Electric Vehicles and Air Quality

January 31, 2012By electricleoUncategorized

The health costs of air pollution

You may have noticed that I tend to emphasise the health issues surrounding our vehicle fleet.  With air pollution costing the NSW Dept of Health over 4 billion dollars annually in health costs it is a reasonable case to put at the forefront of  the case for electrifying our vehicle fleet.  More deaths are caused in NSW from air pollution than traffic accidents!  The same story is global.  Despite the huge advances in fuel efficiency in recent decades the sheer increase in the number of vehicles in our cities has meant that any gains in efficiency and emissions controls have been outweighed by the volume of vehicles.  No matter what we do there is no clean way to burn petrol/diesel.  We can however over time clean up our power sources which means EVs run on the normal power grid will produce less and less emissions over time.  With zero local emissions in electric vehicles and zero emissions overall if powered by clean power, there is the opportunity to clean up our cities and reduce the enormous costs due to poor air quality.

I’ve scouted around the net a bit to find others interested in this aspect of EVs.  Here is additional information for this compelling argument to electrify our fleet sooner rather than later.

California Adopts Strict New Car Standards, Updates Zero-Emissions Vehicle Mandate – Bloomberg BNA

It is not surprising that California is taking these measures.  From previous research (links available on MyElectricCar.com.au), air pollution costs California in excess of 25 billion dollars annually in health costs.

Green Guru: Do Electric Cars Really Reduce Pollution?

Cars fueled by an electric charge produce fewer emissions than their gas-guzzling cousins, even when taking into account that plug-ins draw energy from power plants. Most electricity in the United States comes from natural gas, nuclear energy, and coal—the … In light of the EPA clamping down on air pollution violations, utilities are taking steps to move away from coal. For instance, one of the nation’s largest coal-burning utilities, the Tennessee Valley Authority, has …

Some more food for thought as I’ve seen silly arguments saying that the overall pollution from EVs (if they run on coal powered electricity) are greater than petrol/diesel.

That’s all for this post – hit the website (myElectricCar.com.au) if you want more information on the air quality and health aspects related to electrifying our vehicle fleet.

:) Leo