Since the beginning of the pandemic, there has been a notable decrease in pollution globally. The lockdown finally gave our planet a chance to breathe and the absence of major human intervention began to show results. The Global Pandemic and the subsequent lockdown allowed the whole world to witness the pervasive impact man has on the environment.
Perhaps as a result of this revelation, ever since, India’s Vehicle landscape has been making large strides when it comes to making the world’s fourth-largest automobile market electric. Several enabling policies at the state and central level can be considered the catalysts for this shift towards a more environmentally friendly automobile market including the Union government’s FAME policy II.
The aim as set out by this policy is to make India the electric vehicle hub of the world and a 100% electric vehicle nation by the year 2030. Similarly, state government policies have also been introduced in the past year that further the entry of electric vehicles in the Indian mobility market. The demand for electric vehicles has been increasing every day, with as many as 236,802 electric cars and 25,735 electric two-wheelers sold in FY21.
At Yulu, our mission to enable sustainability has led us to develop an institution of shared mobility, which capitalizes on the benefits of electricity and takes into account the problem with the excess number of vehicles on the road. And we are doing our part by bringing on board more people and helping them adapt to electric vehicles.
Electric Vehicles are considered to be the best solution to make mobility sustainable at present. The move towards electric mobility is marked to be one towards sustainability. They are most frequently mentioned in the context of climate issues as a way of cutting greenhouse gas emissions caused by road traffic.
But what is the exact impact EVs have on the environment? Let’s have a look
Tail-pipe emissions:
The major benefit of electric cars is the contribution that they can make towards improving air quality in towns and cities. When an electric vehicle is running on electricity, it emits no tailpipe emissions which means pure electric cars produce no carbon dioxide emissions when driving. This reduces air pollution considerably.
Electric cars give us clean streets, making our towns and cities a better place to be for pedestrians and cyclists. In over a year, just one electric car on the roads can save an average of 1.5 million grams of CO2.
Well-to-Wheel emissions:
The Well-to-Wheel (WtW) estimate is a sum of all emissions in the entire lifecycle of an EV, including the production stage. The emissions created during the production of an electric car tend to be higher than a conventional car. This is due to the manufacture of lithium-ion batteries which are an essential part of electric cars.
When taking well-to-wheel emissions into account, all-electric vehicles emit an average of around 4,450 pounds of CO2 equivalent each year. More than a third of the lifetime CO2 emissions from an electric car come from the energy used to make the car itself.
By comparison, conventional gasoline cars will emit over twice as much annually. And as EV technology develops, even this rate of emission is significantly getting lower.
Noise Pollution:
As electric cars are far quieter than conventional vehicles, driving electric vehicles creates a more peaceful environment for us and we can help reduce noise pollution.
Mileage:
Another reason why electric vehicles are considered more sustainable than traditional vehicles is that the efficiency of electric vehicles is higher.
In most ICV cars, only 17 to 21 percent of the energy from fuel combustion is converted into power. On the other hand, EVs are able to convert 59 to 62 percent of the electric energy into power for the vehicle.
The average MPG of a typical gasoline-powered car is around 24.7 miles per gallon which as compared to the fuel economy of EVs of about 100 MPGe, is significantly lower.
Road ahead in India’s EV adoption
As detailed, EV has a significant positive impact on the environment around us. However, in the Indian context, we still have quite a long way to go.
- In India, the source of power for electric vehicles itself continues to be generated from fossil fuel-powered plants rather than renewable power. The benefits of electric mobility are thus blunted by the high carbon emissions that come from the power grids. Hence, we need to build more power grids that draw from renewable sources and are less carbon-intensive.
- The batteries that are powering most of the EVs right now require Lithium. The increased demand for these minerals will adversely impact the environment, and also affect the communities living in and around such mineral reserves. We need more state and business regulations that are all-inclusive in this respect.
- There must also be initiatives to develop a second life battery supply chain so that the batteries at the end of their EV life cycle are repurposed.
These steps will maximize the environmental benefits of EV transition and enable the country to reduce its footprint to the greatest possible extent. The benefits of electrification can only be fully reaped when such measures are taken.
Moreover, while electricity is the future and the comparatively more sustainable mode to travel, the issues of road congestion and traffic will not be solved due to this shift. Along with the need for a shift towards electric vehicles on all fronts, there must be more significance given to shared vehicles, especially in public commute and government processes.
Since its inception, Yuluites have saved more than 7000+ metric tonnes of carbon emission by traveling a total distance of 95 million kilometers since 2017. Three years later, our journey to sustainability is still ongoing and we are ardently focused on our mission to build the most seamless, shareable and sustainable means to travel. With the rise of EV adoption and the coming together of enabling policies, we hope to soon see an urban life that is free of life-harming emissions.