"EV's simply move the tailpipe to Coal" Answer

There is a good reason for difference in energy. The light sweet stuff if cracking isn't used, uses about 4 kwh of energy per gallon of gasoline. The Alaskan stuff comes to about 7 kwh. The unconventional stuff like oil sands uses even more in refining and especially in pulling it from the ground. US refineries use more energy than European refineries because they refine on average a lower grade of crude which is cheaper. This is why Europe was more hit by the loss of Libyan oil than the united states was.

I would love to know the numbers for the marginal oil. It must be remembered that refiners have a choice on whether this energy comes from electricity, natural gas, or the oil itself.

 

All the argument(s) about transferring EV emissions from the tail pipe to the coal stack, misses my previous poste, essential point. EVs are the perfect "vehicle" for integrating solarand wind into the grid, and in effect providing the overnight/cloudy day/lack of wind storage capacity for these alternative sources!

What is required however is a comprehensive look at our energy use, and our grid infrastructure as well as the subsidies involved in our energy choices.

Do EVs have the potential to transfer emissions as he OP suggest? Sure, ut that is only if we do nothing else differently!

So, EVs integrating with a 2 way grid, allowing segregate of RE.
EVs by being electic and therefore much more thermally efficient converters or energy to motion, therefore reducing the over all need for energy (and emissions!) what the hell is there not to like?

You guys can all day about the esoteric energy calculations misses the potential great benefits that EVs can (and I predict will) be part of both our entry solutions, as well as our global warming issues!

Icarus

 

Hill- This is highly interesting research paper, but it is by some "outsiders" who do not really understand the energy balance in a refinery. I liked some of the diagrams though.

The Dept of Energy DOE (proper source) has pretty good info on:
Fuel consumed at Refineries-
U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA)

NOTE: we discussed this in Grumpy Cabbie's July 2, 2011 post- How Much Electricity Does a Refinery Use?
At that time I showed, based on DOE data, the USA number for puchased electricity by oil refineries is 0.16 kWhr per gallon or 2 cents a gallon of refinery product!!

How do we get from 0.16 kWhr/gallon DOE elec puchase up the humongous 7 kWhr/gallon quoted so often here?

>Base number on worst case scenario (eg; CA - not average)
>Prorate all energy used to Gaso (assign 0 to diesel, kerosene etc)
>Convert all heat inputs (nat gas, fuel oil) from BTUs to kWhr
>When the above converion is done, assume 100% conversion to electricity is possible

This is how you could possibly argue that a humongous amount of "potential" electricity is needed to refine oil. But the official DOE numbers show you would barely get down the driveway.

 

as usual the wonderful "this is more efficient" debate. but then we have the end product and what we do with it and more importantly what "it" does to "us"

this discussion (lets call it even);

** ignores difference in environmental impact; winner; EVs (can you possibly debate that?)

**financial stability: winner EVs. electricity produced here, used here and paid for here, FRICKING STAYS HERE!! and guess what?? we dont have to borrow money from China to buy it. try to make that point with foreign oil

**convenience; well, that is a tough one... its plug in EVERY DAY, like what a hassle or get gas once every 10 to 14 days?? ok, we will call that a toss up. but others may differ on that

**self awareness; even here amongst a dedicated group of people who are concerned with the future of personal transportation, we are really clueless to the true impact of our decisions and this thread illustrates that. we are presented facts which in themselves is pretty straight forward, but then we allow ourselves to interpret those facts based on our previous experiences, education (which becomes outdated in this area faster than an unpasteurized fruit smoothie spoils) where the winner of the argument boils down to the one with the best or most organized sentence structure (which is why i lose most of the time)

i did not mention GCC or GW because no one really knows so no sense in pretending we do. many articles state the true cost of gasoline to be 250-400% more than we actually pay and that is on the low end of the estimate.

but the chain of the two energy sources can both be long, but one has the potential to be very short and that is electricity. no one here makes their own gasoline (Doug is not included here but he sold his veggie oil Mercedes anyway) but many see a very short chain on where their power comes from.

Even if you dont use solar, there is Daniel. his power source is straight forward (the water is also used for a LOT MORE other things which should add to the value of hydro juice, but that is an unfair addition to a topic that is already becoming pretty one-sided.)

so...once again, winner; EVs.

**distribution of wealth; oil wealth does not proliferate well. its pretty concentrated amongst a few hundred entities. granted profits that high pay out dividends to billions and i am ashamed to say that my 401K does invest in big oil. unfortunately, there was not a single Large Cap fund that did not. so it was either ignore an entire investment category...or do along. i went. i dont hate myself, but sometimes i get an upset stomach with gas over it...(pun intended)

Electricity allows small communities to benefit. Juhl Wind is a company that specializes in Community wind farm projects. this allows small cities to generate power on their own or at least subsidize their power expenses. so....(this is getting old) winner; EVs

i could go on and on. its hard to believe, but i have really barely scratched the surface.

so, ok, so gasoline is as efficient as electricity. i agree. i will let gas have one

 

Agree with you, but recently here on PriusChat I think both Tideland Prius and Hill have posted about blogs from California EVangelist Peder Norby, so we got going on it (again - pls forgive us).