The Greenest Cars (ACEEE) 2013

<AHEM> "Greener . . ." what?

Well their research is missing the great work by CNW Marketing. In 2006, Art Spinella proved that a Hummer is 'greener' than the Prius. Where is the Hummer in your list?

Source: Wiki

This Washington DC group may be better than their research suggests but right now, I'm not seeing evidence of original work. Rather, more stuff suggesting paper analysis than real.

I'm a Prius owner and have to pay real expenses for every form of transportation I own and use. Given how badly CNW Marketing screwed up the concept of "life cycle" cost, I can't get excited by ". . . from its birth to its disposal." We don't need a sequel to CNW Marketing.

Bob Wilson

 

Do you have LINK to the article?
Looks reasonable to me, and might be consistent with my philosophy pending further review, but these sorts of analyses have a large degree of judgment and it also depends on your personal eco-priorities, some may feel ACEEE is biased one way or the other. Sometimes life cycle anaylsis is helpful; other times it is not.

 

Wrong green:


One of the greatest frauds is that owning a Prius means you are some sort 'green' freak. Although I'm fully subscribed to Global Warming (i.e., seen the Venus research,) I have no illusions about what our Prius accomplished beyond 'cost avoidance.'

I like the idea that less sophisticated people pay through the nose for the gas that powers their cars. In contrast, I simply get in the Prius and drive without really thinking about the cost of gas and whether or not I'll have to eat MacDonalds or buy the gas needed to get home.

You've been suckered by the gas-hog, frauds who think only "Bambi-lovers and Leaf-lookers" buy Prius. Sorry for you . . . not much. Fortunately, you've found your way back to PriusChat and the many folks willing to help you 'see the light.'

Bob Wilson

 

^^^really? if so it is not active link on my system

 

OK I can always look it up but your post is not getting much comments perhaps becuase it needs a reference LINK.

 

I actually have to concure w/ bob... if the results are not completly supported by the data it is wrong and could do more "harm" to the cause than for it.

 

atleast the prius c is the greenist ;-)

 

The term *Greenest* is a high level abstraction, a distillation of undisclosed parameters in judgement and methodology. It sounds great if you are trying to sell cars on customers seeking to be *green* -- but in reality being ecologically friendly requires a more comprehensive look at one's consumption and activities than just buying a car. The impact of each act vary from from extreme to another -- from spilling crude oil into Gulf of Mexico.... to dumping something toxic into a landfill.

For example, an electric car being powered solely by a photovoltaic array or a hydroelectric dam for its entire lifetime is going to put out less fuel-energy emissions that a electric-gas hybrid. However, if a electric car, like the Nissan Leaf, is getting its electrical power from a coal burning electric plant with dirty emissions then a 50 mpg Prius' total operational emissions will be less than that of the electric car's. Note that the non polluting electricity source must be nearby if not then the needed dirty electricity transmission cost (which can be as high as .333 kwh for every 1.000 kwh purchased) will start increasing the pollution/emissions for each kwh used.

When cataloging and classifying things it is more useful to use low levels of abstractions which have a one to one relationship with physically verifiable measurements with a detailed disclosed testing methodology which allows measurements to be repeated, verified, and validated. The reason detail disclosed testing methodology is important is so other can see duplicate the testing results (this acts to discourage the use of fake data and provides a window to challenge the robustness of testing methodology for any flaws).

 

In the summary of their methods for this latest annual report they say:

I parse that as saying the non-plug Prius is only accounted for the manufacturing pollution (CO2 etc) of the original battery but the Plugin Prius, Ford hybrids, and the Chevy Volt are calculated as using both an original and a replacement battery. I think that's bogus for the Prius Plugin, Ford Energi models and the Volt since even a battery with a remaining capacity of only 70% will far exceed the requirements of ordinary continued operation -- they will just have reduced range and power in EV mode. The only real speculation might be around the non-plug CMAX and Fusion that use a smaller Lithium battery.

I was going to download the detailed report methodology document but when I clicked the link to download the report it sent me to a page hosted on the same site that wanted me to first create a user account. On my iPhone that page was sprayed over by all kinds of pharmaceutical keywords related to drugs which treat certain male equipment not functioning adequately. It looked like some kind of Google search optimization keyword spam. I saw the same thing on another Turn off signatures in Tapatalk the Chrome browser but things were fine on an iPad or Mac laptop. Weird.

I eventually downloaded the methodology report and the 2013 update to it using an iPad.

 

Boeing was using the least stable cathode chemistry, Lithium Cobalt, because their design got locked in a long time ago before the safer variants being used in today's EVs were commercialized and sufficiently validated.

The only car sold in substantial numbers using Cobalt cells was the Tesla Roadster.