Quote:
Originally Posted by Zagga
The 40e is no doubt a great car but I do disagree with all this green rubbish people spout when talking about hybrid and all electric cars. The assumption is, as it does 70mpg and doesn't burn fossil fuels its a good thing and owners can pat themselves on the back for not driving a diesel/petrol. This is also reflected by government that support the use of these vehicles and incentivise them via tax breaks.
Last time I looked, many countries still burn fossil fuels to produce electricity that very regularly fuel these cars. The batteries used to store this energy are mainly manufactured from plastics. The battery technology uses inside contain very toxic chemicals and the life cycles of these batteries are much shorter than any petrol or diesel engine meaning problematic future disposal.
I personally feel the real green credentials of these cars is much, much less and governments will be doing u-turns on recommending them as they become increasingly popular, just as they have done with diesel.
Sorry for the rant!  |
Perhaps that's right. I'm not really in a position to debate it as I don't really know the facts. I do know that there's a record amount of electricity coming from renewable sources, at least in the US and Europe, and natural gas plants are very clean compared to burning petrol or diesel. Tesla seems to think they can recycle their batteries, but who knows what that involves.
Environment aside, I do think it's probably a good thing to get away from being totally dependent on oil countries economically, electric cars at least provide some flexibility.
As for me, I simply want to avoid the pump as much as possible. I usually end up pumping gas for both me and the wife. If she can just plug in, and can go get gas once every other month instead of every other week that would be great. Plug in hybrid also seems like a good way to dip your toes into electric without having to deal with charging on long trips.