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Page added on November 27, 2013
Why Electric Car Could Be Safer than Gasoline-Powered Ones
Sure, lithium-ion batteries have risks, but so do gasoline-powered cars.
But there are reasons to think that vehicles using lithium-ion batteries could be even safer than those that run on gasoline.
Gasoline is concentrated in a single large tank. The flammable liquid electrolyte that burns in battery fires is contained in small packages. That provides more opportunities to protect the electrolyte and slow the spread of a fire if one of them has a problem. The recent fires in the Tesla Model S were contained in the front part of the car.
You don’t have to refuel batteries, so there’s no pumping of flammable liquids.
Electric cars have far fewer moving parts than gasoline ones, so there will be fewer things to break down. A large share of the fires in conventional cars are the result of the failure of mechanical parts.
During normal operation, you don’t set fire to the electrolytes in batteries. But gasoline engines operate by deliberately exposing gasoline to a spark. The engines run hot. It’s a tricky mix to manage.
And electric vehicles don’t emit pollution locally, which will improve air quality in cities, reducing death and sickness—especially in countries like China. Pollution from the power plants that are used to charge electric cars is easier to control and monitor than pollution from millions of gasoline tailpipes.
In summary, there are many reasons to prefer electric cars to gasoline-powered cars in terms of overall safety. Of course, for electric vehicles to have a good name, car makers will need to manage the very real risks that come along with using lithium-ion batteries.
14 Comments on "Why Electric Car Could Be Safer than Gasoline-Powered Ones"
bobinget on Wed, 27th Nov 2013 7:51 pm
U.S. fire departments responded to an estimated average of 152,300 automobile fires per year in 2006-2010. These fires caused an average of 209 civilian deaths, 764 civilian injuries, and $536 million in direct property damage.
Facts and Figures
Automobile fires were involved in 10% of reported U.S. fires, 6% of U.S. fire deaths.
On average, 17 automobile fires were reported per hour. These fires killed an average of four people every week.
Mechanical or electrical failures or malfunctions were factors in roughly two-thirds of the automobile fires.
Collisions and overturns were factors in only 4% of highway vehicle fires, but these incidents accounted for three of every five (60%) automobile fire deaths.
Only 2% of automobile fires began in fuel tanks or fuel lines, but these incidents caused 15% of the automobile fire deaths.
Source: NFPA’s “Automobile Fires in the U.S.: 2006-2010 Estimates” report by Marty Ahrens, September 2012.
NFPA does not test, label or approve any products.
Updated: 5/13
J-Gav on Wed, 27th Nov 2013 8:56 pm
The real issues with EVs are not broached in this article. To make a long story short, fleet replacement and infrastructure build-out (charging stations) would 1 – take too long; 2 – cost too much to be of much use beyond the range of municipal fleets.
DC on Wed, 27th Nov 2013 9:39 pm
Two issues. One is a technical point. Li-on batteries are designed to fail and degrade quickly. A feature of all capitalist ‘innovations’. If we wanted a battery chemistry for EVs that is long-lived, reliable, and doesn’t catch fire, or require complex battery management systems, wed be using Ni-HM. OPPS! Chevron bought that tech out and prompty buried it
See:http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Patent_encumbrance_of_large_automotive_NiMH_batteries
Second point is, that EV’s, as currently envisioned and configured, will ‘save’ exactly zero lives. 4000 pound eco-friendly EVs will kill just as many pedestrians, cyclists and other EVers just as capbly as there gas-burning counterparts do now.
Li-on is designed to fail and catch fire. The mere fact that is can and does, whether its in an Ijunk, a laptop, or a mobile trash can, hasnt deterred our corporations from pushing this rather useless ‘tech’ on the world. Billions of discarded li-on batteries are added to the mountains of tech trash we have now every year. All powered by Li-Ons, or were. Cept there mostly un-recyclable batteries are too cheap to reclaim so we do what we always do, toss em to the third world.
bobinget on Wed, 27th Nov 2013 11:43 pm
Just for a minute. Try to imagine, you and cohort scientists have invented a new oil based fuel as a replacement for diesel (gas-oil). WE came up with the name ‘gasoline’.. This fuel we maintain is far more flexible then gas-oil. Gas (for short) can be used in low cost 2 cycle engines to lower compression aircraft and inboard pleasure craft. Gasoline stores nearly as much energy as diesel and doesn’t freeze up in zero temps.
I know some of you crybabies are going to say ‘gas’ gas fumes are highly explosive, like having a bomb in the vehicle at all times.To that I say, what better way to get out of onerous lease payments!
I need all your help, Please! Write to your congressMAN, the EPA, request we approve gasoline for use in mobile vehicles, including donation-cycles.
I Thank You. As does all future spark plug, ignition system companies and firefighters sick of sitting around watching TV with other ugly men.
BillT on Thu, 28th Nov 2013 1:28 am
J-Gav, you have to keep driving home those FACTS. Techies want to believe they can save the world, as they continue to destroy it.
And, I add, where are the ~750,000 tons of rare earths needed to replace the ~250 million cars in the US with Electrics? If you use the total production for cars, what about the wind turbines and all of the other techie toys that require rare earths? (ALL of them.) Only 100,000 tons of Rare Earths were produced in 2012, worldwide, and most of that was in China.
Then again, replacing those 250 million vehicles with electric at $30K average each is: $ 7,500,000,000,000 or $24,000 per man, woman and child in the US. (Don’t forget, each of us owes ~$60,000+ on the National Debt.)
And, since producing a car uses about half of the oil it will consume in it’s life cycle, there is only a transfer of energy use from oil to some form of electric producing energy that is also dependent on oil. (ALL of them except muscle power.)
Tom S on Thu, 28th Nov 2013 3:00 am
BillT:
“And, since producing a car uses about half of the oil it will consume in it’s life cycle,”
No. That’s just drastically wrong. We can find on the EIA website that manufacturing of transportation equipment of all kinds requires about 23 trillion BTUs of oil, which is about 0.06% of petroleum usage. Since half of petroleum is used for gasoline (approximately), and almost all of that is used for automotive fuel, we can estimate that less than 0.2% of the oil used to power a car during its lifetime, is used during its manufacture.
“where are the ~750,000 tons of rare earths needed to replace the ~250 million cars in the US with Electrics?… Only 100,000 tons of Rare Earths were produced in 2012,”
This implies that replacing the entire fleet of cars with electrics would take less than 50,000 tons of rare earths per year, because the car fleet takes more than 15 years to turn over. That’s half of worldwide production at present. Which implies that mining of rare earths would need to increase 50% just to replace all American autos with electrics.
Rare earths are not actually particularly rare. The current rate of production is not anywhere near the limit.
“replacing those 250 million vehicles with electric at $30K average each is: $ 7,500,000,000,000 or $24,000 per man, woman and child in the US.”
Electric cars would cost about $23k per car if they were mass-manufactured on a larger scale, not $30k per car. If you deduct the savings on fuel costs for electrics, they’re only modestly more expensive than gasoline cars when considered on a TCO basis (with gasoline at $4/gal), provided they’re mass-manufactured.
It might cost $23K to buy an electric car (when they’re mass-manufactured), but the car lasts more than 15 years. That’s about $128/month for the purchase of an electric car until it gets old and is discarded, not counting any financing costs. This remains within the capability of most Americans to buy.
…I think there will be a gradual transition to plug-in cars over the next 50+ years. After which, the cost of driving per mile will be approximately the same as now, or modestly lower. In the end, it will make little difference for consumers.
Oil is not ultimately required for any purpose whatsoever. Industrial civilization will gradually switch away from oil to alternatives over 100+ years, as the extraction of oil declines gradually. This transition away from oil is already underway, for a few years now, even though oil has not peaked and is not declining.
For better or for worse, oil depletion will be a yawn-type event of gradual substitution spread out over a century.
-Tom S
BillT on Thu, 28th Nov 2013 1:32 pm
Dream on Tom. You live in some techie fantasy world, not the real one.
There are NO ‘alternatives’ that do not require oil energy to exist. NONE!. Plug-ins are toys for rich people and rich people wannabes, not the average person. Never will be. And, eventually even those will cease to exist. Say in about 20 years or less. Battery replacement will make sure their useful life is less than 5 years and the price will actually go up, not down.
If you actually beleive anything from government departments or their corporate sponsors, you are a typical uneducated sheeple. Go back to sleep.
Kenz300 on Thu, 28th Nov 2013 2:14 pm
Electric vehicles are the future of transportation….
Beery on Thu, 28th Nov 2013 2:19 pm
What about the fact that they weigh a ton more than regular cars? Surely the potential for damage and loss of life with such a massive vehicle is greater.
bobinget on Thu, 28th Nov 2013 4:21 pm
One problem with these discussions could be we get stuck on a single alternative,
when there are indeed others.Because personal transportation often reflects personalities of operators, we are bound to have many sorts of locomotion
in future autos.
Because ICE power predomninates today doesn’t mean over time, it’s starting now, we won’t see compressed air/gas, diesel high-breds, fuel cells stoked with natural gas or solar generated hydrogen,grid tied electrics. Electric power captured from under road transmission lines.
IMO, electrics have a slight edge because electric power is even more ubiquitous then natural gas distribution. Also, self recharging of batteries today has become commonplace.
WE still await more efficent storage.
Until then we will get along just fine with combining small ICE power with big
electric to cut excess battery baggage.
What posters here don’t want to hear
Tom S on Thu, 28th Nov 2013 5:22 pm
BillT:
“There are NO ‘alternatives’ that do not require oil energy to exist.”
That is a basic, obvious factual error. Just like your earlier claim that half the oil used by a car is during its manufacture.
There are MANY obvious alternatives to oil. Oil is not fundamentally required for any purpose.
This is a matter of basic chemistry. Oil does not have any magical properties. It was selected to be used first because of convenience and cost. Other alternatives may be worse in some regard (e.g. range issues for EVs) but they certainly exist, for ALL usages of oil.
Oil isn’t even the only combustible liquid fuel. We could manufacture anhydrous ammonia from wind power for about $7/gal.
“Plug-ins are toys for rich people and rich people wannabes, not the average person. Never will be.”
Again, wrong. The Nissan Leaf is $28k now, which is not for “rich people”.
Furthermore, even if EVs were just for “rich people” now, your claim that they “never will be” for average people would still be wrong. Prices of EVs have been declining rapidly, and the price of a leaf-type EV would be about $23k if they were manufactured in greater volumes than now.
“If you actually beleive anything from government departments or their corporate sponsors, you are a typical uneducated sheeple. Go back to sleep.”
You’re a fool. Your “facts” are not only wrong, but trivially refutable.
-Tom S
Tom S on Thu, 28th Nov 2013 5:30 pm
Beery:
“What about the fact that they weigh a ton more than regular cars? Surely the potential for damage and loss of life with such a massive vehicle is greater.”
There are various drawbacks to EVs, such as range, weight, and so on. Also cost: even after the price of an EV comes down, I expect it will still be modestly more expensive to operate on a TCO basis than an equivalent gasoline-powered car is now.
It seems possible to me that working-class people will be unable to take long-distance uninterrupted road trips in the future, because their cars will be incapable of it. Also, air travel could be somewhat more expensive and rarer in the future. People will just have to live with those restrictions.
There are reasons that oil was selected first. That said, oil definitely isn’t the only option for industrial civilization, and there is a lot of time to make a transition.
-Tom S
Tom S on Thu, 28th Nov 2013 5:39 pm
bobinget:
“One problem with these discussions could be we get stuck on a single alternative, when there are indeed others.Because personal transportation often reflects personalities of operators, we are bound to have many sorts of locomotion in future autos.”
I’m not sure about that. There are “network effects” here (in the economic sense of that term) whereby one person’s usage of an alternative makes it cheaper for others. As a result, the market tends to “settle” on one alternative, for some things.
For example, if we start adding transmissions lines under the roads, that would only make economic sense if all cars used them. It would be prohibitively expensive to add under-road transmissions lines for some small fraction of cars, since it’s a fixed price. The cost per car of transmission lines would be very high if only a few cars were using them.
In the early 20th century, there were various competing fuel technologies for cars, such as gasoline-powered cars, battery-electric cars, steam-powered cars with coal, and so on. Eventually, the choices whittled down to one.
I realize we still have several fuel choices (gasoline, diesel, etc) but I think that’s because of the chemistry of oil and of the differing-length hydrocarbons found in oil, which practically forces us to use several fuel types. It’s expensive to convert octane to naphthalane, etc.
-Tom S
BillT on Fri, 29th Nov 2013 1:43 am
Tom needs to get out in the world and learn some things. There are no non-hydrocarbon provided energy sources except that fueling muscle power, and yes, wind, but it takes a machine to harness wind power, and that machine is made from wood and stone and with muscle power. Anything needing metals or rare earths comes only from hydrocarbon powered sources, basically oil.