[mayankjha1806]

Electric cars are not the future, as the manufacturer is making one to believe, they are not less polluting in fact they pollute more for the the amount of electricity they consume. On another thread where future fuel technologies were discussed, i posted Hydrogen fuel cell cars are the way in the future as we have abundance of hydrogen, it emits water (which is non polluting)

[pareshraheja]

Originally Posted by yosbert

Not really. I was not talking about installing a new power plant, but rather about refining fuel (petrol/diesel) and then transporting that to your vehicle. In short the effects of actually producing and delivering the fuel to you. Because that is what we are considering when we consider the pollution in generating the electricity for the EV.

I agree with what you say but, even if we consider an existing power plant, coal /biomass/oil&gas has to be transported from their respective locations to the power plants adding to the pollution. Further after the fuel burns in the system, the particulate emissions and for ex: ash from the coal has to be disposed off. Again for the same, there is fuel consumed adding to the emission.

So, in a nutshell, I will still say that these factors being present in both cases cancel each other out.

Cheers

[yosbert]

Originally Posted by man_and_machine

The stats will provide a better picture why the E vehicles in India add more pain than gain.

Several problems with the stats here. Let me point out a few.

Originally Posted by man_and_machine

Now look at the emissions (these are US number, where lets consider its the most efficient)

coal-fired generation are: 2,249 lbs/MWh of carbon dioxide, 13 lbs/MWh of sulfur dioxide, and 6 lbs/MWh of nitrogen oxides.

Fuel: 1135 lbs/MWh of carbon dioxide, 0.1 lbs/MWh of sulfur dioxide, and 1.7 lbs/MWh of nitrogen oxides

Source please. These figures look a little off. Here is a link which contains, among other things, CO2 emissions for Coal vis-a-vis Petroleum (page 2) power plants. The figures are a little old though (1999), but we get a general comparative idea: 2.095 vs. 1.969 lb/kWh.
Note that the figures for Petroleum are for Petroleum fueled power plants. Now efficiency of gasoline-powered cars is quite low. Its about 20%, most of the heat comes out of the tailpipe. Here is the reference.

Originally Posted by man_and_machine

Meaning e-cars are produce 6 times more pollution than petrol cars (considering today's reliance on coal for generation).

I couldn't find the enthu to do the calculations to derive the amount of electrical energy required to drive the same distance as 1 gallon of gasoline, but refer here for someone who actually did.
Also note that 1 gallon of gasoline produces about 20 lb of CO2. 1kWh from coal is about 2 lb of CO2.
Even if we account for transmission losses, battery efficiency, etc., we can do the comparison. The ratio will definitely not be 6:1 maybe something like 1:1.

Originally Posted by man_and_machine

Pollution and social responsibility, e-cars in my view do not score over their traditional fuel counterparts atleast for a considerable time in India, unless the situation changes in the future!

I am not commenting at all on the social responsibility, etc. of driving an EV in India. That's a totally different debate altogether.
Just expressed a few of my views. Hope I didn't offend you.

[pareshraheja]

Originally Posted by srishiva

If Solar was even half efficient as you mention, the world would have been a greener place already.

I know most of U.S power comes from coal. The recent advances enable very clean (relatively speaking) generation from coal. Chinese ones are not that clean. Hence the study done in China cannot be a model is all that I mean.

I guess you are mixing efficiency with load factor. Solar is close to 95% efficient but, the load factor is lower than even hydel. This means it is close to a 35% load factor. So, even though I too wish the world to be a greener place, in simple terms, supply is no where close to demand and hence, the major power supply is on coal based plants.

Further, please elaborate what you meant by technology being used in US is good and the one being used in China is not that good.

As per my knowledge in the industry, the most efficient form of power plant based on coal technology is SUPER-CRITICAL-the plant efficiency for which, I mentioned in my first post.

Also, please do-not generalize Chinese products without knowing the facts. They have both the best and the worst at-least in the power plant industry. For ex: Shanghai Electric: see their customer reference list (do a Google search). Some of their power plants in the super-critical range are as good as the Americans if not better.

There is no denying that Chinese can stoop down to the lowest level when it comes to price but, if a customer is willing to buy a lemon then you cannot blame the manufacturer.

Cheers

[man_and_machine]

Originally Posted by yosbert

Just expressed a few of my views. Hope I didn't offend you.

As a true T-Bian I am never offended with an alternative view! That is what this forum is all about.Feel free to agree/disagree!

The stats are from the US energy watchdog website (need to dig it out again).

Just from a outlook do you think our RPTS and Ramagundam are more efficient compared to my i-Vtec when it comes to kW to kW comparison :-) ?

[srishiva]

Originally Posted by pareshraheja

I guess you are mixing efficiency with load factor. Solar is close to 95% efficient but, the load factor is lower than even hydel. This means it is close to a 35% load factor. So, even though I too wish the world to be a greener place, in simple terms, supply is no where close to demand and hence, the major power supply is on coal based plants.

Further, please elaborate what you meant by technology being used in US is good and the one being used in China is not that good.

As per my knowledge in the industry, the most efficient form of power plant based on coal technology is SUPER-CRITICAL-the plant efficiency for which, I mentioned in my first post.

Also, please do-not generalize Chinese products without knowing the facts. They have both the best and the worst at-least in the power plant industry. For ex: Shanghai Electric: see their customer reference list (do a Google search). Some of their power plants in the super-critical range are as good as the Americans if not better.

There is no denying that Chinese can stoop down to the lowest level when it comes to price but, if a customer is willing to buy a lemon then you cannot blame the manufacturer.

Cheers

For me efficiency is how much energy is converted to useful form. Hence solar panels are not more than 20% efficient at best.

Lets talk about coal power plants without generalizing about chinese products in other areas.

Power plants in the west use high temperature and pressure steam to produce 20 to 50 percent more KW at the same amount of pollution. The plants are costlier and sulphur is also reduced from emission which is not so in China.

China subsidizes energy use to make it cheaper which will see increase in use of cheap equipment, more pollution. Pollution from chinese coal plants are seen in Japan, Korea etc. People use headlights to drive in some cities in china....

[pareshraheja]

Originally Posted by srishiva

Power plants in the west use high temperature and pressure steam to produce 20 to 50 percent more KW at the same amount of pollution. The plants are costlier and sulphur is also reduced from emission which is not so in China.

China subsidizes energy use to make it cheaper which will see increase in use of cheap equipment, more pollution. Pollution from chinese coal plants are seen in Japan, Korea etc. People use headlights to drive in some cities in china....

Buddy, as I mentioned earlier, the most efficient coal plants are called super-critical power plants. In these power plants the coal is converted into a powder form with the help of an equipment called pulvarizer. Companies like B&W (USA), Foster Wheeler(Europe), Shanghai Electric(Chinese), Doosan(Korean) all manufacture these pulvarizer's. They all are similar in quality and efficiency. On the exhaust side, there is an equipment called ESP (electro-static precipetator) which captures the particulate matter. Again these are manufactured by different vendors across the globe. Chinese too use the same vendors. So, how can we conclude that US power plants are better than Chinese.

Yes, there is a great possibility that some dubious power plant owners in China bypass the ESP and hence it makes it extremely dangerous. But, believe me, I have seen some of the Indian customers do the same to save a few bucks.

Sulphur is an inherent property of the fuel. The super critical boiler does not add or reduce the sulphur. This sulphur combines with hydrogen & oxygen during combustion and forms acid rain(in layman's words). To reduce the effect of sulphur, limestone(calcium carbonate) is added in the boiler. No equipment is used on the exhaust of the boiler to capture sulphur. So, I suppose whether you add limestone in a Chinese boiler or American boiler, the results are similar

Yes, on the subject that Chinese use cheap equipment in some of their power plants to save on cost - I totally agree. Also, I am in agreement that the basis of comparison with Chinese power plants cannot be a benchmark for this debate.

However, the fact remains that electric vehicles do-not reduce pollution in comparison to gasoline run vehicles based on points mentioned in my earlier post.

[ilangop]

@mayank & @suhaas,
Agreed that burning hydrogen leaves a cleaner residue, but from where and how did this hydrogen come from. Where did the energy for compressing & storing derived from? Electrolysis again needs electricity to split it from water molecules. And now we are back to square one, the efficiency of a Thermal power plant and efficiency of intermediate processes in filling hydrogen into a car.
-Ilango

[joslicx]

Hydrogen Fuel Cell! Is it really viable for a country like India?
What is the technology cost? How about maintenance?

How about your Mass Rapid Transport System running on electricity that is generated by small dedicated solar power plants. Govt can easily commision them if they have the will. It will be quite clean. Also it can mean solar energy costs can come down drastically (because of volumes) which can potentially mean it might become viable for individual customers for personal home use (and displace the polluting diesel). Why cant the lawmakers understand this???

[ksreddy]

Article on Electric Cars:

Myths And Facts About Electric Cars

Myths And Facts About Electric Cars | Media Matters for America

Articles refutes the myth that Electric Cars do not reduce CO2 etc.

[suhaas307]

Originally Posted by ilangop

@mayank & @suhaas,
Agreed that burning hydrogen leaves a cleaner residue, but from where and how did this hydrogen come from. Where did the energy for compressing & storing derived from? Electrolysis again needs electricity to split it from water molecules. And now we are back to square one, the efficiency of a Thermal power plant and efficiency of intermediate processes in filling hydrogen into a car.
-Ilango

Hydrogen is the most abundant gas in the atmosphere. I'm sure mankind will find a way of effectively and efficiently extracting the gas and storing it, to be used for such purposes.

[srishiva]

Originally Posted by suhaas307

Hydrogen is the most abundant gas in the atmosphere. I'm sure mankind will find a way of effectively and efficiently extracting the gas and storing it, to be used for such purposes.

I agree. The future has to be based on a hydrogen economy. Its doesn't require batteries to store energy. I wonder what the difference would be in using power to generate hydrogen vs storing the same in batteries. What would be the efficiency comparison with the current technologies.
Fuel cell stack would be the cost difference I think.

[srishiva]

Union of concerned scientists are releasing a study on green house gases released resulting from charging the battery packs of pure electric vehicles. They considered the Nissan Leaf for the study.

They took the source of power generation while giving the equivalent mileage. In california where the power is cleaner, the Leaf gave a mileage equivalent to 79 mpg while in Denver it was 33 mpg.

Power consumed by Leaf is 0.34 kwh per mile (0.36 kwh for Volt). A hybrid would generate much less greenhouse gases than a pure electric in regions where the power sources are dirtier.

If you consider the batteries themselves which are a headache after their life, the hybrids may be cleaner on an average.
[source: NY times]

[volkman10]

Some facts on EV emission claim,

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_QW57LzLKWc

[sudev]

Interesting.

How does one go further and add costs and pollution generated on both sides based on life cycle?

Elements like resource transport from mines/wells, refining, handling, waste disposal.

What cost do you put on depletion of natural resources?

Pollution away from cities is as much pollution. So that cannot be a factor.

Interesting to read varied inputs. Love Tbhp for it's resource base.