The US EPA Makes 40.6 equal 118 MPG or 34.4% equal. 100%
 

The EPA allows plug in vehicle makers to claim an equivalent miles per gallon (MPG) based on the electricity powering the cars motors being 100% efficient.

Lindsay Leveen - GREENEXPLORED - June 12, 2012

Don't shoot the messenger, please --Ed.

Bloom Energy claimed 60% efficiency when they actually only had 45.2% efficiency. But Bloom is not the world’s biggest fibber. That honor goes to the US EPA. Has the Green Machine lost it? Is he cozying up to Al Gore and Colin Powell? Is he just plain nuts? None of the above! The Green Machine is now exposing how the US Government can choose to create data that disobey the laws of thermodynamics so that the worthless government policy of favoring plug in vehicles over gas or diesel powered vehicles can be supported by the public. Yes the US EPA chooses to make 34.4% equal to 100%.

Is this just another way for a do good government to dictate that the least smart student in the class gets an A. The socialist inspired nincompoops at the EPA believe the plug in needs higher grades just because three Nobel Prize winners told them so. Two of the prize winners won for peace the other for physics. ... [Read More]

Re: The US EPA Makes 40.6 equal 118 MPG or 34.4% equal. 100%
 

Sigh -- does the author of this editorial think that gasoline appears out of thin air? Does the MPGe rating on diesels or E85 need to be prorated to include all the energy overhead needed before the fuel is pumped into the tank? Now that we are using bitumen from Alberta, does a gallon of gasoline only count for ~2.5 quarts?

What about all the electricity used all during the production of oil used to make gasoline? We use about 7-8kWh PER GALLON of gasoline -- that electricity *alone* would let you drive a Leaf at least 22 miles. (Never mind all the natural gas and water used in oil production...) The same overhead on that electricity and natural gas and water ALL needs to be added to each gallon of gasoline, too.

I can produce my own electricity on my rooftop -- how's that personal gasoline production going?

Neil

Re: The US EPA Makes 40.6 equal 118 MPG or 34.4% equal. 100%
 

Mr Leveen may be overlooking the age old technique employed by every promoter who wants to advance the marketing of a product or service - the massaging of the truth through selective exaggeration. Of course, the reality of mpg equivalency is lower than stated but if it gets more people to make the mental jump to electric power in their vehicles, I'm fine with it.

The real cost of ensuring adequate petroleum supplies is far higher than the cost at the pump. How many people (adherents to this forum perhaps excluded) really expect to get the oft quoted fuel economies out of their vehicles?

A bit off topic... Mr. Leveen seems to display too much vitriol on his site, for my taste. Is this his method of promoting his brand of the truth, his "product"?

Re: The US EPA Makes 40.6 equal 118 MPG or 34.4% equal. 100%
 

I always thought that the MPGe rating was an equivalent cost basis rather than an efficiency basis. That is, we're trying to figure out how much it costs the end user to fuel the vehicle in MPG terms he/she are familiar with. In that case, the EPA's rule-of-thumb of 33.7kwh = 1gal of gasoline is not far wrong if you pay ~12 cents per kwh for electrical power.

Re: The US EPA Makes 40.6 equal 118 MPG or 34.4% equal. 100%
 

"The Green Machine is now exposing how the US Government can choose to create data that disobey the laws of thermodynamics so that the worthless government policy of favoring plug in vehicles over gas or diesel powered vehicles can be supported by the public."

Anybody wanna bet Leveen knows anything about the laws of thermodynamics?
It doesn't make any sense to debate efficiencies unless you've agreed on definitions of relevant inputs and outputs. He deliberately picks an alternate definition of input, then quarrels with the resulting different efficiency number. Mere propaganda.

Re: The US EPA Makes 40.6 equal 118 MPG or 34.4% equal. 100%
 

A Prius gets 50mpg, since a gallon has 33.7kW of energy then that is 1.48m/kWh.. The Leaf is rated at 3.7m/kWh or in other words the Leaf is 2.5 times as efficient as a Prius.

Stop driving that gas hog Prius!

Re: The US EPA Makes 40.6 equal 118 MPG or 34.4% equal. 100%
 

I understand that there are generation and transmission losses with electricity, and that there are lots of cumulative inefficiencies in the production and transport of gasoline and diesel. Again, those can vary widely. So the only thing the EPA really can do is to rate how many miles the vehicle itself goes on a certain amount of energy, and ignore what happens before the energy gets to the vehicle.

It's based strictly on the energy equivalence of the two fuels (i.e. 1 gallon containing 33.7kWh of energy). The EPA has been doing it this way ever since the last round of BEVs in the 1990s.

Gas prices fluctuate too much ($4 today, down near $1.50 at the depths of the recent financial crisis) and electricity prices vary too much from place to place (I pay about 8c/kWh, used to pay 2.2c/kWh when I lived in Seattle, some people on the east coast pay upwards of 20c/kWh) for any kind of cost equivalence to work.

Re: The US EPA Makes 40.6 equal 118 MPG or 34.4% equal. 100%
 

In other words, it's comparing chemical energy in a car's fuel tank to charger input electrical energy, NOT comparing energy at the well or mine (or lake or fuel rod). Laveen illogically wants EPA to factor in the production and distribution losses for electrical energy, but not for gasoline.

Re: The US EPA Makes 40.6 equal 118 MPG or 34.4% equal. 100%
 

It's just the same old tired line.

We know.

We just don't care because PEV => relatively good efficiency + less urban pollution + less noise + less maintenance + largely domestic energy + fungible fuel source + fungible large potential fuel sources + better electricity grid + P(much smaller military budget).

Re: The US EPA Makes 40.6 equal 118 MPG or 34.4% equal. 100%
 

I don't see the EPA's MPGe standard as being useful, however, I don't feel the need to get emotional unstrunged like Mr. Leveen. While I don't agree with the EPAs cut and paste approach, Mr. Leveen's analysis and approach is no better.

Re: The US EPA Makes 40.6 equal 118 MPG or 34.4% equal. 100%
 

I guess my issue with fueling plug-ins versus petro ...

There appears to be NO standardized and widely available/used input metering system for kW/hrs transferred through the plug for plug-ins.

Just that simple ...

I have been trying to get a handle (measured data) on ENERGY IN for plug-ins since 2009.

Am I wrong?

Re: The US EPA Makes 40.6 equal 118 MPG or 34.4% equal. 100%
 

You know, there is an argument for carbon equivalence and that obviously varies. But if I have to charge my EV with electricity generated from coal and the analysis says that a fit EV runs me the carbon equivalence of a HCHII, I may not be willing to deal with range issues or spend $30k on a new car.

There are strong arguments against EVs from an environmental point of view. EVs in general seem to give you other things other than environmental benefits (ie Leaf is faster than Prius). Sure electricity is more versatile but coal is horrible.

The military argument against oil is probably 5 years away from being irrelevant. NA is very close to being self sufficient for oil. Sure the oil will always cross borders and the Middle East will have a lot of oil for some time. But throw in 5 years of high CAFE numbers and growing (even if just a little) production in the US and the tar sands, and the trend line is in our favor.

Re: The US EPA Makes 40.6 equal 118 MPG or 34.4% equal. 100%
 

The USA is using less coal all the time -- we are now down to about 38% of our electricity from coal. Of course fracking for gas and oil means that those now take a lot more energy and more water to get them out of the ground, and the amount of leaked gas out of the ground, etc. is not accounted for, either.

Even with 100% coal, the carbon equivalent is about 80MPG on gasoline.

Electric motors are up to 94% efficient.
Gasoline engines are up to 38% efficient and diesels are up ~42%, if I am not mistaken.

Re: The US EPA Makes 40.6 equal 118 MPG or 34.4% equal. 100%
 

"Up to" is the critical phrase there. Those numbers are for the best engines, running steadily at their most efficient combination of speed and load. For average engines under all the varied conditions of normal driving, with normal drivers, a lot less.

Re: The US EPA Makes 40.6 equal 118 MPG or 34.4% equal. 100%
 

Consider http://greet.es.anl.gov/results

5 data packed pages

Re: The US EPA Makes 40.6 equal 118 MPG or 34.4% equal. 100%
 

if that worries you then get solar panels installed at your home.. dont ask me how you plan to charge at night :)

The other alternative is E85.. yes half the board just gasped!.. there are cars that run well on E85.

Re: The US EPA Makes 40.6 equal 118 MPG or 34.4% equal. 100%
 

This is a flawed argument. The oil market is a world market and oil is fungable and all of the supply infrastructure is held by private commercial entities who sell to the highest bidder. That means even if the US is producing the same amount as it is consuming, if there is a war or embargo or some sort of disruption of the supply somewhere else, that oil will flow out of the US to the highest bidder. Oil demand is extremely inelastic short term so we will still see huge price spikes and we will still be in the business of being the "world police" in oil producing areas until we break or oil addiction.

The REAL national security argument for increase oil production in the US is balance of trade. When a sovereign nation has a negative balance of trade (imports exceed exports) over the long haul, that equation balances by foreigners and foreign nations buying up more and more of the nations assets and debt. Foreign entities currently own 28% of US debt. At what level of indebtedness to foreign entities does a country start lose it autonomy and freedom to act as a sovereign nation? Has it already happened? What would happen to the the US borrowing costs if China or the Saudis or others decided to dump ALL of their Treasuries on the world market tomorrow?

My appologies for sending this thread off on a tangent . . :eek:

Re: The US EPA Makes 40.6 equal 118 MPG or 34.4% equal. 100%
 

Well - I understand you calling it a flawed argument but there is some merit.

In a war, we have enough to not be shocked. So it becomes less of a national security issue. In a real war, the oil is not in the hands of the private entities. In a real war, ships don't go unfettered from the US to China or India. So in a real (or serious or WWIII), the origin of oil makes a big difference.

And then you made the 2nd part of the argument. The balance of trade and we are fixing that gradually on the energy side. Obviously billions flowing to unstable/unfriendly regimes is not a good thing. We can't fix that Iran has oil and we can't fix that oil has value. We can use less but every drop we cut gets used us by someone else (admittedly at a slightly lower price).

So yes, oil use has a military consequence. But this is diminishing over time - not to zero but diminished. There is no way we can wave our hands and make world oil have no value. So because of that, Iran having oil is a problem. But it is a problem even if the US uses none of it. I just would argue that you can't really attribute $500 billion a year going forward to protect oil supplies. Some of that is going to be spent anyway because oil will always have world value. Even if the US used no oil at all, some of that would be still be spent.

I've seen an EV analysis that put the coal comparison at about 35 mpg. (carbon)

On the other hand, you can't going around saying gasoline is 38% efficient. It is more like
15% in average use. But you can say that coal is 40%.

Re: The US EPA Makes 40.6 equal 118 MPG or 34.4% equal. 100%
 

Can anyone link to a graph of US oil production vs consumption, because the idea that we are on a path to oil independence does not jive with anything I've seen. Sure, we are exporting a bit of our refined (imported) oil, but I think our consumption still swamps our production...

Re: The US EPA Makes 40.6 equal 118 MPG or 34.4% equal. 100%
 

A few years back I was interested in steam powered automobiles.

Guess what ... they get about 10 mpg ... of water.

Re: The US EPA Makes 40.6 equal 118 MPG or 34.4% equal. 100%
 

And one needs a source of heat to make steam...

Re: The US EPA Makes 40.6 equal 118 MPG or 34.4% equal. 100%
 

No graphs but here are some numbers.

US consumption in 2007 - 20.6
US consumption in 2011 - 18.8

NA Production 2007 - 7.5
NA Production 2011 - 9

Now cherry pick that trend line and in 2019 (admittedly 7 years away) and consumption is 15 and production is 13.

So not quite after 7 years but the math was just easier. Now - some of the growth in production may actually increase as the Gulf continues to come back on line after the BP spill. But obviously this is cherry picking and the consumption probably won't fall that fast. But of course the CAFE numbers are even more aggressive.

Either way, in the lifetime of a Volt, the military impact of oil will be much less than today.

Re: The US EPA Makes 40.6 equal 118 MPG or 34.4% equal. 100%
 

One could argue the decline in consumption merely corresponds to a decline in economic activity...

Hopefully the economy finds a way to recover AND get more efficient, but the efficiencies tend to be gradual, especially in a drill, baby, drill environment.

Re: The US EPA Makes 40.6 equal 118 MPG or 34.4% equal. 100%
 

Check the Cyclone web site, they are offering small steam engines suitable for cars and pickups.. about 120hp and a bazillion ft-lbs of torque, and you dont need a transmission. The trick is using steam at critical temperatures/pressures, the steam loses less energy to friction and is more efficient.. besides the benefit of not needing a transmission you also dont need the usual anti pollution equipment.

http://www.cyclonepower.com/

Re: The US EPA Makes 40.6 equal 118 MPG or 34.4% equal. 100%
 

The Prius' Atkinson cycle gasoline engine is reportedly 38% energy efficiency, i.e. 38% of the chemical energy found in gasoline is converted into mechanical energy. Whether an otto or atkinson cycle, gasoline engine are the least efficient for the first five or so minutes from a cold start with much of the lost energy spent on warming up the engine. An engine block heater can minimize the thermal lost from a warmup (at the expense of the energy used to heat up the engine block heater itself).

Re: The US EPA Makes 40.6 equal 118 MPG or 34.4% equal. 100%
 

DOD already had working prototypes of a shale-oil and bio-oil blends for jet A fuels so in theory our military fuel supply should be able to weather out any oil crisis as long as the military logistics of oil distribution is flexible enough. Our civilian/commerical oil distribution network for North America is inflexible so while one region can drown in oil another region can have an oil shortage so just increasing oil production in Montana/North Dakota will not make all of NA's civilian/commercial markets immune to global shifts in oil supply and productions.


With respect to how big an electric car's carbon foot print is Scientific American published a study[1] which found that it depends on where you get your electricity and that often depends on where you live and recharge your vehicle..

With respect to distribution efficiency, in washington DC, my local utility charges 4 cents for energy to distribute/pump every 1 kwh of electricity (10 cents/1kwh of electricity). This equates roughly to an extra 0.4 kw/H to distribute 1.0 kw/H - that is to say the electric distribution efficacy in the DC area is about 71% (you get 1 kwh for every 1.4 kwh sent) which is way lower than the 90% efficency that Leveen had estimated. In addition, while electric deregulation allows me to buy my 1.0 kwh from Cleancurrent a wind turbine consolidator(which is carbon free), I still must buy 0.4 kwh of dirty electricity(*) from my local utility Pepco just to get it into my home. So when I buy 400 kwh of clean electricity I'm also buying 160 kwh of dirty electricity with it...


(*) 37% OF the electricity will be from coal burning plants

[1]
http://www.scientificamerican.com/ar...endly-vehicles

http://www.scientificamerican.com/ar...lug-in-hybrids

Re: The US EPA Makes 40.6 equal 118 MPG or 34.4% equal. 100%
 

I believe the peak of gasoline consumption (don't know about petroleum) was in 2006 and consumption has been falling steadily with the fleet gradually becoming more efficient.

The past year should be instructive to everybody: the price has reacted quickly and sharply to supply constraints and changes in economic growth in the larger consumers. Buy a guzzler in haste and repent at leisure.

Re: The US EPA Makes 40.6 equal 118 MPG or 34.4% equal. 100%
 

That SA article was the one I was thinking of.

If it is true, then buying a Leaf or Volt will not change my carbon footprint from my HCH-II.

Amazing the comments on that article - one would think Scientific American readers would have more sense than an average american.

Now the baseload argument is probably a good one. But you have to love the argument (comment from the article) that enough baseload is wasted to charge 3 times the total number of vehicles in the US if they were all EVs. Obviously not true.

Re: The US EPA Makes 40.6 equal 118 MPG or 34.4% equal. 100%
 

looking at the eia #'s here
http://www.eia.gov/dnav/pet/pet_cons...s_mbblpd_a.htm

it is hard for me to see a reduction apart from the crash of 2008/2009 from which we are still feeling the effects.

As was suggested, it is cherry picking to compare pre/post crash data over such a short period.

Re: The US EPA Makes 40.6 equal 118 MPG or 34.4% equal. 100%
 

And here is production history:
http://www.eia.gov/dnav/pet/hist/Lea...s=MCRFPUS2&f=A

We are on a fracking binge in a period of high crude prices, so it makes sense we would see an upward blip in production. It's not like we are returning to 1970 production levels. Ever.

Re: The US EPA Makes 40.6 equal 118 MPG or 34.4% equal. 100%
 

Until you run out of charge, in which case you have to use the fuel efficiency of the tow truck for the rest of your journey.

Harry

Re: The US EPA Makes 40.6 equal 118 MPG or 34.4% equal. 100%
 

Isn't that the truth. :p

Lets see if I drive from the Vezzo Restaurant in New York to the Portofino Marina / Restaurant in Long Beach California, AKA Cannonball Run, it's 2738 miles coast to coast.

I would need to make "four" stops for fuel, that take at most six to seven minutes each in my Prius. I wonder how many hours or days it would take to charge a Leaf or any other BEV to cross the United States? :rolleyes:

50 gallons of fuel at a cost of $171 as of today's fuel prices, or 6.2 cents per mile. :D

Re: The US EPA Makes 40.6 equal 118 MPG or 34.4% equal. 100%
 

Reminds me of the tow truck operator that I chatted with at a gas pump, he filled up with diesel every couple of days.. ouch!

He went on praising the chassis strength of the Ford heavy duty trucks.. he knew a lot about hypermiling.