What analysis of EV vs ICE is readily available?

[WannabeOwner]

All said, essentially, it makes a bit of a difference but is too expensive to be worth it. So I tried to get out of them the two sides of this - how much better and how much money. None had a full picture.

The Passive House view is that no internal surface should be more than 4C colder than any other - otherwise you get falling (convection current) air, draughts, feel cold, turn up thermostat ... and exacerbate the problem.

The whole house has to be designed thermally ... I don't see that triple glazing on its own will help, but it won't do any harm (and if on its own it stops convection it will definitely help I also think you will have zero internal condensation in Winter, which you might have had with double glazing .. thereby avoiding the secondary problems that that would have brought)

I am working on the principle this makes a big difference too, although we're not in ye

I expect you will be well pleased. We retro fitted MVHR to the old part of our house, because we found it so fantastic in the Passive House bit. The net gain was that we have no moulds in the old part. We didn't have a significant problem - no mushrooms growing on the ceiling! - but all the improvements we had made over the years (double glazing,cavity fill, improved air tightness [open fire -> fully enclosed wood stove], more loft insulation) lead to much less natural air flow. All the damp and window-condensation is now just GONE. Absolutely nightmare to retro fit ventilation to a house - no such thing as "narrow bore air ducting" unlike the narrow-bore pipes you can get for Rads!

We haven't had a winter cough/cold in the 5 years since we did Passive House - those health benefits are are known of course. So I am expecting that your triple glazing, and air tightness, plus MVHR, will give you that benefit too.

 

[Midnight Star]

Over and above any detailed / data driven analysis, the following points are worth making in discussions on this topic:

1 - it’s not just carbon footprint - EVs reduce airborne pollutants where people live and breathe, especially in major cities

2 - centralised burning of fossil fuels is arguably more efficient as well as cleaner (see above)

3 - power grids are also decarbonising over time - the example for the uk below shows:
a) coal is a tiny proportion these days b) there is a major reduction of carbon based power generation since 2006:
Electricity generation mix by quarter and fuel source (GB)

4 - battery improvements over time e.g. efficiency, less cobalt, reuse e.g. second life for grid storage, recycling i.e of raw materials will help mitigate their net environmental impact

5 - finally, it just so happens that Tesla is an energy company that also makes cars. To date they have generated far more solar power than their cars have used - not a bad way of offsetting

Tesla Impact Report: 4 million tons of CO2 saved, 13.25 TWh solar electricity generated

 

[LukeT]

The Passive House view is that no internal surface should be more than 4C colder than any other - otherwise you get falling (convection current) air, draughts, feel cold, turn up thermostat ... and exacerbate the problem...

We won't get to Passivhaus standards but the temperature of the internal surface of triple should be somewhat closer to what's next to it than would be for double.

I'll get back to you in a couple of years on the rest of it. My hope is it uses very little energy to heat and is a lovely place to be. I'm confident (but not certain) of that.

 

[cezdoc]

Can anyone recommend independent well presented, concise information explaining the difference in environmental impact of electric vs ICE, and at least trying to cover the whole picture?

I'm no expert but have read around the subject. The trouble with trawling the Internet is that there's a lot of material which pushes an agenda from both sides and it's difficult to weigh up how much bias is in the material. Also things are changing so keeping up-to-date is crucial.

I found this article in the Guardian:
Electric cars emit 50% less greenhouse gas than diesel, study finds
which may have have been sourced from the following:
https://www.transportenvironment.org/sites/te/files/publications/2017_10_EV_LCA_briefing_final.pdf
The latter looks like the sort of thing you're after ("Electric vehicle life cycle analysis and raw material availability"). I don't know anything about the organisation behind the doc (transportenvironment.org) but they do include references for all the facts and figures which provides some reassurance.

I had a quick skim of the above report and didn't find any mention of air pollution concerns which has arguably become a bigger and more tangible driver to move from ICE to EV than CO2 emmission reduction.

If you like "doing your bit" (which I suspect includes many EV drivers) another key point is that if you choose a renewable electricity tariff and/or have domestic solar PV then you can virtually eliminate your "personal" CO2 emissions for charging your car. If you drive an ICE this kind of choice simply isn't available. If you're not persuaded by that argument you can also choose to charge when the grid emissions are lower: overnight when it's windy in winter, mid afternoon when it's sunny in summer. I tend to do this just because I can (I typically charge once a week) - so I use "less carbon intense" electriciyy but it's pretty academic at the moment (and in any case my supplier is 100% renewable). It does demonstrate how grid demand can easily be managed as EV uptake increases though.

On the same theme, as mentioned above, all of Tesla's Superchargers are powered by renewable electricity. So a lot of studies looking at national grid averages are arguably overstating the EV carbon emissions from recharging batteries.

Another promising reference will the Fully Charged almanac - but this isn't due to be published until the end of the year
The Fully Charged Guide to Electric Vehicles & Clean Energy
[note to self, investigate further, see if there's still time to be a supporter of the project]

 

[WannabeOwner]

Good writeup @cezdoc

Anyone know if Ionity going to use 100% Renewables for its rapid charging network?

 

[cezdoc]

Good writeup @cezdoc

Anyone know if Ionity going to use 100% Renewables for its rapid charging network?

If they are, they aren't shouting about it. Reading their website & mission statement the focus seems to be on ease-of-use and speed; compared with some other network providers there's a noticeable lack of commentary regarding carbon emissions or the environment. They also have a long list of oil companies as site partners - which makes sense in terms of being able to tap into a network of convenient site locations - but these partners, er what can I say, are probably not the in the vanguard when it comes to accelerating a transition to sustainable energy and transport.

I found it interesting to contrast Ionity's blurb with that of Instavolt who very much do stress the environmental benefits of electric vehicles and use 100% renewable energy sources for supplying their chargers: Caring for our environment | Instavolt

As for other major network providers I'm not sure. CYC provide back-office support so I would imagine it's down to the chargepoint host where they get their leccy from. Pod Point "believe travel shouldn't damage the earth" but don't claim to supply 100% renewable electricity although they do have guides in improving sustainability on their website. So a bit of a mish mash it would seem.