Electric Cars Are Powered by Coal

A few years ago gasoline prices were hovering around the 5-dollar per gallon mark driving automakers around the world to meet the sweeping demand for alternatively powered vehicles. Within a year, nearly every company had unveiled its own version of either a hybrid or fully electric passenger car.

The first electrically-powered cars were introduced in the U.S. and Europe around the mid-nineteenth century. Though it is unclear who actually invented the concept back in those days, today there is every reason to believe that the electric car is no better of a solution than its gasoline ancestors; at least not yet.

According to the United States Energy Information Administration, almost half (45 percent) of America's electrical power is currently generated by burning coal. Natural gas and nuclear power come in second and third, 23-percent and 20-percent, respectively. Wind and hydroelectric power providers barely even register on the scale.

With these facts in mind, it may as well be said that an electric car being operated in the United States is essentially powered by coal. Yes, coal; and environmentally-minded drivers need to know that there's nearly nothing green about driving an electric car.

Coal mining requires the excavation of substantial areas of land and poses a host of environmental hazards including soil erosion, excessive noise and pollution of the air and water. In an effort to appear more environmentally friendly over the years, mining companies have done a better job at covering their tracks. However, backfilling and tree planting will ever undo the overall destruction caused by the extraction process.

Mining also takes a toll in human life. In 2010, for example, 48 people died working in American coal mines. At the same time, China lost more than 2,400 workers to mining accidents.

Once mined, coal is burned to boil water for immense steam turbines which generate electricity. Burning coal is a dirty process; a statement that cannot be easily disputed. Burning coal gives off a mixture of sulfur dioxide, carbon dioxide and nitrogen oxide.

Any ideas that so-called clean coal technologies will help to curtail environmental damage is idealistic but finally erroneous. Adding chemical-filtering scrubbers to the chimneys of power plants will only slightly reduce the amount of toxins released into the atmosphere over time because of the increasing number of plants needed to meet power demands.

And what happens to the contaminants when reusable scrubbers are cleaned? Some scientists claim that the filtered toxic waste ends up in the soil and water supplies in close proximity to the power plants. There is no consensus on an answer to this question.

Eventually, the world's coal supply will be exhausted, just as petroleum stores will be and vehicle designers will be back to square one. But the immediate issue rests in how to limit America's dependence on foreign fuel supplies. For the moment, electricity seems to be the go-to technology, but even the cars themselves pose an environmental threat.

While they may not directly create a pollution problem, electric cars have some particularly toxic components, particularly the lithium-ion batteries which power the motors. Currently, the federal government says these batteries can be freely disposed of in normal municipal landfills.

Toyota, on the other hand, recently stated that lithium-ion batteries were far too hazardous to be used in passenger cars at all. If sold en mass, these batteries could create a significant amount of solid waste, with no predetermined plan for their complete disposal or breakdown.

Trading one problem for another is not a solution. For now, the amount of petroleum needed to generate wind and solar power prevents either from becoming immediately affordable or practical. There is no perfect answer but until there is a viable option, not just for gasoline but also for coal, the electric car is not going to help the environmental problem.

In the end, using more electricity to run the millions of automobiles in the United States will, at least in the short term, generate more pollution and waste. Anyone looking down their environmentally-friendly noses from behind the wheel of an electric car should remember just how much damage they may still be doing.

Gery L. Deer is an independent columnist and business writer based in Jamestown, Ohio. Read more at www.deerinheadlines.com.