NY Times Article: How Green Is That Electric Car [Taycan & Model S]? And When It Hits 100 M.P.H.?

[kmcdonal]

NY Times just posted this article on the environmental side of the Taycan and Teslas. I could quibble about certain parts of the article, but overall I thought it was pretty solid.

https://www.nytimes.com/2020/10/15/business/electric-supercars-porsche-taycan-tesla.html

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[dmb]

interesting, good thing in arizona there is plenty of sun. Between my solar panels and telsa power walls i am off grid almost entirely

 

[Reg]

NY Times just posted this article on the environmental side of the Taycan and Teslas. I could quibble about certain parts of the article, but overall I thought it was pretty solid.

https://www.nytimes.com/2020/10/15/business/electric-supercars-porsche-taycan-tesla.html

For those without a subscription, what it Is the summary? Thanks

 

[kmcdonal]

For those without a subscription, what it Is the summary? Thanks

I think they give you a certain number of free articles a month, but here is the text...


They only look like conspicuous polluters.

A new breed of electric performance cars, including Porsche’s Taycan and the Tesla Model S P100D, shows how environmentally minded fans of horsepower might square their circles.
A supercar with a carbon footprint that seems closer to a jet engine’s than to a Prius’s may feel irresponsible in the face of climate change. But what about electric vehicles that can keep pace with or even outperform the likes of Lamborghini?

The Tesla Model S can sprint to 60 miles per hour in slightly more than two seconds, making it one of the quickest machines on the market. Is it notably cleaner than a comparably fast gasoline-fueled car like the BMW M5, which is powered by a fuel-hungry 617-horsepower twin-turbo V8?

The numbers say yes. The Tesla is convincingly the green choice, but there’s more to the story.
Even small, less powerful electric vehicles haven’t always been cleaner than the most efficient gas-powered autos. A 2012 article in The New York Times summarized a report from the Union of Concerned Scientists that found the environmental benefits of subcompact, modestly powered electric cars like the Nissan Leaf depended on where they were charged.

At the time, many states still relied heavily on coal-fired plants for electricity, and the investigators found that in some areas, electrics were no cleaner than efficient gasoline-powered cars when factoring in the emissions resulting from electricity generation.
E.V. technology has advanced considerably since then, and electricity generation in America has shifted, as well.

The latest report from the Union of Concerned Scientists, in a February article by David Reichmuth, its senior vehicles engineer, is much more optimistic than the one eight years ago. After analyzing all emissions — including those from fossil fuel production, along with conventional vehicle tailpipe emissions and power plant emissions — the group found that electric vehicles were responsible for about 10 percent less overall emissions in 2018 than they were just two years earlier. Emissions generated during vehicle and battery production or in the mining of lithium for E.V. batteries were not part of the calculation.

In this study, the average electric vehicle in the United States was found to be responsible for emission levels equivalent to those generated by a gasoline vehicle that gets 88 miles per gallon. In areas where a lot of coal is still burned to make electricity, the electric vehicle m.p.g. equivalency number can fall to as low as 49 miles to a gallon, but those areas are few and less densely populated than regions with clean power.

OK, but what about electric supercars like the Model S and Taycan? Since they produce mammoth horsepower, doesn’t it follow that their emission levels are high as well?

“A very powerful electric performance automobile is less efficient than a hyper-efficient E.V. but still far cleaner than a comparably powerful car that burns gasoline,” Mr. Reichmuth said in a telephone interview. He added that a Model S driven in California, which has some of the nation’s cleanest electrical power, is about equivalent to a gasoline vehicle that achieves 120 m.p.g. In other words, in an area with relatively clean electric plants, this extremely powerful machine can be cleaner than even the most efficient gas car.

The numbers Mr. Reichmuth cited assume that the Model S is driven responsibly. With the throttle held wide open, a Model S will gobble up the watt-hours. While Tesla doesn’t provide data for aggressive driving, some Tesla owners have explored the extremes. One estimate on Tesla’s web forums claims that at full throttle the car will use about 869 watt-hours of electricity per mile and have a range of about 88 miles on a full charge. In simple terms, that means driving 30 miles at full throttle would require about the same amount of electrical energy that an average American home uses in one day
.
Driving at wide-open throttle at length would quickly heat the Tesla’s battery, triggering electronic safeguards that would slow the vehicle. So the Tesla isn’t going to take on gasoline rivals in an endurance race. But its fun-to-drive factor is very high, and in short sprints, it is nearly unbeatable. In one 2016 drag race captured on YouTube, a Model S takes on a 707-horsepower Dodge Challenger Hellcat, and emerges the victor.

The Taycan, according to Car and Driver magazine, is rated even quicker, but the magazine editors recorded identical 70 MPGe power consumption with both cars on a 300-mile trip at 75 miles an hour. (MPGe is an acronym for miles per gallon equivalent, and it’s the government’s way of quantifying the efficiency of electric vehicles. The Environmental Protection Agency, officially, pegs the Tesla at 97 MPGe combined city and highway driving, and the Porsche at 68 MPGe combined.)

The discrepancy in the Tesla and Porsche E.P.A. ratings is likely due to the structure of the test and appears to indicate that the Tesla has an efficiency advantage over the Porsche in stop-and-go city driving. No gasoline-powered high-performance car can be driven anywhere near as economically as the Tesla or Porsche electric.

A comparison of E.P.A. ratings suggests that the least economical gasoline-powered cars emit more than twice the emissions of the most economical gas car. For example, the Mitsubishi Mirage G4, with its three-cylinder engine, is E.P.A. rated at 35 m.p.g. combined, while a Ford Shelby GT 500 Mustang earns a 14 m.p.g. combined rating.

The spread between the electric extremes is much narrower. The Hyundai Ioniq Electric, one of the most efficient electric vehicles, is E.P.A. rated at 122 MPGe, yet the Tesla Model S Performance car earns a 98 MPGe rating.

Choosing a high-performance E.V. over a mild-mannered electric comes with much less of an efficiency penalty.

The way E.V.s are charged adds to their worth. When asked if electric cars were overtaxing the electrical grid, Mr. Reichmuth said, “A high-performance E.V. is not like an appliance with a cord that draws electricity in real time.”

He added, “Oftentimes, they are plugged in at night. So a high-performance model is going to be plugged in longer, but it doesn’t take more power at any one time.”

Consider, too, that charging stations are turning to renewable power sources like solar, in combination with a battery storage system. Tesla has promised that its Supercharger high-speed charger network will eventually be powered exclusively by renewable energy.

It’s all good news for performance enthusiasts. Now you can go fast and go green. You may have to play to an artificial soundtrack, but play you can.

 

[Dave T]

It's true that the source of electricity is a very important consideration. You're not so green if the electricity you're charging your car with is coming from a coal fired power plant. But one thing that the article doesn't consider is that you often have an option of a greener source of your home electricity. My electric company (National Grid) lets you choose a different "supplier" of your electricity. I recently switched to a 100% green supplier that actually saved us money relative to the default supply charges from National Grid. So I can charge my car with virtually zero carbon footprint. I don't know the options for other people in other states, but I'd think many (most?) would have the same option.

 

[manitou202]

Overall, a good article.

5+ years ago I had a diesel SUV, a sport sedan, and a 911. Now I'm an all electric fleet offset by the solar power generated on my roof. Not to mention my local utility is now at 20% renewable and will be at 80% renewable by 2030 with Colorado's largest solar farm and battery storage in progress.

I also haven't purchased a gallon of gas in over a year.

 

[Genau]

Now I'm an all electric fleet offset by the solar power generated on my roof. Not to mention my local utility is now at 20% renewable and will be at 80% renewable by 2030 with Colorado's largest solar farm and battery storage in progress.

That's awesome! A rarely mentioned benefit of reducing heat exchange power plant (coal etc.) consumption is that you are conserving scarce freshwater. Where you live in Colorado, most electricity is produced from fossil fuel plants accounting for about 10% of the demand on the rapidly diminishing Front Range aquifer reserve. That freshwater is evaporated into the atmosphere from the power plant heat exchangers, and comes at the expense of local agriculture, and increases demand on the already critically oversubscribed Colorado river. (Source: me, when I taught environmental chemistry at the Air Force Academy in Colorado Springs and took the cadets on field trips to the coal plant etc.)

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