Judging by recent reports from the world's media outlets, depending on where you live you're
presumably either suffering from heat stroke from the hottest temperature your country has
ever experienced or you're wondering how you're going to rebuild your house now that the wildfires
have flattened your entire town, or perhaps you're seriously considering going the full Kevin Costner
and buying a houseboat to cope with the floods that seem to be arriving with ever increasing
regularity. And don't get me started on the food crisis and the crippling cost of fuel!
It can all sound a bit apocalyptic sometimes can't it? And apocalypses do tend to make us
feel a little anxious about what the future holds and whether there's anything we can do about it!
And that's not helped by the tidal wave of conflicting information in the press
and on social media. The temptation is to do absolutely nothing at all, a bit like
the proverbial rabbit in the headlights. And of course, just like the rabbit in the headlights,
doing nothing at all is probably not your best option! Transport is a great example isn't it?
Should you get an electric vehicle, or is it all just a big scam like some bloggers would
have you believe? How about aviation? Are you really making climate change worse by flying off
to your holiday destination once a year? And how about all the stuff we buy that comes from abroad?
How can we really find out what impact that's all having on the environment? It's all a bit
of a minefield really isn't it? Thankfully though, some really thorough research has
been carried out in recent months by a couple of well-respected organizations, analysing the full
life cycle carbon footprints of the main types of powered vehicles we use in modern day society.
So I thought it might be a good idea to dive in and have a look when they found out.
Hello and welcome to Just Have a Think. Global transport emissions account for around 12 billion
metric tons of CO2 equivalent going into the atmosphere each year. That's about 25 percent
of all human-induced greenhouse gases. Without a step-change in policy those emissions are set to
nearly double by 2050. If we really want to limit global warming to only 1.5 degrees Celsius above
1850 temperatures then we'd need to reduce those emissions by about 80 percent from today's levels,
taking them down to only about 2.6 billion tons by mid-century. But you can only know
for sure if that strategy would be successful if you've got some way of properly measuring the
full life cycle impact of each type of vehicle. That's precisely the sort of data that this 2021
report seeks to clarify. It was produced by the International Council on Clean Transport or ICCT.
They're the folks who, back in 2014, accurately assessed the genuine emissions from VW diesel cars
and alerted the US EPA that there might be some skulduggery going on. A finding which led to the
notorious Dieselgate scandal costing Volkswagen upwards of 20 billion dollars to rectify.
This latest study considers the whole range of environmental factors from the
lifetime average carbon intensity of fuels and electricity mixes including biofuels and biogas
through to the carbon intensity during the useful lifetime of the vehicles,
and it takes average real-world usage to derive its data instead of relying on official test
values. And very importantly it includes the near-term global warming potential of methane
leakage emissions from natural gas and natural gas derived hydrogen fuels. All of that gets combined
with greenhouse gas emissions from vehicle production maintenance and recycling to give
a single value for each vehicle type measured in grams of carbon dioxide equivalent for every
kilometre the vehicle travels. What the analysis doesn't factor in is any emissions from building
factories, distribution centres or recycling plants, or the fuel for transporting vehicles
and installing filling stations and vehicle chargers. And it doesn't account for road building
either. And that's because all those variables are pretty similar whichever type of vehicle you use,
so they don't really have a significant influence on total life cycle comparisons.
The ICCT carried out all that analysis for each of the four major passenger vehicle regions, the USA,
Europe, India and China, and they arrived at three fundamental conclusions. Number one - only battery
electric and hydrogen fuel cell electric vehicles have the potential to achieve the reductions in
life cycle emissions needed to meet the Paris agreement goals. In fact life cycle emissions
for battery electric vehicles registered today in all four regions are already lower than comparable
internal combustion engine cars. In Europe they're 66 to 69 percent lower, and in the States the
difference is 60 to 80 percent. China's grid is still dominated by coal so the difference is not
so stark there but even with the dirty black stuff accounting for most of the electricity generation,
overall lifetime emissions are still 37 to 45 percent lower for electric vehicles. India is also
very coal dominant and they don't tend to have the most efficient vehicles either, but nevertheless
electric vehicles there still produce between 19% and 34% fewer emissions than gas guzzlers.
And of course as electricity grids continue to decarbonize rapidly through the rest of this
decade the gulf between EVs and combustion engines will only get wider and wider. For
medium-sized cars registered in 2030 life cycle emissions for European electric vehicles are 70 to
77 percent lower than fossil fuel cars. American EVs are 62 to 77 percent lower. China improves to
between 48% and 64%, and even Indian electric vehicles achieve emissions that are 34% to 56%
lower than internal combustion engines. Conclusion number two from the ICCT is that there is
no realistic pathway for deep decarbonization of combustion engines. The so-called self-charging
hybrid vehicles only get to an average global reduction of about 20 percent over internal
combustion engine vehicles at best. And even the more common plug-in hybrids vary from about a 40%
reduction in the States to around 25% in Europe and only about 6% to 12% in China.
Vehicles using blends of biofuel and biogas in fossil diesel gasoline and natural gas by 2030
will only result in a maximum lifetime emissions reduction of 9% over fossil fuel cars. The study
found that it's just not feasible to supply enough low carbon biofuels from residues and waste based
biodiesel, ethanol or biomethane to substantially displace fossil fuels in combustion engine cars.
Plus the very high production cost of these e-fuels means they're not likely to contribute
substantially to decarbonization of the fuel mix within the lifetimes of 2021 or 2030 cars.
The third and final conclusion from the ICCT is that to align with the Paris agreement targets
the registration of new combustion engine vehicles needs to be phased out in the 2030
to 2035 time frame. Only battery electric vehicles powered by renewables and fuel cell
vehicles powered by genuinely green hydrogen will get us to the reductions required according to
the ICCT's assessment. Now there are of course still plenty of naysayers who dispute the idea
that EVs are really much better for the climate than conventional internal combustion engines.
Those folks still focus on the energy-intensive nature of lithium-ion battery production and point
to the predominantly fossil fuel power grids that provide electricity for battery charging.
The ICCT analysis shows that even with those variables factored in,
both of which are rapidly improving by the way, but even with them factored in, battery electric
vehicles still massively outperform gas guzzlers across their lifetime. What those naysayers also
conveniently forget to mention is the carbon emissions related to producing and transporting
fuel for those gas guzzlers. For petrol and diesel those upstream emissions add about 20 percent to
the emissions of fuel combustion itself. Electric vehicle motors are about eighty percent efficient,
partly due to the fact that as the vehicle brakes or goes down a hill,
energy can be sent back into the battery to charge it back up a bit as you're driving. Combustion
engine cars don't have that option and the engines themselves, even after more than a hundred years
of fettling by the automotive industry, are still only about 30 percent efficient at best.
A typical mid-range EV like a VW ID3 or a Chevy Bolt uses about 20 kilowatt hours for every 100
kilometres, or 60 miles travelled. That's equivalent to 104 miles per US gallon. That
means an electric vehicle quickly pays back the higher manufacturing phase emissions. An average
European EV would pay back after 12,000 miles and in the USA it would take about 12,500 miles.
That's about a year and a half of driving for the average motorist. Those still determined not to
be convinced may point to China's coal-dependent electricity grid and ask the classic schoolyard
question "why should we be good boys and girls if those kids over there are being naughty?"
Now of course any rational adult will tell you that two wrongs don't make a right
and that setting a good example is the best way to change the behaviour of others, but if that
doesn't do it for you, then how about this report from the World Resources Institute,
which finds that if China enacts its three major national decarbonisation policies, which knowing
China is highly likely, then petroleum consumption in that country would peak by 2027, and with a big
push that peak could come as early as 2024. Over the longer term those policies can reduce China's
road transport emissions by as much as 95% by 2060, in line with China's net zero commitment.
Now this video would get pretty long if I went through the whole report, so I won't do that,
but I will leave a link in the description section below so you can take a look for yourself.
Of course we don't all travel exclusively by car do we? What about emissions from other forms
of transport? Well, that's where the folks at a website called Visual Capitalist can help us out.
Back in February 2022 they gave us this little offering based on data from the UK department of
Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy via the Our World in Data website. It shows the carbon
footprint of all the main transport types, again measured in grams of carbon dioxide equivalent
per person per kilometre travelled. The worst offenders are short-haul flights and driving
alone with no passengers. Of course not owning any kind of car at all and walking or riding a
bicycle or taking public transport instead are the very lowest carbon ways of getting from A to B.
Not everyone can use those options of course, but millions of us can and yet most of us don't. So
if you're looking for the answer to the question I posed at the start of the video, which is what
can I do to make a difference, maybe think about ditching the car all together and getting yourself
a nice shiny new two-wheeler! You'll certainly be fitter and healthier as a result. Now, no doubt
you've got your own views on this thorny issue, so as always the place to leave your thoughts
is in the comments section below. That's it for this week though. A massive thank you, as always,
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As always thanks very much for watching, have a great week,
and remember to just have a think. See you next week