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Read other letters about this article
I liked Joe's article a lot and it brings up many very serious issues.
But I don't think it can be emphasized enough that when you seek to understand how efficient, effective or capable a transportation system is you must examine the entire system, not just parts of it. Some of the parts of this system we usually don't think about can use almost as much energy and create almost as much waste products as the vehicle itself, therefore they must be taken into account. Joe does allude to this fact in the article but does not make the point sufficiently, IMO.
Even a car with a "normal" internal combustion engine is not a stand-alone transportation device; it is part of a much larger system. Among other things that system is made up of:
- Oil drilling operations.
- Tanker ships, trucks, pipelines.
- Refineries.
- Roads, and road construction/maintenance.
- Local distribution systems (gas stations).
- Clean-up efforts (big oil spills and a billion little oil changes).
- etc.
All of these other parts of the system consume energy and produce waste.
If we want to make comparison between Hybrid type A, type B (or any transportation system) the total amount of and type of energy used, and amount and type of waste produced must be compared for their entire supporting system.
I want to drive this point home for hybrids especially since I often meet people that sort of believe that "plug-in" cars run on "free" energy (beyond what shows on your electric bill). Not only does it take coal, natural gas, nuclear, oil, etc there are also significant losses of energy when the electrical energy is conducted to your home. I'm not saying that a plug-in hybrid is not they way to go, I actually do think a combination of these technologies is they way to go along with more research.
Total energy usage per mile and total emissions per mile is the standard for a proper comparison.
The required information to perform these calculations is not too difficult to dig up, yet I have NEVER seen a proper comparison made between the overall efficiency of hydrogen, electric, gasoline, diesel, or hybrid cars.
PS:( two more points.... if anyone is actually board enough to read my entire post. In my opinion being able to practically recapture the energy otherwise wasted in braking has been the most significant development in "automobile" efficiency in decades. Two, every ounce of weight in your car that does not consist of you our your payload, your stuff, is wasted energy and increased emissions. The excess size and weight of vehicles today has been a totally avoidable disaster. You want to the biggest bang in reducing energy consumption and emissions, get rid of those ridiculous SUVs and massive cars. We can have VERY nice and quick cars that weigh less than half what these monstrosities weigh.)
John, who should be working
