The ten most important questions about electromobility
1. Why do we need electric cars at all?
Transport accounts for around one-sixth of total CO2 emissions, so it must also make a major contribution to the reduction. The savings potential for cars is very high because the fossil fuels gasoline and diesel are used with particularly poor efficiencies: Less than a third of the calorific value contained in the fuel reaches the wheels as drive energy, while purely electric drives with a battery as storage system achieve efficiencies of over 70 percent. That's why even an electric car that is powered by the German electricity mix with large shares of coal-fired electricity is more CO2 cheaper than a combustion engine over its entire service life.
In addition, the electric drive is also the right answer to the nitrogen oxide and particulate matter problem in city centres: electric cars are locally emission-free and even the particulate matter from brake abrasion is largely eliminated by electric recuperation. Only the tires remain as a source of particulate matter.
For German manufacturers, the successful implementation of their electrification strategies is an essential factor: Countless countries, including China, for example, have decided to end the combustion engine or at least to gradually push it back. If German brands fall behind in these markets because they do not have a suitable electric product range, then this is a major problem for Germany as a business location.
That's why we have to start electrifying transport now.
2. What is the CO2 balance of electric cars?
Electric cars with large lithium-based batteries start their car life with a CO2 backpack from battery production. While the production of a combustion engine causes less than 10 tons of CO2 emissions, an electric car produces up to 22 tons, depending on the energy source for battery production. In the worst case, a car with a large battery (for example, a Tesla Model S with a battery capacity of 100 kilowatt hours) drives below average, uses electricity from the normal German electricity mix and is scrapped after fifteen years with less than 150,000 kilometers of mileage. According to various studies, this distance is then just enough to compensate for the CO2 backpack compared to a modern diesel.
However, the CO2 balance improves over every single parameter: A smaller battery (e.g. 50 kWh) turns the balance far into positive territory because the CO2 backpack is correspondingly smaller, consistent use of green electricity does the same. Every additional kilometre driven ensures that the battery is used better and those who have their own photovoltaics to supply the car can reduce the CO2 load to a third of combustion engine emissions over the entire life of the car.
With the global energy transition, CO2 emissions from battery production will ultimately also be reduced and will be close to zero. The goal of CO2 neutrality is therefore possible, and significant savings are already being achieved today.
3. Are e-cars more dangerous than combustion engines?
Accidents involving electric cars (almost always Teslas) are in the headlines again and again, resulting in battery fires. The individual battery cells overheat in the event of a short circuit and can ignite in the process. Neighboring cells are also overheated and can ignite themselves.
4. Are e-car batteries hazardous waste after 150,000 kilometers?
Quite the opposite! First of all, the batteries in electric cars last much longer: As a rule of thumb, you can assume at least 1,000 full charge-discharge cycles as a service life. This means that an electric car should achieve a thousand times the range as mileage. For a BMW i3 in the 120 Ah variant, that would be at least 270,000 kilometers, for a Tesla Model S 100D up to 600,000 kilometers. So the battery works longer than an average car. All manufacturers have therefore developed second-use models – for example, to stabilize the power grid. Old car batteries are connected together in large blocks for this purpose. They can remain in operation in such plants even if they only reach 30 percent of their original capacity and output. Power grid stabilization helps to balance the volatility of solar and wind power. The batteries then help to save CO2.
Once the batteries have finally reached the end of their life, they can be recycled. In pilot plants, it is now possible to recover 100 percent of metals such as cobalt and manganese from the batteries, 50 percent of lithium, and an increase to 70 to 80 percent is envisaged. Volkswagen is building a plant in Salzgitter with a target rate of 97 percent. As soon as there is a constant return flow of old batteries, this industry should ensure that the raw materials are recycled in the same way as car steel is today.
5. Do electric cars have enough range?
The first generation of electric cars, for example the first Nissan Leaf or the BMW i3 with the 60 Ah battery option, demanded concessions from the driver: In practice, theoretical ranges of 160 kilometers could sometimes shrink to 90 kilometers in winter. Recharging on the go was not a trivial task in 2014. The cars were therefore limited to the second car role.
Today, things look different: With battery capacities of 40 kilowatt hours or more, the electric volume models can drive around 250 kilometres, and there is a fast-charging option with at least 50 kilowatts of charging power at every motorway service station. If you regularly drive a long way, you have a range of around 400 kilometres with the "big" models, for example from Nissan Leaf or Hyundai Kona, with over 60 kilowatt hours – and in contrast to the petrol engine, the "tank" is always full when you drive off in the morning if you have your own charging option. The Audi e-tron quattro and even more so the Porsche Taycan are even intended to serve real frequent drivers: With charging capacities of 150 kW (Audi) and 350 kW (Porsche), recharging a range of 250 kilometers now only takes a coffee and toilet break. According to the Federal Motor Transport Authority, the average daily mileage of cars registered in Germany is 38 kilometres.
6. Where will the electricity for the many e-cars come from?
If all car traffic were to be converted to electric drives, this would increase electricity consumption in Germany by almost 20 percent (i.e. by about 130 terawatt hours). The power plants in Germany could already do this today – but both nuclear power plants and coal-fired power plants are to be completely taken off the grid in the next few years.
The expansion of renewable energies must therefore continue and accelerate as much as possible. The omens for this are good: wind power from offshore plants is currently fed into the grids for less than 9 cents per kilowatt hour, while photovoltaics is slightly higher. This means that further expansion would no longer be dependent on subsidies. It is economical, which means that a real market for renewables will develop. Higher electricity prices would lead directly to investments in new plants. The electricity suppliers are therefore very relaxed about the load issue.
7. Can the power grids withstand many millions of cars charging at the same time?
If you multiply the number of cars in Germany (around 50 million) by the maximum charging power (announced for the Porsche Taycan: 350 kilowatts), you arrive at a theoretical power requirement that all power plants in Europe together could not satisfy. However, the practical charging requirement is several orders of magnitude lower: For the average daily mileage of 38 kilometers, an electric car needs around 10 kilowatt hours of electricity. A normal Schuko socket supplies this amount of electricity within a good four hours. If the charging time is set in the low-consumption night hours, then 50 million cars in Germany can actually charge at the same time – just as today in every household in Germany the lights, the coffee machine and the boiler are allowed to be on in the morning while industrial plants are being started up at the same time.
If charging is planned intelligently and night-time electricity is offered at a lower price, then e-cars are no problem for the power grid. If further photovoltaic expansion is also geared to demand, for example by consistently equipping parking garages, then the load on the grids can even be reduced.
9. Are there enough charging stations in Germany?
8. Are electric cars more expensive than combustion engines?
10. Where do the raw materials for e-car batteries come from?
A technology that is introduced to relieve the environment (of CO2) must of course be measured by the negative effects it itself has on the environment. The extraction of raw materials for the production of batteries and electric motors is of great importance here. Cobalt in particular, which is important for electrodes in current battery technology, has a reputation for being mined under inhumane conditions, for example in the Congo. Lithium production in South America also has a major impact on the immediate vicinity.
But these are not new topics – opencast lignite mining, oil sands production, natural gas fracking also destroy the environment in the immediate vicinity. While the extracted fossil fuels are consumed and then gone, the raw materials for the batteries are to be reused in a recycling cycle, just as we are used to from steel for cars. There is no direct comparability of environmental damage, but it is still necessary for the future that the manufacturers of batteries and cars make it transparent by means of a voluntary commitment and certifications that the environmental damage is kept as low as possible and, in particular, that it is less than the damage caused by combustion engines. Raw materials that cannot be extracted under reasonable conditions must be replaced. With cobalt, this is to happen with the next generation of batteries.