Greenhouse Gas Emissions (CO2)
One hypothesis is that widespread use and adoption of this vehicle will lead to a decrease in CO2 emission and help the global warming problem. This could occur from a decrease in the use of gasoline assuming the assumption that most drives are less than 40 miles.
The next step in this theory is to determine how much greenhouse gas would be released by power plants that are supplying to the grid the electricity that are charging the Volt’s batteries. This factor will depend on how the power plant generates its energy. Most in the U.S. use natural gas, and coal, less common are nuclear and hydroelectric. I will try to calculate the net effect on CO2 emissions, if say 25% of the population uses this car (or similar). Any ideas on values for this calculation are appreciated.
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3 Responses to “Greenhouse Gas Emissions (CO2)”
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January 18th, 2007 at 9:22 pm
You are assuming that the power will come from the grid. It is quite viable to power the car from a wind turbine or electovolaic solar panels (etc. etc.) on the garage roof overnight. Local or micro generation tends to be less emitive.
January 26th, 2007 at 11:14 am
“electovolaic solar panels (etc. etc.) on the garage roof overnight.”
…assuming you have a home battery system to transfer saved up voltage from the day.
February 16th, 2007 at 9:29 am
There’s no need to store the power from photovoltaic (solar) cells. If net meetering is used the power needed to offset what the car draws can be fed to the grid during the day (which is also when it’s most needed as demand peaks about the same time as photovoltaic output peaks) and then drawn back from the grid at night. The effect on carbon emmissions and utility bills is about the same without the need to install and maintain batteries,or the associated losses.
The same approach could also be used for wind power.