The Manhattan Institute released a new study that doubts if electric vehicles (EVs) are noticeably reducing carbon emissions.
The study also discusses whether the economic cost of such vehicles is feasible.
Mark Mills, senior fellow of the Manhattan Institute, wrote that no one knows the degree carbon emissions may decline with the continued development of EVs.
He also noted there is no understanding of when EV prices will be comparable to internal combustion engines.
“Imagining a hypothetical all-EV world requires acknowledging the unavoidable fact of a rats’ nest of assumptions, guesses, and ambiguities regarding emissions,” Mills wrote.
“Much of the necessary data may never be collectible in any normal regulatory fashion, given the technical uncertainties and the variety and opacity of geographic factors, as well as the proprietary nature of many of the processes.”
Although EVs do not put out carbon emissions while in use, “emissions occur elsewhere—before the first mile is ever driven and when the vehicle is parked to refuel,” Mills explained.
As for the price of EVs, Mills explained that “Future battery costs now depend almost entirely on a single fact: Basic materials now account for 60%–80% of the cost to make batteries.”
“Even if labor and capital costs decline (both are currently trending up), battery prices (and future upstream emissions) are now firmly in the hands of decisions made by global miners and refiners,” he added.
Reporting from The Epoch Times:
Mr. Mills wrote that its easy to estimate carbon emissions from traditional vehicles by simply knowing the miles they’ve gone, and that the emissions produced from manufacturing these cars and producing the gasoline needed to fuel them account for about 10 to 20 percent of an internal combustion engine vehicle’s lifetime emissions. He said by comparison, there are a lot of unknowns about the emissions brought about in the initial production of an EV. He wrote that the emissions created by recharging an EV battery will also depend on a number of variables like the type of energy grid used and hourly variations in electricity production. “Accounting for those realities, and not a hypothetical average kWh, reveals that CO2 emissions per EV fill-up can range from zero to as high as the same as just burning gasoline to drive the same number of miles,” Mr. Mills wrote.
