Are electric cars really as good as you think?

Electric cars are perceived as being good for the environment because you charge your car with electricity, and you do not have to pay for fuel. Especially with these fuel prices people are more motivated to get cars which run on electricity. You have probably heard people say, “Wow you have an electric car, that’s so good for the environment!” - but are electric cars as good as you think they are? Well let’s dive in!

To start off, electric cars must be charged with electricity, but unfortunately electricity does not just come out of nowhere; it comes from a place called the grid. Each country has multiple different grids where electricity is produced. These grids use fuel to generate energy, but different grids use different types of fuels. Firstly, there are coal fired power stations. These powered stations use coal to create electricity and they emit 800-850 grams of Co2 per kWh. There are many countries which primarily depend on coal powered stations because that is the only resource that they can produce electricity with. Unfortunately, emissions produced by coal contribute to the greenhouse effect. On the other hand, if more countries would rely on renewable energy would it be more energy efficient to own electric cars, causing less carbon pollution. According to the studies made by the Youngs Peoples Trust for The Environment state that the electricity and heat made from renewable energy emits around 36g of CO2 per kWh. That is a massive difference to coal powered stations. If an electric car is being charged by renewable energy, the negative impact on the environment would be far lower than an electric car being charged by energy from a gas-powered coal station.

In addition, cars which run on gasoline do not need a battery unlike electric cars. Of course, this creates more pollution because electricity uses carbon emissions. As the BBC stated, “The global warming potential from electric vehicle production is about twice that of conventional vehicles” This means that cars which run on gasoline have less global warming potential than electric cars, when being assembled. The batteries for electric cars use an element called Lithium which is slowly becoming extinct. This is due to the intensive mining process. In addition, lithium has a very destructive characteristic meaning mining a small portion of lithium can cause various environmental impacts. Studies conducted by the German company called “Change it” showed that Lithium, when mined, produces over 40 percent of the world’s total climate impact. Additionally, an article by the Washington Post mentions that a Tesla Model 3 (which runs on electricity) already produces 65 percent more emissions than the Toyota RAV4 (which runs on gasoline) before the car is even launched.

Electric cars are not all negative. There is also a myriad of positives of electric cars. Electric cars are particularly useful nowadays, due to the shortage of gas and fuel.

You do not have to pay for those unreasonable prices because electric cars can be as cheap as 0.70 dollars when charging the car. In addition, some cities impose a congestion charging zone, where you must pay a certain amount if your car pollutes a certain amount of CO2, which helps you with cheaper prices since you are exempt from these rules if you own an electric car.

Overall owning an electric car can bring similar impacts to the environment than a car which runs on gasoline, so make sure you do your own research about electric cars before being influenced with false hope!