The impact of electric transportation on pollution and reduced carbon emissions and fossil-fuel consumption is complicated. On the one hand, well-designed electric vehicles (EVs) use much less energy per mile than conventionally-fueled vehicles. For passenger cars, good all-electric designs use roughly a quarter of the energy per mile of gasoline cars, tracing back to the source. On the other hand, the emissions impact tends to be much more local, and depends on how electricity is generated in a region.
How can utilities and customers work together to get the highest benefits and reduce fossil-fuel needs? “It depends” is not a useful answer, but this article seeks to offer some discussion and ideas that may help.
