@mondoman712 No, they don't. Go read one of the rebuttals. The original, occasionally repeated pseudo-study claimed that tyres and brakes cause *hundreds* of times more particulate pollution than exhaust. This is physically impossible as both would wear down much faster than is observed.

See e.g.:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aar8njoGgNY

https://www.rac.co.uk/drive/electric-cars/running/do-electric-vehicles-produce-more-tyre-and-brake-pollution-than-petrol-and/

https://cleantechnica.com/2022/03/24/uk-environment-secretary-proven-wrong-on-ev-tires-brake-pollution/

Also this thread (use the Internet Archive):

https://twitter.com/MatthewToad42/status/1532728307908763650

https://twitter.com/MatthewToad42/status/1596861715547066370

https://twitter.com/KateFantom/status/1542246513329508352

I'm not saying tyres and brakes aren't a problem. Certainly we need to improve on them. And we need to reduce the number of cars.

But they're not as big as problem as claimed in these dubious pseudo-studies. Otherwise we'd be replacing tyres rather more often than we do.

This is just pro-petrol propaganda.

@marmo7ade @queermunist Who is "they" here? Cyclists?

Plenty of cars don't stop for stop signs and traffic lights too. At least around all the crossings near where I live. Now, it's possible that there are timing issues, but AFAICS the mentality is it's okay to keep going as long as the car in front of me is moving. Regardless of the state of the lights.

@mr_washee_washee Delaying the technologies that we know work, continuing to dig up more fossil fuels, and giving it a veneer of credibility by funding more research is a classic delayer tactic. Delay being a stage of denial.

@Atemu @Aatube This is my standard response to FUD about EV carbon emissions.

https://www.carbonbrief.org/factcheck-how-electric-vehicles-help-to-tackle-climate-change/

EVs do improve the situation. And the electricity mix is rapidly improving in most countries, it must continue to do so, and frankly it's low-hanging fruit compared to some of the other problems. But I agree that we will have a faster transition if we have fewer cars. More and cheaper buses will get us maybe 30%, but for the rest we'll need to change cities, change housing, build new rail lines etc. A lot of degrowth measures involve large amounts of construction, social change, and political challenges. They take time, potentially more time than we have.

We need to do *both*.

@flux @QuinceDaPence Concrete and steel (for stations, track, etc) matter. So does the electricity used to maintain stations, not just propel the train. So lifecycle emissions of a train are immensely complicated, plus then you get into how to route a new rail line without destroying too many ecosystems.

Even so, clean electricity is the easy bit compared to making planes clean. More trains please.

@MattMastodon @BrianSmith950 @Ardubal @Pampa @AlexisFR @Wirrvogel @Sodis IIRC most studies show that long term storage is only a few percent of total energy, certainly well under 10%. So it is a viable option - if you can get past leaks, and other problems (e.g. the temptation to burn it, producing NOx pollution). And can store vast amounts of energy relatively cheaply.

Nuclear is of course a viable option. There are a few others e.g. iron-air batteries, or just building a lot more renewables than we need. Long range interconnectors help. Lithium is only helpful for short to medium term storage.

Re synthetic fuels, so far extremely expensive and limited scale. Might possibly be used for aviation in the long run (but it's easier just to fly less, and we still need a reliable, safe solution to the contrails problem). Maybe shipping too (possibly as ammonia).

@MattMastodon @BrianSmith950 @Ardubal @Pampa @AlexisFR @Wirrvogel @Sodis Here's a study from a while back about how much storage is actually needed, using the example of Australia. You can get to ~98% with relatively little storage. For the remaining 2%, you need to think about more difficult options - demand side measures, nuclear, long term storage, etc.

https://reneweconomy.com.au/a-near-100-per-cent-renewables-grid-is-well-within-reach-and-with-little-storage/

@MattMastodon @BrianSmith950 @Ardubal @Pampa @AlexisFR @Wirrvogel @Sodis There seems to be a lot of uncertainty around the cost of green hydrogen. The first three Google links differ wildly on it.

Natural gas has certainly increased the cost of grey hydrogen lately.

If the problem is the cost of electricity, that's easily solved by producing mainly when there's a surplus of green electricity. However, if the cost is the capital outlay, that's harder. Which is it?

Of course, we can and must require by law that all new capacity be green. Current incentives also include blue, but there is more green hydrogen actually being built.

@MattMastodon @BrianSmith950 @Ardubal @Pampa @AlexisFR @Wirrvogel @Sodis Also, which country is that? Look at e.g. today's UK chart - wind was dominant until 6:30PM. Sadly this service does not include batteries because there's no data on *charging* them.

https://grid.iamkate.com/

@MattMastodon @BrianSmith950 @Ardubal @Pampa @AlexisFR @Wirrvogel @Sodis There is commercial production of green hydrogen today, but it requires a subsidy. The cost of grey hydrogen does not reflect the damage it causes.

@MattMastodon @BrianSmith950 @Ardubal @Pampa @AlexisFR @Wirrvogel @Sodis The problem with using it for long term electricity storage is leaks, of course. It's a weak greenhouse gas (sort of).

https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2022/jun/17/pollutionwatch-hydrogen-power-climate-leaks

@MattMastodon @BrianSmith950 @Ardubal @Pampa @AlexisFR @Wirrvogel @Sodis Also, smart tariffs for EV charging (dependent on when there is most renewable energy) already exist, at least two companies doing them. That's not V2G though.

@MattMastodon @BrianSmith950 @Ardubal @Pampa @AlexisFR @Wirrvogel @Sodis What that means is if you're going the long term storage / hydrogen or iron-air batteries route, the inefficiency doesn't matter (but the capital cost does).

On the other hand if you try to reach 100% with minimal demand side interventions even in emergencies, you end up building way more (~3x) renewables than you ideally need. Which has a cost - rare earths etc.

But there are plenty of options for managing intermittency. All of them have problems or costs though. Which is one reason I'm not strongly opposed to nuclear, for instance, but nor am I terribly enthusiastic about its ability to deliver quickly enough.

@MattMastodon @BrianSmith950 @Ardubal @Pampa @AlexisFR @Wirrvogel @Sodis Yup, lots of interconnectors being built/planned in theory, but they seem to take ages. We need more in any case.

@MattMastodon @BrianSmith950 @Ardubal @Pampa @AlexisFR @Wirrvogel @Sodis IMHO reusing ex-EV batteries as grid storage may be more important in the medium term though.

@MattMastodon @BrianSmith950 @Ardubal @Pampa @AlexisFR @Wirrvogel @Sodis Africa too - see the Xlinks project: 10GW Saharan solar + battery + 3.6GW interconnector -> UK baseload equivalent to a nuclear power station.

Although that is now dependent on a 20GWh lithium battery, which somewhat stretches credulity. Not to mention the usual questions around appropriation of land and water etc.

https://xlinks.co/morocco-uk-power-project/

@Ardubal @MattMastodon @BrianSmith950 @Pampa @AlexisFR @Wirrvogel @Sodis Also on the timescale: Labour have officially said they would reach 100% clean electricity by 2030, starting in 2025. That's generally seen as challenging, but it may well be possible (albeit at a high cost in lithium and rare earths). There's no way it can be done with nuclear. In any case we need to move fast; most of the rest of the transition depends on clean electricity. My main objection to nuclear is simply that it will take another 20 years to get maybe 3 more reactors if we're very lucky.

@MattMastodon @BrianSmith950 @Ardubal @Pampa @AlexisFR @Wirrvogel @Sodis Maybe. It depends where the cars are plugged in at the time. The charging infrastructure to use them all at once would be pretty serious/expensive, especially if it has to support fast charging in e.g. a (potentially systemic) personal emergency as well as efficient slow charging with V2G.

And the transition to EVs is going to stall pretty soon, because a large proportion of people people do not have driveways or garages, and public chargers are expensive and slow.

Also, I'm hoping the peak number of EVs will be somewhat less than the current total number of cars - we get to sustainability faster with fewer cars.

V2G is interesting though, I agree we should make use of that resource.

@Ardubal @MattMastodon @BrianSmith950 @Pampa @AlexisFR @Wirrvogel @Sodis So no, nuclear is not the only proven option by a long way. Nor is it a feasible option on its own IMHO. And new designs increase risk and time. Building multiple reactors to the same design saves time and money, of course.

Nuclear is an option. It probably isn't enough on its own any more than any of the other options are. There is absolutely no reason to stop building renewables, and slowly scaling up various storage options, today.

@MattMastodon @BrianSmith950 @Ardubal @Pampa @AlexisFR @Wirrvogel @Sodis What would the cost be of fast bidirectional charging points for all those cars though? Both at office and at home? Do you need them to be fast charging, or is V2G at 7.5kW realistic/useful?

You'd be lucky to get 30%. IMHO the resource is somewhat limited depending on how much you put into charging infrastructure.