A Wall Street Journal report at the link below says:
Electric cars are promoted as the chic harbinger of an environmentally benign future.
Ads assure us of "zero emissions," and President Obama has promised a million on the road by 2015.
The one million by 2015 prediction won’t even be close.
Consumers remain wary of the cars' limited range, higher price and the logistics of battery-charging.
If you do own an electric you’re thinking it’s worth it because the car is truly green - except it isn’t!
A 2012 comprehensive life-cycle analysis in Journal of Industrial Ecology shows that almost half the lifetime carbon-dioxide emissions from an electric car come from the energy used to produce the car, especially the battery.
The mining of lithium, for instance, is a less than green activity. By contrast, the manufacture of a gas-powered car accounts for 17% of its lifetime carbon-dioxide emissions.
When an electric car rolls off the production line, it has already been responsible for 30,000 pounds of carbon-dioxide emission. By comparison the amount for making a conventional car is only 14,000 pounds.
The production of the electric car has already resulted in sizeable emissions—the equivalent of 80,000 miles of travel in the vehicle!
A Nissan Leaf getting a charge at home using a charger than could cost up to $1,500.
A Nissan Leaf getting a charge away from home - if you can find a charger.
The Nissan Leaf has only a 73-mile range per charge. Drivers attempting long road trips, as in one BBC test drive, have reported that recharging takes so long that the average speed is close to six miles per hour—a bit faster than your average jogger.
To make matters worse, the batteries in electric cars fade with time, just as they do in a cellphone.
Nissan estimates that after five years, the less effective batteries in a typical Leaf bring the range down from 73 miles to 55 miles.
Even if the electric car is driven for 90,000 miles and the owner stays away from coal-powered electricity, the car will cause just 24% less carbon-dioxide emission than its gas-powered cousin
This is a far cry from "zero emissions." Over its entire lifetime, the electric car will be responsible for 8.7 tons of carbon dioxide less than the average conventional car.
Yet the U.S. federal government essentially subsidizes electric-car buyers with up to $7,500. In addition, more than $5.5 billion in federal grants and loans go directly to battery and electric-car manufacturers like California-based Fisker Automotive and Tesla Motors.
This is a very bad deal for taxpayers and the environment which electric cars were intended to help.
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