Electric cars - where does the electricity come from?

y0ssar1an22

I'm missing something obvious here

an electric car gets charged via a socket connected to the electrical grid. as above, where does all that electricity come from?

surely it cant be from wind/solar/tidal (and certainly not from nuclear).

does it still boil down to gas or coal?

All of the above, including the certainly not.

Geuze

The same place all electricity comes from.

A mix of:

coal

gas

wind

imports

Quantum Erasure

we run the gas off the electricity and the electricity off the gas, and we save two hundred pounds a year...

jhegarty

Mostly gas and renewables.

Coal is almost gone.

https://www.seai.ie/data-and-insights/seai-statistics/key-statistics/electricity/

KilOit

Lightning

y0ssar1an22

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118430826#Comment_118430826

20 days for you to get around!

Alkers

It's cleaner than using petrol or diesel, is constantly improving as renewable proportions increase, you can create your own green electricity from pv panels and you can also elect for a green energy provider.

y0ssar1an22

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118430862#Comment_118430862

so why are electric cars better for the environment?

the raw ingredients are the same, just the method of delivery is different.

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118430891#Comment_118430891

Do you need us to go over the difference between the words "some" and "all"? Because that's going to be a stumbling block.

y0ssar1an22

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118430921#Comment_118430921

no thank you sir.

what i want someone to do is explain how an electric car, which needs to be charged via the national grid which runs on fossil fuels; is any more better for the environment than a car that runs on fossil fuels.

at then end of the day, the energy is being provided by the same source?

Zebra3

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118430891#Comment_118430891

It’s all a bit of a con and a chance for virtue signallers to feel better about themselves.

E-cars will be fuelled more environmentally friendly, but they are still huge damaging to the environment in their manufacture and distribution.

The widespread ownership of cars whether they are traditionally bad for the environment or part of the new conjob will make no difference to congestion and road deaths, as well as the continued desecration of residential areas.

unkel

EVs in Ireland are overwhelmingly charged at home. At night. At the moment about 55% of all electricity produced at night in Ireland is from wind (this percentage is growing every year). So there is your answer. Electric cars are mostly powered by renewable energy.

And to add to that, plenty of EV owners also have solar PV and the most popular electric car charge point being installed in Ireland today is a Zappi. Which is a smart device that charges your EV when you produce more solar PV than you use at any moment. As an example, I have 8kwp of solar PV installed on my home. This produces 8MWh per year of renewable electricty. The average Irish household uses 3.5MWh of electricity per year.

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118431109#Comment_118431109

Yet you still don't seem to understand the difference. You're doing one of 2 things, ironically I'd get in trouble for pointing them out.

Let's pretend you're being completely sincere.

ICE car: Runs 100% on petrol or diesel and about 33% efficiency.

EV: Runs on electricity. A lot of people charge using solar, not the grid. And if you do use the grid it was made up of 43% renewables in 2020. And electric motors are wonderfully efficient, usually 90+%. So the amount of fossil fuel used to power an EV is about half what it is for an ICE (currently, it keeps on falling every year). So an EV uses roughly half as much fossil fuels (likely less with people using solar) per unit of energy put into the car and then uses it 3x more efficiently. Even allowing for 10% loss on the grid they're a fuckload more efficient even if the power comes from a oil burning plant.

Any more questions?

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118431128#Comment_118431128

So we should just be getting rid of private vehicles altogether then?

Freddie Mcinerney

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/2058226377/electric-cars-where-does-the-electricity-come-from

Well if they did not turn off the turbines at night. That be a help.

Mrs OBumble

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118431138#Comment_118431138

Yeah, keep residential areas sacred!

The J Stands for Jay

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118430891#Comment_118430891

ICE cars use a lot of their energy moving their fuel and engine around. Power plants don't move, so there's a bit of a saving there.

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118431356#Comment_118431356

How does the coal get to the coal plants?

NIMAN

I will accept that to make EVs we have to consume, but new cars are being made all the time anyway, so is it not better to be making more efficient ev cars than ice ones? And yes a large portion of the electricity used to charge them is coming from fossil fuels, but it's falling annually.

Secondly, and something I don't think has been mentioned yet, if we end up in 20 or 30 yrs time with city centres with EVs only, there won't be diesel fumes choking up our lungs and our kids lungs. No poisonous exhausts.

eddhorse

http://smartgriddashboard.eirgrid.com/#roi

Here is the current SMart Grid Dashboard, 61% renewable, of course this will fluctuate.

Gregor Samsa

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118431522#Comment_118431522

Moneypoint is the only coal power station in Ireland. The coal gets there by ship (it's on the Shannon estuary). There's a plan for it to cease burning coal by 2025.

magicbastarder

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118431356#Comment_118431356

e-cars use a lot of energy moving their batteries and motor around. e-cars tend to be heavier than equivalent sized ICE cars.

let's not forget that when you read efficiency figures for ICE cars vs e-cars, people often just quote the efficiency of the drivetrain; factoring in the weight is an important one to consider.

e.g. if i drive to the shops in an e-car instead of an ICE car to buy the paper, the efficiency goes from maybe 2.5% to 5%; i.e. if i weigh 5% of the weight of the car and the goal is to get me around, i'm hauling around 20 times my own weight in the vehicle used for conveying me)

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118431634#Comment_118431634

I'm aware, but thanks. I can see Moneypoint from my front door.

magicbastarder

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118431605#Comment_118431605

is it possible to reach 100% renewables generation in ireland? i mean, even if we had the generating capacity to, i assume we'd have to leave a few base load stations running anyway, so even if the wind generated electricity was available anyway, it'd be excess to requirements?

Gregor Samsa

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118431668#Comment_118431668

I think the plan is to have 80% renewable (mainly wind) with most of the rest generated by natural gas - which in itself will be replaced by hydrogen.

Gregor Samsa

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118431656#Comment_118431656

You do know we're on the internet now and we can't see you standing at your front door? Don't be too alarmed if people give you answers in good faith to questions you ask.

kirving

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118431137#Comment_118431137

As Buttonftw says, a combustion engine is in the region of 33% effecient at the very best. The theoretical maximum is maybe 50%.

But because you need to constantly run the engine at different speeds and power levels to drive around the place, it's difficult for engineers to optimise every component for efficiency. ie: Sometimes you need a strong (heavy) engine to accelerate comfortably, but this adds inefficiency at all other times. Sometimes you're running it cold, sometimes it needs an oil change, sometimes it's running at a speed that doesn't allow all of the fuel to burn.

Even if you ran an ESB power plant on Petrol or Diesel, and used that power to charge an EV, it would be much more effecient to run. This is because a power plant runs at a single speed, ideally under a constant load, where there is plenty of space to add extra devices to improve efficiency, and everything little part of it can be optimised extremely well, and get much closer to the theoretical maximum.

Even if you add charging and motor inefficiencies on top - it's still better than burning petrol in the car itself.

But, the EV takes more energy to build, so it takes a while to break even form an energy usage standpoint.

If your EV was built in China and charged in Poland from a coal fired power station, it would take years of driving to break even.

A European built EV, run in Sweden is a much greener option.

fergiesfolly

Creating energy in central locations, ie power stations is more efficient than in millions of individual ICE engines. Electric motors are more efficient than their fossil fuel powered cousins, so that's another energy saving.

Also, if ecars don't come down in price, they're going to be out of reach to low and low-middle income earners, who will have to use public transport, so energy use for transport will fall off a cliff

crisco10

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118431646#Comment_118431646

Totally agree that right sizing of cars is important. But taking everything into account, EV's still use less energy to move from A to B than an ICE vehicle.

An average EV SUV consumes about 20kWh / 100km.

An average ICE SUV consumes about 6l/100km. At 10kWh per Litre (petrol is a little less, Diesel a little more), thats 60kWh /100 km for an ICE. I.e. triple the energy consumption of the EV above.

Disclaimer: Consumption rates based on manufacturers claims which are equally "ideal".

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118431186#Comment_118431186

They, mostly, turn off at night because there is nothing to consume the kWh during the night. If we had more EV's charging over night, this would happen less.

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118431668#Comment_118431668

Renewables, yes. Wind, No.

We do need base load/spinning reserve. But in theory, this can be provided from other sources, doesn't necessarily need to be conventional power plants.

E.g. the flywheel that ESB are building at Moneypoint can provide spinning reserve

Finally, even if EV's were powered exclusively from large Gas/Oil combined cycle power stations, it would still be better than the equivalent ICE scenario. Power plants have efficiencies of scale, rarely cold start and are better maintained than most ICE vehicles on the road. Also, it's easier to deploy Carbon Capture and scrub the exhaust gases from a power plant than millions of ICE vehicles.

The J Stands for Jay

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118431522#Comment_118431522

The same way as petrol and diesel get into the country, but without having to distributed to various filling stations and then pulled around by the cars that burn them. Better for the fuel to be dumped in one location where it's to be used, near the water on which it was transported.

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118431724#Comment_118431724

It was a rhetorical question to the poster I quoted, I'd have thought that was obvious to most posters... Apparently not

Furze99

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118431131#Comment_118431131

And of course, wind farms have substantial carbon footprints in themselves. The fossil fuel industry has been justifiably criticised for many years for not including the environmental destruction as part of their costs of production. We see the same pattern with the wind energy industry. EVs may be a little less polluting overall in the long run but generally speaking, it's a three card trick to churn the market and generate new industries.

Bottom line, if you wanna be a Green - then walk or cycle. Live, Work and Play locally. Give up yer old cars, EVs or ICEs.

Gregor Samsa

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118431797#Comment_118431797

Rhetorical questions are still worth answering. A rhetorical question is done to make a point, a statement of fact disguised as a question. However, the factual answer to the rhetorical question does not always make the point that the person posing the question thinks it does.

In this case, the rhetorical question was intended to nullify the claim that the environmental efficiency of coal fired power generation relative to the environmental impact of vehicular traffic was nullified by the fact that coal has to be transported to the power station. And it's true - there is an impact from the transportation of the coal.

However, the fact that it's transported by ship - and not road - is significant in determining whether centralised coal fired generation is more efficient and less environmentally impactful than the equivalent input energy burned bu ICE vehicles. Shipping is significantly better than road transport in this regard.

Also the fact that coal burning there is being imminently phased out s significant to the debate at hand.

Furthermore, this is a public debate, and not everyone here knows where Moneypoint is or how the coal gets there.

So your the point made by your rhetorical question - while I'm sure you got some satisfaction from the pithy nature of it - was not sufficiently complete.

So in short, my lack of psychic abilities regarding your front door, your view or even your rhetorical expression don't matter. The point being made by your rhetorical question required being expanded upon.

Gregor Samsa

Companies do certainly overblow their green credentials, and every technology has an environmental impact. And quite clearly no cars would be much, much better than some cars of any kind.

But there's an environmental impact to existing at all. The question is, at what point do we say it's too much. We've clearly already gone past an acceptable limit, so we have to pull back. But how much can we pull back in a realistic sense, and can we find a balance between the benefits of the technologies and lifestyles that we've developed, and the negative impacts they have? Should we not do something just because it isn't a complete solution? Perfect is the enemy of good.

I think one of the benefits of EVs is the very fact that they shift the mode of distribution of energy from specific physical bulk to electricity - which is neutral to how the energy is generated in the first place. This is a shift that only needs to be made once - no matter what advances are made in the generation of energy in the future, the mode of distribution is already in place. Had we shifted to something like hydrogen for private transport, there would be clear benefits on emissions, but we'd be replacing one network of matter distribution with another, and then locked into it. EV's don't lock us into anything. If someone in the future comes up with a safe, efficient way of generating power from nuclear fusion, we don't have to think about how to miniaturise it and put a little reactor into every car like in Back To The Future - we do the generation at scale (where it's always going to be more efficient and therefore cheaper), and just feed it into the network we already have.

That they're only a little greener (for want of a better word) than their ICE counterparts now is not the whole picture. The future potential in the conceptual and practical shift away from every vehicle having it's own personal portable power plant that's stuck on on burning one type of physical matter is significant in itself.

kirving

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118431646#Comment_118431646

Equally though, that assumes that your own time has zero value.

A 5km round trip to the shops, taking 6 minutes would cost 10c in an EV, or 85c in an ICE.

EV: 10c/kWh * 20kWh/100km * 5km

ICE: 170c/l * 10l/100km * 5km

But it would take the guts of an hour to walk it.

By the time I got the bike out of the shed and back in again, it would take at least 25 minutes. Some days I'd walk or cycle that journey, but some days I value saving 20 mins of my time (vs bike) at more than 10c.

But I agree - it's a complete false dilemma to market new EV's a green and old ICE as bad when all cars have a huge carbon footprint relative to cycling, walking, or public transport of any kind.

Manion

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118431109#Comment_118431109

As others have stated, efficiency of energy generation is the big advantage. The laws of thermodynamics would be a good place to start your Google.

Secondly, it allows us to generate power in places where people aren't, making for cleaner urban environments.

Lastly, because the power is generated from a mix of sources, even if efficiency levels where the same, electricity would had less of an environmental impact due to a portion of the power being generated from renewable and sustainable sources. In the UK and France for instance you have much higher rates of nuclear power, which are carbon free.

Burning coal to power electric cars wouldn't be a great idea.

MTU

It was all the vogue of having a suv on the school run now it an ev and recycle coffee cup.

monkeybutter

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118431844#Comment_118431844

what carbon footprint or environmental destruction from wind?

I mean we have a carbon footprint just existing or cycling or making a bike, or making the shoes you walk in

El Tarangu

@kirving

If your EV was built in China and charged in Poland from a coal fired power station, it would take years of driving to break even.

A European built EV, run in Sweden is a much greener option.

I'm with you as far as the coal-fired power station, but surely a European-built EV is still using Chinese lithium batteries? Insofar as I understand the process, the mining and processing of this material is an environmental catastrophe.

El Tarangu

@monkeybutter

what carbon footprint or environmental destruction from wind?

Building thousands upon thousands of wind turbines uses enormous amounts of steel and concrete - particularly considering that they only work at partial efficiency, part of the time. And that every watt produced needs to be backed up with (usually) fossil fuel-powered infrastructure.

I mean we have a carbon footprint just existing or cycling or making a bike, or making the shoes you walk in

True, but the 10-12kg raw materials required to build a bicycle uses an order of magnitude less resources than the 1,000kg of materials required to manufacture a car of any type - and that's even before the carbon emissions required to run the latter.

Ah Jesus **** Christ.

Here we go again with the lie of "Oh, every unit has to be backed up by conventional sources". How is it then that in the last couple of decades we've added a few GW of wind power while not adding new burners and in fact closing down the peat place (though it was a stupid errand from the start) and closing Moneypoint soon.

Please, explain your logic behind your lie.

Gregor Samsa

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118432285#Comment_118432285

At present, this is certainly true.

But out-an-out revolutions where every problem is solved in one fell swoop rarely work or happen. I think things need to be taken a step at a time. Lithium mining is a problem, but that doesn't mean it shouldn't be done or that EVs shouldn't be made. There will be better, cleaner more efficient alternatives to lithium batteries - there's just no way that we've reached the peak of our abilities in electricity storage this soon. There's already a host of candidates being explored and developed. But the switch to using them won't require the same sea-change for end users and transport infrastructure that moving from ICE to EVs has required. It will be an evolutionary change.

For example, if (and it's a big if at present) Sodium-ion batteries could be developed that matched the potential of Lithium-ion ones, it would severely reduce the impact of mining and processing, while opening up the possibility of production to pretty much the entire world, as Sodium is one of the most common and easily accessible elements we have. And they would be safer than Li-ion ones in terms of fire risk. But they currently don't have the energy density needed for vehicles, and cost too much to produce. But the same was true of Li-ion batteries not so long ago.

One of the things about EVs and the surrounding technology is that we're only at the very beginning of their development and potential.

kirving

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118432348#Comment_118432348

There was an interactive tool on this site previously, but looks to be missing now.

Plenty of activity when it comes to EV Battery development in Europe too.

https://www.transportenvironment.org/discover/how-clean-are-electric-cars/

https://www.cnbc.com/2021/12/29/-northvolt-europes-tesla-battery-rival-produces-lithium-ion-cell-.html

https://unitedlithium.com/projects/sweden/#:~:text=The%20Bergby%20Project%20is%20a,transportation%20infrastructure%2C%20workforce%20and%20equipment

El Tarangu

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118432376#Comment_118432376

Where did the energy come from this autumn?

An a very cold winter day, when no wind is blowing, little-to-no solar power is being produced, and everyone is indoors with their normal level of appliance use plus, increasingly, charging their EVs, where will the energy come from?

crisco10

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118432514#Comment_118432514

I think the subtlety is just because there is backup generation available, does not mean it's producing emissions all the time as well.

So when wind blows, your peakers are burning ZERO fossil fuels, and when it's not they do burn fuel to fill the gaps. At our current electricity mix, that means we are avoiding burning gas/oil for approx 40% of Ireland's Electricity needs. That's a huge amount of fuel saving/reduction.

techman1

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118431137#Comment_118431137

Electric motors might be 90% efficient but electric generators are at the very best only about 60% efficient. Therefore converting coal , oil , water, wind energy etc to electricity is at most only 60% efficient. Therefore you need to knock another 40% of the efficiency of electric cars that you quoted. All this stuff is not limited by technology but by the laws of thermodynamics and entropy. You can never get to 100% efficiency in converting energy to electricity

notAMember

There are efficiencies in producing power in large powerplants, rather than carrying your own individual powerplant around in your car... which is what fuel engines are. Plus of course the flexibility... fuel for the grid can come from anywhere, and you can work on making that less polluting. You can't really change the engine in your car. It is de-coupling energy production from energy use.

That being said, the most green car is the one you already own. We only considered and bought an EV when our other car was driven into the ground and effectively was not worth repairing.

And, transport is affected by other decisions. Ideally we wouldn't need any car at all, but public transport in this country isn't great. We work around it though. For example, when moving home 10+ years ago, we had the budget for a 4 bedroom rural house on an acre of land, or a 2 bed home in an urban area with a smaller garden. We chose the small one that meant we could walk to schools, shops, use public transport, rather than needing to drive around the place. We put an extension on to get an extra bedroom for the kids. We can use bikes, buses, walking and as a family, only need one car for longer trips.

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118432514#Comment_118432514

Can't find the stats but I'm going to make an informed assumption that it didn't come from the made up new Fuel burning plants that we apparently needed to add over the last 15 years.

Capt'n Midnight

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118432159#Comment_118432159

Nuclear isn't carbon free (or reliable or economic)

One claim is that in 2020 there was 98% up time for Finland's four reactors. However they have been burning coal and oil since 2009 to cover for the fifth reactor which should have been providing a third of Finland's nuclear power. So the reality is that it was only 67% up time and the plant cost three times it's advertised price.

Scotland have shut down a nuclear power plant today leaving just one active. Renewables in Scotland are providing nearly 100% of the amount of power used when you take into account the nett exports over the interconnectors. So we have a long way to go on renewables but it's possible.

kirving

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118432615#Comment_118432615

That's true for combustion based electricity generation true - and has been addressed in this thread.

It is not true for wind or hydro generators. Even if it was - so what? The energy is free anyway.

It's not applicable to the likes of solar PV.

Even still, 60% @ power plant * 90% battery charge is 54%. Likely double that of of an ICE car.