Electric vehicles and internal combustion automobiles emit vastly different sums of carbon, and electric vehicles are quickly widening the gap between the two options as the electricity generation industry cleans up its act.
David Reichmuth writes for the Union of Concerned Scientists with an unequivocal message about the environmental impacts of electric cars relative to automobiles with combustion engines: "The latest data affirms that driving on electricity produces significantly fewer emissions than using gasoline and is getting better over time."
"Based on where EVs have been sold, driving the average EV produces global warming pollution equal to a gasoline vehicle that gets 88 miles per gallon (mpg) fuel economy," explains Reichmuth. "That’s significantly better than the most efficient gasoline car (58 mpg) and far cleaner than the average new gasoline car (31 mpg) or truck (21 mpg) sold in the US."
The numbers have also improved by 10 percent in favor of EVs in the past two years.
Reichmuth reaches this conclusion using recently released Electricity power plant emissions data for 2018.
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