When Efficiency Does Not Help Sustainability
My brother and I had a discussion about methanol where we concluded that methanol is a promising sustainable liquid fuel for transportation devices when batteries cannot do the job. While Methanol is initially not carbon zero, as long as we focus on developing zero carbon electrical energy, eventually we can produce zero carbon green methanol. Once there is plentiful green methanol, existing methanol vehicles will automatically become zero carbon transportation.
The core argument is that zero carbon electricity production is becoming the most promising approach for zero carbon energy whether through solar, wind wave or nuclear energy. Once we develop gobs of zero carbon electricity, we can do sustainable carbon capture, sustainably produce methanol and use EV’s or methanol to mine lithium for batteries. That is, if we still need lithium for batteries by then.
There are those who argue that biofuels can be zero carbon too. In theory there are some situations where biofuels can be carbon zero (waste conversion, etc.), but once we farm our stock for bio fuels (like corn or sugar cane), the whole house of cards comes tumbling down. This is based on very simple math. A plant can, at best, convert 10% of sunlight into useful sustainable energy and that requires water, labor, farm equipment, fertilizer, bio fuel plants and all kinds of other energy consumers. Meanwhile, an infertile field planted with solar panels directly converts 20% or more of sunlight into useful sustainable energy with minimal water, fertilizer, conversion plant, etc. use. The math for farmed biofuels simply does not work.
The next day my brother alerted me to an article published in the Washington Post that commented on a study prepared by the American Council for an Energy Efficient Economy. This study concluded that the Toyota Prius Prime is the greenest car you can buy in the United States.
The Council assesses vehicle "green scores" not only by their on-road emissions, but also upstream emissions, including what generates the power needed for EVs, as well as emissions from mining and processing minerals for batteries, and creating vehicle components. It was unclear if it includes emissions for gasoline production or counts carbon produced by gasoline combustion alone (one gallon of gasoline produces 20 pounds of CO2, but the production and distribution of gasoline also produces anywhere from 3 to 6 pounds of CO2). I actually dug into the available information on the website, but stopped when I discovered the posted basis for the rating is a 2016 study, which will be inherently incorrect due to the rapid pace of technology.
As near as I could establish, the American Council for an Energy Efficient Economy is an earnest and well-meaning organization, but while many of their efforts, like promoting the conversion to heat pumps and improving home insulation, make perfect sense, they are missing an important point in their determination that a plug-in hybrid is the greenest car, and it applies regardless of the methodology they use to rate their cars.
Inherently plug-in hybrid cars cannot be the greenest cars, since they will continue to spew carbon into the atmosphere over the life of the car, while an EV would eventually become a zero-carbon emissions car with ever increasingly clean electricity production. My EV is already much greener than the study assumes because I use solar and wind generated electricity.
It is frustrating to note that this technical pig has not made it through the ACEEE python.
With regard to plug-in hybrids, one may argue that once we produce ample clean methanol we could convert the IC car from gasoline to methanol, but compared to just buying an EV today that is a pointless exercise. It would actually make more sense to buy a plug-in hybrid that is configured for methanol IC, but, unfortunately, no such cars are being produced today. A methanol plug-in hybrid may not be the most efficient approach today, but it holds the promise of eventually being carbon zero.
Don’t get me wrong, I am an efficiency freak, and I strongly support the inherent favorable bias to smaller cars in the ACEEE study. Nothing is less efficient than a huge truck (EV or not) driving one person around. It is technically stupid, and quite frankly also economically unattractive from the driver’s point of view, since it simply increases their cost for getting from A to B.
As a matter of fact, if the Toyota Prius were listed as “A best alternative if an EV cannot do the job” I would heartily endorse the ACEEE study.
Efficiencies need to be strategically applied. Something that is efficient today may not be efficient tomorrow, and only efficiencies that increase through time are truly great efficiencies.
Moreover, efficiencies in individual devices are not always the best approach. Generally, efficiencies in large systems have much better payoffs than individual component efficiencies. In the maritime industry we know this, because containerization is superefficient as a system. Although an individual container may not be the most efficient package for every random object, as a system, it beats any other solution.
Meanwhile, building ever larger container ships may reduce the carbon footprint per box mile, but running half full super large container ships within the system is less efficient than running full smaller container ships. The solution to this problem actually also applies to cars. Run small cars when you are alone, and use (own or rent) larger cars only when you carry a full load.
I know, it is all so confusing. Is there are straightforward approach that avoids these pitfalls?
After some pondering, I think I can reduce it to this logical sequence:
- It is the carbon. We want zero carbon as soon as possible.
- Focus on sustainable electricity generation.
- Provide the smallest device that can do the job.
- Electrify everything.
- Avoid building new carbon fuel IC equipment at all cost.
- Efficiency increases are a great way to speed up sustainability, but not if it achieved by introducing long term carbon fuel use.
- If a liquid or other chemical fuel is needed, provide equipment that can use fuels that can eventually be produced as green fuels such as hydrogen or methanol.
- Don’t sweat green fuel costs, once there is ample sustainable electrical energy, all other required fuels such as green methanol, or green hydrogen will become much cheaper.
Keep in mind this is a logical sequence from a design point of view. Consumers can only respond to it if we provide the proper products. Without the proper products, we cannot blame them for not doing the right thing.
Therefore, first the designers, engineers, policy makers, NGO’s and manufacturers need to get their head around the problem and, most of all, they need to stay away from promulgating sloppy arguments and studies.
For every column I write MREN has agreed to make a small contribution to an organization of my choice. For this column I select the Sierra Club. When I was trying to find the CO2 emissions for the production of a gallon of gasoline, they popped up first with a well-supported answer.