Thread by @AukeHoekstra

New @ADAC study is trash-talking the electric vehicle

ADAC says natural gas is better for the environment and diesel and electric are a wash. I correct the errors and show diesel emits over 250 grams CO2eq/km while electric emits less than 100.
innovationorigins.com/tomorrow-is-wh…

The ADAC is the biggest car club in Europe so this matters.

Blog has the details but let me list the biggest errors and what you get when you correct them. For this I use my trusted format of "the top 6 mistakes of people trash talking electric vehicles". sciencedirect.com/science/articl…

Error 1 is to exaggerate CO2 emitted during battery production.

Study uses few and outdated scientific sources and ignore large factories and industry. It then assumes emissions are 163 kg of CO2eq per kWh of batteries. I show why current sources make me propose 65 kg per kWh.

Error 2 is to underestimate battery lifetime.

Study assumes you have to replace the battery after 150 thousand km. I show modern batteries outlast the lifetime of the car.

Error 3 is to pretend electricity will not become cleaner during the lifetime of the EV.

This is incorrect. After 15 years you will be driving a much cleaner electricity mix in Germany. You have to take this change in electricity mix during the lifetime of the car into account.

Error 4 is to use unrealistic tests for energy use.

Study assumes a diesel uses 4.7 liter per 100 km. But according to road tests, the average diesel on German roads since 2017 uses 7.3 liter.

Error 5 is to ignore diesel production.

This is the only top 6 error they don't make.

Error 6 is lack of system thinking.

Waiting for the electricity mix to become greener before you scale up EVs will emit more CO2.

Plus: with diesel you can reduce emissions maybe 40% in the long run and that's pretty optimistic. With electric you can reduce 95% in the long run.

There is one thing that might confuse you if you compare with the original ADAC study. In their CO2/km graph they assumed the car lasts 150 thousand km. For reasons explained in the blog I assumed 225 thousand km. This lowers production emissions of all cars a bit.

So that's all you need to do to show the @ADAC was very wrong: take the top 4 errors and replace the unrealistically negative assumptions. This will increase diesel emissions from 169 to 258 grams CO2eq per km while reducing electric car emissions from 168 to 90 grams.

I hope you retweet and use this thread to reply to people spreading the false information from the ADAC study. The ADAC is a trusted name and the biggest car club in Europe so this matters. Furthermore the expert tool they used is also used by the @OEAMTC.

However, the usual caveat applies: electric cars are *better* than combustion vehicles but they are not perfect either. A world with 10 billion people owning 5 billion electric cars will do large damage to the environment. So we must treasure the bike and the train.

Another way to put this is to say the electric car takes 15 thousand km before it has paid back the CO2 emitted during battery production compared to the average German diesel.

Some more caveats: the @ADAC has taken a car with a 42 kWh battery. If you take e.g. an 84 kWh battery, payback time doubles. Also, if you replace a small combustion vehicle with a large EV, payback time increases. Finally, smaller Chinese factories can be more problematic.