiny car with a ultra efficient and clean gas engine?
well the electricity has to come from somewhere so even if the car doesn't really pollute, the electricity you use to charge will (especially if it comes from a thermal plant).
add to that to loss in efficiency from the transportation in the power line, the losses when it's being transformed to go to your house, the losses in the car's charger, etc.
if it takes you 1kWh to go somewhere, it's always gonna cost you 1kWh no matter where it comes from.
the answer i think, is not changing where that 1kWh comes from, but improving efficiency and just drive less
28 Feb ’12
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and as far as environmental impact of a product, we have to look at the whole product lifecycle, not just the energy consummed by the end user.
that includes:
-how much energy is used to get the raw material and what impact does it have on environment
-how much energy to transform raw materials into finished products
-what chemicals are used to produce
-how much energy to transport the product to the end user
-how much packaging
-how much energy is used by end used to perform product function.
-how do you disposed of the product after it's usefull life
-how long is the usefull life of the product vs another.
etc. etc.
there are so many more variables when it comes to the environmental aspect of a product and people forget about that as soon as you say something is green in an add
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