EVs are worse for the environment (and other EV related myths)

No some people take issue with the view that all EV drivers buy the cars predominantly on environmental grounds. The corollary of this view is that 'climate change deniers' wouldn't buy them because obviously they have no concern for the environment. The strange thing is that all the EV drivers you know have bought them on environmental grounds whereas all the ones I know have bought predominantly on financial grounds. What gives....

Regarding point 1 I'm not overly convinced, even the poster I replied to initially put forward evidence that amounted to maybe just 10% improvement, hardly going to dent those 8 billion tonnes of coal is it?

Regarding point 2, the problem is global warming, not Irish warming, just because we are using less coal here won't solve the global problem. ~80% of our energy comes from fossil fuels, so unless I'm missing something then ~80% of our global ev fleet is being powered by fossil fuels that might be just 10% better than if they were ICE instead.

This idea that ev's will help make the world carbon neutral is surely another big lie?

I have no issue with coal, in fact it's better than russian gas. Long term we need to move away from all fossil fuels of course.

Close Moneypoint is fine, once you have a replacement. Which we don't.

Well at the moment we are achieving little to nothing. Electric cars ain't solving it anyway.

Instead of closing Moneypoint in 2025 we are now seemingly converting it to oil instead. But we built Moneypoint because we were over exposed to oil in the 1970's oil crisis and now we are going back to increased oil dependency.

Our 1 million electric cars on the road by 2030 will be fun to watch for sure.

You can't take a snapshot like that. It means nothing. How about the snapshot when it's >75% wind?

For example, right now we're mostly cooking our dinner with wind.

So what is being done?

Why is global coal consumption not falling?

Why is Moneypoint no longer being closed?

How is our million electric cars by 2030 looking?

Why did we cut duty on petrol and diesel?

Why do we keep missing our climate change targets?

Here we go again. A whopping 10%, 30%, even 50% more efficient, so what? They are still fossil fuel powered cars destroying the planet, they still need coal to move.

+1. I would say the majority of EV owners are similarly motivated.

It appears the young people you know are in the minority

Yes you are missing something, 80% of our energy is from fossil fuels you say and then assume this is the same as the % powering our EVs.

Except EVs aren't powered by petrol, diesel, turf, wood or home heating oil or anything else you put in your fireplace or fuel tank.

A BEV fueled entirely by Coal generated electricity is slightly better than ICE.

This is the worst case scenario. In the real world, a BEV is likely to be charged at night when demand is low, so it's much more likely to be powered by gas, or renewable generated power (on a windy night, demand is lower than supply so wind can power almost the entire grid

As renewables replace Coal and Gas power generation, the savings improve, while ICE cars will Always be powered by refined oil for their entire life cycle.

I don't disagree with any of that at all except the second half of the last paragraph. We could have hydrogen combustion engines too.

Or you could just look 2 posts below mine where somebody posted today's 70% renewables.

Somebody yesterday posted our annual breakdown as well. Keep up.

I don't dispute any of these graphs. But when the **** hit the fan last week and we hit our all time high electricity demand it was coal, oil and gas that kept the lights on.

I don't dispute ev's give reduced tailpipe emissions in cities. Pity it's at the expense of people in places like La Guajira though.

Yes, as EV drivers it's the dirty little secret a lot of us, including you, know nothing about. Our little blood mine, 3/4 the size of county Dublin (think about that for a minute, then think about it again) kept our EVs moving last week.

A few years ago, being super cool, we switched to Russian coal. But now we have quietly switched back, but you won't hear Eamon Ryan talk about that.

By the way, last week, when we really needed power, our RES clocked in at a whopping 9%.

That snapshot, or similar, has been posted already. I'm not disputing it, you however want to bury your head in the sand when your EV is powered from our dirty little blood mine that you didn't even know about until I told you.

On the days last week when we needed power, our renewables chumped in a stellar 9%.

What will renewables deliver next winter with our batteries?

In a severe winter will the batteries hold 3 months reserves like our dirty little blood mine holds down in Clare?

If our governments were in any way serious about the environment they’d have taken steps to provide proper far reaching green public transport infrastructure… we’ve had Green Party politicians in government in around 7 of the last 20 years. Plenty of lip service to the ideals but have delivered precious little to nothing apart from bleat on about bicycles in a country where it rains between 150-200 days a year. An island nation not exactly adverse to high winds and shabbily designed road infrastructure also.

Dublin is the only Irish city in the entire country with a tram / light rail system…and for a city it’s size, only 2 lines which hardly scratches the surface of commuter needs.

So we need not more EVs, non EVs on our already crowded roads, we need firstly fúcking public transportation that is fit for purpose, environmentally friendly, … fit for the population it’s required to serve…. Trams, metros etc… not all just for Dublin’s population although that needs to be a priority.

Dublin has less rain and less rainy days than Amsterdam, so is perfectly ok for cycling.

Spending on active travel and public transport has never been higher. It's just started 30 years too late.

36% of electricity isn’t a bad place.

Lots of off shore in development aswell as Solar, aswell as green hydrogen.

that number should increase steadily over the coming years.

That number also means you are better off driving an BEV than an ICE

This seems very heavy handed. The poster in question is making reasonable arguments and there are enough counter arguments being made to provide balance and context. The poster isn't being in anyway abusive and boards is not an academic institution so not citing sources surely isn't an offence. Shutting down threads/ threatening to shut down threads/ banning people from threads does more damage to your cause than letting the debate move on. Perhaps you should step back from this thread as you are clearly over invested in it. Out of fairness, a player really shouldn't be refereeing a match they themselves are playing in.