Environment

Are electric cars ‘green’? The answer is yes, but it’s complicated

Published

4 years ago

July 26, 2021

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An electric vehicle charging point in Stoke-on-Trent, England.

Nathan Stirk | Getty Images News | Getty Images

The number of electric vehicles on the world’s roads is surging, hitting a record number last year.

That would seem to be good news, as the world tries to wean itself off fossil fuels that are wrecking the global climate. But as electric cars become more popular, some question just how environmentally friendly they are.

The batteries in electric vehicles, for example, charge on power that is coming straight off the electric grid — which is itself often powered by fossil fuels. And there are questions about how energy-intensive it is to build an EV or an EV battery, versus building a comparable traditional vehicle.

Are electric vehicles greener?

The short answer is yes — but their full green potential is still many years away.

Experts broadly agree that electric vehicles create a lower carbon footprint over the course of their lifetime than do cars and trucks that use traditional, internal combustion engines.

Last year, researchers from the universities of Cambridge, Exeter and Nijmegen in The Netherlands found that in 95% of the world, driving an electric car is better for the environment than driving a gasoline-powered car.

Electricity grids in most of the world are still powered by fossil fuels such as coal or oil, and EVs depend on that energy to get charged. Separately, EV battery production remains an energy-intensive process.

Producing electric vehicles leads to significantly more emissions than producing petrol cars … which is mostly from the battery production.

Florian Knobloch

Cambridge Centre for Environment, Energy and Natural Resource Governance

A study from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology Energy Initiative found that the battery and fuel production for an EV generates higher emissions than the manufacturing of an automobile. But those higher environmental costs are offset by EVs’ superior energy efficiency over time.

In short, the total emissions per mile for battery-powered cars are lower than comparable cars with internal combustion engines.

“If we are going to take a look at the current situation, in some countries, electric vehicles are better even with the current grid,” Sergey Paltsev, a senior research scientist at the MIT Energy Initiative and one of the study’s authors, told CNBC.

Paltsev explained that the full benefits of EVs will be realized only after the electricity sources become renewable, and it might take several decades for that to happen.

Batteries are the biggest emitter

EVs rely on rechargeable lithium-ion batteries to run. The process of making those batteries — from using mining raw materials like cobalt and lithium, to production in gigafactories and transportation — is energy-intensive, and one of the biggest sources of carbon emissions from EVs today, experts said.

Gigafactories are facilities that produce EV batteries on a large scale.

“Producing electric vehicles leads to significantly more emissions than producing petrol cars. Depending on the country of production, that’s between 30% to 40% extra in production emissions, which is mostly from the battery production,” said Florian Knobloch, a fellow at the Cambridge Centre for Environment, Energy and Natural Resource Governance.

Those higher production emission numbers are seen as “an initial investment, which pays off rather quickly due to the reduced lifetime emissions.”

China currently dominates battery production, with 93 gigafactories producing lithium-ion battery cells versus only four in the U.S., the Washington Post reported this year.

“I think the battery is the most complicated component in the EV, and has the most complex supply chain,” George Crabtree, director of the U.S. Department of Energy’s Joint Center for Energy Storage Research, told CNBC, adding that the energy source used in battery production makes a huge difference on the carbon footprint for EVs.

Batteries made in older gigafactories in China are usually powered by fossil fuels, because that was the trend five to 10 years ago, he explained. So, EVs that are built with batteries from existing factories

But that’s changing, he said, as “people have realized that’s a huge carbon footprint.”

Experts pointed to other considerations around battery production.

They include unethical and environmentally unsustainable mining practices, as well as a complex geopolitical nature of the supply chain, where countries do not want to rely on other nations for raw materials like cobalt and lithium, or the finished batteries.

Mining raw materials needed for battery production will likely be the last to get decarbonized, according to Crabtree.

Recycling and decarbonizing the grid

Today, very few of the spent battery cells are recycled.

Experts said that can change over time as raw materials needed for battery production are in limited supply, leaving firms with no choice but to recycle.

McKinsey’s Hannon outlined other reasons for companies to step by their recycling efforts. They include a regulatory environment where producers, by law, would have to deal with spent batteries — and disposing them could be more expensive.

“People who point to a lack of a recycling infrastructure as a problem aren’t recognizing that we don’t need extensive recycling infrastructure yet because the cars are so new, we’re not needing many back,” he said.

Most auto companies are already working to ensure they have significant recycling capacity in place before EVs start reaching the end of life over the next decade, he added.

It’s not silver bullet for climate change mitigation. Ideally, you also try to reduce the number of cars massively, and try to push things such as public transport

Florian Knobloch

Cambridge Centre for Environment, Energy and Natural Resource Governance

Knobloch from Cambridge University said a lot of research is going into improving battery technology, to make them more environmentally sustainable and less reliant on scarce raw materials. More efforts are also needed in decarbonizing the electricity grid, he added.

“It’s very important that more renewable electricity generation capacity is added to the grid each year, than coal generation capacity,” Knobloch said.

“Nowadays, it’s much easier to build large scale solar or offshore wind compared to building new fossil fuel power plant. What we see is more renewable electricity coming into the grid all over the world.”

Still, he pointed out that generating electricity by using renewable sources will still emit greenhouse gases as there are emissions from producing the solar panels and wind turbines. “What we look at is how long will it take until the electricity grid is sufficiently decarbonized so that you see large benefit from electric vehicles,” Knobloch added.

Policies needed for societal change

Experts agree that a transition from gasoline-powered cars to EVs is not a panacea for the global fight against climate change.

It needs to go hand-in-hand with societal change that promotes greater use of public transportation and alternative modes of travel, including bicycles and walking.

Reducing the use of private vehicles requires plenty of funding and policy planning.

MIT’s Paltsev, who is also deputy director at the university’s joint program on the science and policy of global change, explained that there are currently about 1.2 billion fuel-powered cars on the road globally –that number is expected to increase to between 1.8 billion to 2 billion.

In comparison, there are only about 10 million electric vehicles currently.

People underestimate how many new cars have to be produced and how much materials will be needed to produce those electric vehicles, Paltsev said.

The International Energy Agency predicts that the number of electric cars, buses, vans and heavy trucks on roads is expected to hit 145 million by 2030.

Even if everyone drove EVs instead of gasoline-powered cars, there would still be plenty of emissions from the plug-in vehicles due to their sheer volume, according to Knobloch.

“So, it’s not silver bullet for climate change mitigation. Ideally, you also try to reduce the number of cars massively, and try to push things such as public transport,” he said. “Getting people away from individual car transport is as important.”

Environment

Mitsubishi debuts EV battery swap network for cars AND trucks in Tokyo

Published

1 day ago

June 14, 2025

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Mitsubishi debuts EV battery swap network for cars AND trucks in Tokyo

Mitsubishi Fuso and Ample to partner on battery-swapping technology for electric trucks

Mitsubishi is partnering with Ample and Yamoto Transports to deploy an innovative new battery swap network for electric cars in its Japanese home market — but it’s not just for electric cars. Mitsubishi Fuso commercial trucks are getting in on the action, too!

Despite a number of early EV adopters with an overdeveloped concept of ownership, battery swap technology has proven to be both extremely effective and extremely positive to the overall EV ownership experience. And when you see how simple it is to add hundreds of miles of driving in just 100 seconds — quicker, in many cases, than pumping a tank of liquid fuel into an ICE-powered car — you might come around, yourself.

That seems to be what Mitsubishi thinks, anyway, and they’re hoping they’ll be your go-to choice when it’s time to electrify your regional and last-mile commercial delivery fleet(s) by launching a multi-year pilot program to deploy more than 150 battery-swappable commercial electric vehicles and 14 modular battery swapping stations across Tokyo, where the company plans to showcase its “five minute charging” tech in full view of hundreds of commercial fleets and, crucially, the executives of the companies that own and manage them.

How battery swap works for electric trucks; via Mitsubishi Fuso.

A truck like the Mitsubishi eCanter typically requires a full night of AC charging to top off its batteries, and at least an hour or two on DC charging in Japan, according to Fuso. This joint pilot by Mitsubishi, Mitsubishi Fuso Trucks, and Ample aims to circumvent this issue of forced downtime with its swappable batteries, supporting vehicle uptime by delivering a full charge within minutes. The move is meant to encourage the transport industry’s EV shift while creating a depository of stored energy that can be deployed to the grid in the event of a natural disaster — something Mitsubishi in Japan has been working on for years.

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Trucks like the eCanter already serve a number of roles throughout the global truck market, including municipal waste collection, regional delivery support, and more.

The pilot is backed by Tokyo Metropolitan Government’s “Technology Development Support Project for Promoting New Energy,” with local delivery operator Yamato Transport testing swappable EVs for delivery operations on both its eCanter light-duty trucks and Mitsubishi Minicab kei-class electric vans.

Electrek’s Take

Fuso eCanter battery swap; via Mitsubishi.

Electrifying the commercial truck fleet is a key part of decarbonizing city truck fleets – not just here in the US, but around the world. I called the eCanter, “a great product for moving stuff around densely packed city streets,” and eliminating the corporate fear of EV charging in the wild just makes it an even better product for that purpose.

Here’s hoping we see more “right size” electric solutions like this one (and more battery swapping tech) in small towns and tight urban environments stateside somewhat sooner than later.

SOURCES | IMAGES: Mitsubishi, Fuso.

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Environment

Opel Grandland Blitz AWD electric SUV should give US Jeep fans hope

Published

1 day ago

June 14, 2025

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Opel Grandland Blitz AWD electric SUV should give US Jeep fans hope

Conquering New Terrain: The Opel Grandland Electric AWD

After becoming the first European brand to offer fully electric versions of every model it sells — and at the same price as the ICE models — Opel is going even further, with a new, AWD electric SUV that should give American Jeep fans hope for a new electric Cherokee!

Now part of the Stellantis, rather than GM portfolio of brands, Rüsselsheim-based Opel showed off the first official pictures of its new Opel Grandland Electric AWD — the company’s first all-electric SUV to feature the “Blitz” performance emblem and all-wheel drive.

“Our top-of-the-range Grandland SUV is a milestone for Opel,” says Opel CEO Florian Huettl. “Customers already have a choice of battery-electric drive, plug-in hybrid and hybrid with 48-volt technology. We are now offering even more choice with the Grandland Electric AWD and thus ensuring that our customers can enjoy maximum efficiency and safety in diverse weather and road conditions, combined with plenty of driving fun.”

Stellantis gets it right in Europe

Opel says its new, AWD Grandland is its most aerodynamically efficient model yet, with a drag coefficient (Cd) of just 0.278. That efficiency, paired with similarly efficient electric motors and a 73 kWh li-ion NMC battery give the electric crossover a 501 km (311 mile) WLTP range, while a combined 325 hp and 375 lb-ft of torque should make for suitably spirited acceleration to go along with all that green cred.

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Suspension and handling, too, are promised to deliver on what Opel claims is a “typical” Teutonic driving experience in the Grandland AWD:

Both driving pleasure and comfort are further emphasized by dampers with frequency selective damping technology. This unique technology comes as standard on the Grandland Electric AWD and incorporates a second hydraulic circuit in the damper chamber to mechanically adapt the damping force in relation to the frequency. Depending on the situation, road surface conditions and driving style, it enables different damping characteristics for comfortable gliding at high frequencies – i.e. with short impacts such as on cobblestones or a manhole cover – as well as for a sporty, ambitious driving style with more direct contact with the road at low frequencies. The Grandland reacts even more immediately and directly to any command from the driver and, as is typical for Opel, remains stable when braking, cornering and at high speeds on the Autobahn.

OPEL PRESS RELEASE

The Opel Grandland Electric AWD ships with four standard drive modes that include “normal,” eco, sport, and 4WD mode, which simulates locking axles and true 4×4 off-road performance. The ESP and traction control systems adopt specific settings to enhance grip in 4WD mode as well, and maximum power and torque are instantly available.

Electrek’s Take

2026 Jeep Cherokee Electric SUV; via Chat GPT.

As you maybe could tell by now, feeding European Stellantis EVs into an AI image generator and asking it to “make them into Jeeps” is one of my new favorite things to do. This new Opel is no different, and the resulting image (above) paired with the models’ stated specs give me hope that the next wave of Jeep EVs will do better than the Wagoneer S at attracting buyers. All they really need, I think, is the right name — and the right price, to be winners.

SOURCE | IMAGES: Opel.

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Environment

With $25,000 off, is the Jeep Wagoneer S the best EV deal going?

Published

1 day ago

June 14, 2025

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With ,000 off, is the Jeep Wagoneer S the best EV deal going?

Deep discounts hit Jeep’s flagship EV as Stellantis struggles with demand

Like a 90s “gifted” kid that was supposed to be a lot of things, the electric Jeep Wagoneer S never really found its place — but with dealers discounting the Jeep brands forward-looking flagship by nearly $25,000, it might be time to give the go-fast Wagoneer S a second look.

SKIP THE STORY: get straight to the deals.

Whether we’re talking about Mercedes-Benz, Cerberus, Fiat, or even Enzo Ferrari, outsiders have labeled Jeep as a potentially premium brand that could, “if managed properly,” command luxury-level prices all over the globe. That hasn’t happened, and Stellantis is just the latest in a long line of companies to sink massive capital into the brand only to realize that people will not, in fact, spend Mercedes money on a Jeep.

That said, the Jeep Wagoneer S is not a bad car (and neither is its totally different, hideously massive, ICE-powered Wagoneer sibling, frankly). Built on the same Stellantis STLA Large vehicle platform that underpins the sporty Charger Daytona EVs, the confusingly-named Wagoneer S packs dual electric motors putting out almost 600 hp. That’s good enough to scoot the ‘ute 0 to 60 mph in a stomach-turning 3.5 seconds and enough, on paper, to convince Stellantis executives that they had developed a real, market-ready alternative to the Tesla Model Y.

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With the wrong name and a sky-high starting price of $66,995 (not including the $1,795 destination fee), however, that demand didn’t materialize, leaving the Wagoneer S languishing on dealer lots across the country.

That could be about to change, however, thanks to big discounts on Wagoneer S being reported at CDJR dealers in several states, according to our friends at the Car Dealership Guy podcast.

Jimmy Britt Chrysler Dodge Jeep Ram in Georgia, has a Wagoneer S with an MSRP of $67,590 listed at $43,104 ($24,486 off)
In Florida, Taverna Chrysler Dodge Jeep Ram Fiat has a $67,590 Wagoneer S slashed to $43,138 ($24,452 off)
Chris Nikel Chrysler Jeep Dodge Ram Fiat in Oklahoma has a Wagoneer S listed for $43,425 ($24,165 off)

“Stellantis bet big on electric versions of iconic American brands like Jeep and Dodge, but consumers aren’t buying the premise,” writes CDG’s Marcus Amick. “(Stellantis’ dealer body) is now stuck with expensive EVs that need huge discounts to move, eating into already thin margins while competitors focus on [more] profitable gas-powered vehicles.”

All of which is to say: if you’ve found yourself drawn to the Jeep Wagoneer S, but couldn’t quite stomach the $70,000+ window stickers, you might want to check in with your local Jeep dealer and see how you feel about it at a JCPenneys-like 30% off!