Mastodawn

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Real-world CO2 emissions of cars are 20% higher than indicated. For plug-in hybrids they are 350% higher.

https://feddit.it/post/6569904

Real-world CO2 emissions of cars are 20% higher than indicated. For plug-in hybrids they are 350% higher. - Feddit.it

It’s not a tupi; plug hybrids are used in real word cases with ICE much more than anticipated. In the EU, fuel consumption monitoring devices are required on new cars. They studied over 10% of all cars sold in 2021 and turns out they use way more fuel, and generate way more CO2, than anybody thought. The gap means that CO2 emissions reduction objectives from transport will be more difficult to reach. Thruth is, we need less cars, not “better” cars.

FireRetardant Mar 23, 2024

Regardless of how it is powered, bringing thousands of pounds of steel and plastic everywhere you go to get to work, grocceries or other daily needs, is ineffecient.

oce 🐆Mar 23, 2024

But most importantly, it spends about 95% of its life parked. Such as waste of resources and space. I hope actual automatic cars in the future will allow people not connected to public transportation to avoid needing an individual car.

FireRetardant Mar 23, 2024

Often parked on prime real estate, or in a sea of wasted spaces that are rarely ever at capacity, sometimes both.

Wooster Mar 23, 2024

When I saw the headline, I thought this was clickbait, since the headline and the linked article avoided quantifying how much CO2 the vehicles said they consumed vs the real world usage.

If you dig into the cited materials, it turns out it wasn’t hyperbole.

That said, I still consider it extremely poor form to omit the information the study was centering its argument around.

[email protected]Mar 23, 2024

Honestly I thought that, being the article on the European Commission website, was a good enough sign of trustable source.

I added a disclaimer at the top of the post hoping to make things more clear

Wooster Mar 23, 2024

To be fair, I’m really just judging the EC’s article writer. Not the trustworthiness of EC or the study itself.

delirious_owl Mar 23, 2024

I dont get it. The numbers are all less for the hybrids

Showroom7561 Mar 23, 2024

They are a less than full gas vehicles, but they output considerably more CO2 than they are tested and marketed to output.

Many people buy them because they believe they are a green form of transportation based on the marketing. But the real world pollution they cause makes them not very green at all.

This is a significant report, especially when you consider the source.

delirious_owl Mar 23, 2024

Thanks. It sounds like they are greener in all cases. But they’re not as green as the industry expected because people aren’t actually charging them

chatokun Mar 23, 2024

That and from what I understand of them they only cover about 25 miles. The reason to get a plug in hybrid vs a full plug in is generally because you need to drive more than that on average. I have a full electric from 2015 with a horrible battery, and on a single charge I can get ~50 miles at most in greater Atlanta area, GA, USA.

That’s mostly fine for me, but I once looked up the plug in hybrids for trios etc, and I sometimes forget to charge and have issues having to charge on the road. A plug in Hybrid would have saved me those minor problems, but not because of the electric part. I have a feeling anyone using a plug in hybrid is barely using the battery part of it. I get by because I mostly use the car for shopping, so on average it’s once or twice a week, all within 1 battery’s usage a day.

delirious_owl Mar 23, 2024

Or because 90% of the time you only go 25 miles and you want to occasionally go to DeKalb market a few times per year

chatokun Mar 23, 2024

Sure, my comment doesn’t cover every use case, and apologies if it sounded like I was accusing anyone who had one. I’m just saying I know my limitations somewhat helps me decide not to do certain driving, and the ability to just drive without worry might have me drive more often beyond the 25. Even my own driving would often go beyond 25, as H-mart alone would eat 25 for me, so I’d make half my trip on gas everytime.

SnipingNinja Mar 24, 2024

I don’t live in a car-dependent location, so forgive my ignorance, but wouldn’t renting a petro car for those few times a year be cheaper and better for the environment to boot?

Christof Damian 💙💛Mar 24, 2024

@SnipingNinja
Exactly, have a small electric car for everyday, and a few time you rent a car for the purpose. For example a pickup for carrying stuff, RV for the holiday, or something large and comfy for large distances.
So much cheaper and you always get a brand new car.
@delirious_owl

delirious_owl Mar 24, 2024

Or just use a bicycle and public transport for everyday and carshare for the purpose

bluewing Mar 24, 2024

The issue become, Can I get to a rental place? Do they have something to rent to me suitable for my use? Will they even rent to me? How do I get the vehicle back to the rental place? Can I afford the high cash outlay right now?

It’s not so easy to rent a car. There are lots of hoops to jump through.

delirious_owl Mar 24, 2024

Places with car sharing programs where you rent by the hour, yes.

Cities where you rent cars by the day, no.

Showroom7561 Mar 23, 2024

Marginally greener when compared to the most environmentally harmful modes of transportation (I.e. other cars and trucks), but not even close to green when compared to alternative forms of personal and/or public transportation.

delirious_owl Mar 23, 2024

Definitely walking or bicycles is best.

nilloc Mar 23, 2024

This is the problem, people who are nervous about charging, or unable to charge at night but want EVs think that a plug-in hybrid will somehow come close enough.

The plug-in bit is key though, otherwise you’re just lugging around a few 100kilos of dead weight.

niartenyaw Mar 23, 2024

from what i understand, the real world hybrid data is significantly worse than its WLTP test data. so much worse that it’s only a 15-20% improvement over petrol/diesel instead of the 75% improvement that would be expected given the WLTP.

AnyProgressIsGood Mar 23, 2024

Wait don’t they only get like 25 percent better milage anyway? Why would that translate into 75 percent better CO2

hobovision Mar 23, 2024

Because if they are charged regularly then they’ll be operated in EV mode most of the time emitting 0% carbon. Plug in hybrids also usually do worse in mpg when in hybrid mode compared to standard hybrids, so if someone buys a plug in but doesn’t charge it, it’s actually worse than buying a standard hybrid.

kboy101222 Mar 23, 2024

Today I learned there are apparently diesel hybrids. Huh.

vividspecter Mar 23, 2024

Seems to be a repeat of the misleading (and outright cheating) scam that diesel emissions turned out to be, although presumably not quite as egregious as what VW did. Although presumably part of the hybrid problem is that people aren’t actually charging them electrically most of the time.

Wooster Mar 23, 2024

TBH, the most astonishing reveal from the study for me was that Hybrid owners weren’t charging their vehicles. Unfortunately, the why isn’t covered in the study since it seems to just be hard math and statistical analysis.

Are they just not plugging in at night?

Too frustrated with the battery draining too quickly?

Driving too far for the battery to meaningfully contribute between charges?

Is the extra hardware mass making the ICE that much less efficient?

Laziness from having to fill both the battery and the gas tank?

cron Mar 23, 2024

I think this is the real question. From the stats you posted, I’d say that at most 10% of Plugin hybrid owners charge their vehicles.

Which is such a waste of ressources. Why does someone buy a car with 10 kWh battery and never even use it (beyond what the car charges itself)?

Sonori Mar 23, 2024

Especially given how much more expensive they are than conventional hybrids and the hoops you have to jump through to even grt one in my family’s experience.

The small battery capacity they have also means that any household outlet will charge them fine, so it would be really interesting to see why people are going through all the extra effort to buy one and then not use it.

Pringles Mar 23, 2024

A lot of plug-in hybrid owners took the state support to buy an ICE with a smaller gas tank. And it also can drive electric, but nobody does that.

poVoq Mar 23, 2024

Plug-in hybrids are relatively new. At least in Europe most newly purchased cars are leasing and company provided cars. These companies probably thought it would be nice green-washing to buy hybrids. They probably also do not have sufficient charging infrastructure at their parking-lots and do not refund their employees for the electricity costs when they charge at home (or rather it is too bureaucratic for the employees to bother with asking for a refund). Which results that these cars are mostly used the same way as regular non-plugin hybrids, which only the relatively modest fuel savings these provide.

Boomer Humor Doomergod Mar 23, 2024

Considering the stories I’ve heard from mechanics about people having their car towed in because they ran out of gas I think people don’t realize they need to plug in their plug in hybrid.

Bytemeister Mar 23, 2024

You don’t have to charge a hybrid to get the benefits of the electric motor. It can charge from regenerative braking. That being said, plugging in a PHEV will maximize the benefits of the system vs relying on regenerative braking alone.

bobburger Mar 23, 2024

EVs only recover about 90% of the energy used I'm braking with regenerative braking. That means they don't even recover all of the energy needed to slow the car down, which certainly not enough to get the car back up to it's previous speed.

All this to say:

Regenerative braking doesn’t add significant miles to your driving range.

So relying solely on regenerative braking isn't going to have any meaningful impact on driving range.

How Regenerative Brakes Work

If you’re shopping for a hybrid or electric vehicle, and you’re wondering what that is and how it works, you’re in the right place.

Energy.gov

Bytemeister Mar 23, 2024

I think you should re-read your source. as it says this…

These small boosts in battery range can accumulate and improve efficiency over time when used regularly.

And your quote is out of context.

Regenerative braking doesn’t add significant miles to your driving range. Still, those gains in recaptured energy can really add up when used liberally and regularly.

Consider that most fuel economy is lost when the car is accelerating, having a system that captures 90% of the heat every lost to braking, which can then be used to get the car moving again, would be a huge benefit. That’s why regenerative braking can’t extend range, it instead reduces the impact stopping and starting have on the range of the vehicle.

bobburger Mar 23, 2024

You aren't getting the full benefits of a plugin hybrid electric motor if you're relying on regenerative braking. My source clearly explains this.

You get small efficiency gains that add up over time, but you certainly aren't seeing a meaningful extension in range over a single trip, and you certainly aren't seeing the benefits of a plug in electric motor if you rely on regenerative braking. In fact, this was one of the main points made in the OP; phev drivers rely on the ICE and thus don't achieve the emissions benefits that should come with a phev.

Bytemeister Mar 23, 2024

phev drivers rely on the ICE and thus don’t achieve the emissions benefits that should come with a phev.

This is true, but the assumption that this means that Hybrids are less efficient than their ICE-only counterparts and have detrimental effects on CO2 emissions is not. The article fails to put into plain numbers the expected CO2 emissions of each vehicle type, and their actual CO2 emissions. A lot of those PHEVs are advertised as having 0 emissions most of the time because you can use the electric only option. Even it people don’t take advantage of that by plugging in the vehicle, the hybrid system is still more efficient (except for some extreme long distance, non-stop scenarios) than a comparable ICE only car. The article does not tell us that hybrids are less efficient than ICE only cars, it tells us that our current methods for testing, advertising and accounting for C02 emissions for PHEVs are not matching real world data. This isn’t actually a new problem, discrepancies with lab data and real world driving data have existed ever since we started testing the fuel economy of cars.

ByGourou Mar 23, 2024

Wow I knew hybrids were not that great and WLTP is always off, but 250% off how is that even possible? There’s practically no difference between plug-in hybrids and standard cars.

[email protected]Mar 23, 2024

Edit : So people are buying plug-in hybrids and just not charging it- why ?

Why is the open point. Maybe the range is not enough for the majority of owners, maybe they are too lazy or maybe gas prices are too low to justify the charge?

I really hope there will be a follow-up study trying to answer this point

ByGourou Mar 23, 2024

At my parents house I had both a full EV that can be charged on any standard power plug and a classic gas car. I barely ever used the gas, and only used the EV because of how much cheaper it is. I would’ve expected everyone to do the same, but maybe as you said gas is not expensive enough for most people so they don’t care.

Atemu Mar 23, 2024

And that’s just tail-pipe emissions. PHEVs have much greater production emissions due to their batteries too.

cynar Mar 23, 2024

I’m guessing a lot of people don’t use them optimally. They used them how they originally used a ICE car. Unfortunately, that means they are lugging a large battery around for no significant reason.

I would also query how the hybrids are being designed however. There should still be a saving due to efficiency gains, since the engine can run at optimal RPM most of the time. The values scream that the manufacturers have over optimised for performance, rather than efficiency.

poVoq Mar 23, 2024

Looking at the above data, these hybrids do reduce fuel consumption. About as much as you would expect from a non-plugin hybrid.

It is rather that the WLTP figure vastly underestimates the fuel consumption.

hemko Mar 23, 2024

Because you buy one thinking you’d charge it more often. Maybe it’s slower to charge at home than you anticipated, or maybe it’s just more convenient to go to closest gas station than charging station - also WAY faster.

It’s like when you buy a box of chocolate thinking you’d just eat few pieces

BastingChemina Mar 25, 2024

I don’t think it make sense to go to a charging station to charge a PHEV with a 30-80km range.

It’s like going to the gas station to only put 3 liters in the tank.

hemko Mar 25, 2024

Yeah maybe not, unless if you can go shop or something while the car is charging

DacoTaco Mar 23, 2024

Just my personal 2 cents of owning a plug in hybrid : i sometimes drive with an empty battery because the range is 50km max, and my landlord refuses to allow me to install the infrastructure to charge at home, even if i’d pay 50% of the costs. There are also people parking in electric parking spots without charging OR being an electric car, denying me of charging publically. Its a whole mess…

That said, 40% of all km i drive are full electric.

Wooster Mar 23, 2024

I feel like this is a large portion of the missing puzzle pieces. The difference between real world and advertised ICE stats are somewhat padded, but not significantly. You’d expect the hybrids to have a similar degree of discrepancy, but it’s wildly out of range of expectations. It may simply be that the manufacturers are giving idealized stats, since while testing they would have access to their personal charger in a laboratory environment. But in the real world, owners cannot guarantee working/accessable chargers or even that they can charge at home, which would dramatically impact the results of this study.

Or at least, I’d assume that’s the case in the US. I don’t know what EU’s charging infrastructure is like, where the study was preformed.

DacoTaco Mar 23, 2024

At least in my country public charging is popping up everywhere, but slowly. Not enough resources is poured into it because they think charging is not a thing yet. Thats bullshit ofc, and there is a reason i have my hybrid car. Also, you can charge at home from a regular power plug, and hybrid cars shouldnt need more than that to charge overnight or over 5h time. However, if you live in an apartment like me, you are royally screwed if the owner doesnt comply. Same with solar panels, but thats a different discussion for a different time haha

Forbo Mar 23, 2024

Last place I was at completely screwed me over when it came to charging my electric car. I was leasing a Leaf and had been running it entirely off of the 120 charger. Lived at this place for a year and had no problem. Then someone on their HOA got a wild hair up their ass and said I couldn’t do that any more. They began by making up bullshit excuses, trying to say that it was a hazard to the landscapers. Except my roommate was the landscaper, and he didn’t give a shit. Blatant fucking lie from the HOA. Then they tried to pivot and say it was the insurance company that was prohibiting it. I offered multiple solutions including expanding the electrical for the covered parking, running power to the curb, or even getting an entirely new line run from the city. Emailed all this to them and hear fuck all for eight months. Then they send me a registered letter with a cease and desist. Had to early terminate the lease on my car.

Landlords and HOAs are some of the biggest inhibitors of EV adoption, and they can all go fuck themselves.

DacoTaco Mar 23, 2024

Be careful, no all landlords are pieces of shit. If i was one i’d do it, and im sure im not alone :)

delirious_owl Mar 23, 2024

There is a difference. Hybrids pollute less. See the articles sources.

ByGourou Mar 23, 2024

It pollutes less, 20% less than classic cars on average in real life use. That’s barely anything.

delirious_owl Mar 23, 2024

That’s apparently when the user doesn’t charge the damn thing. That’s a problem with the user.

Showroom7561 Mar 23, 2024

how is that even possible?

Several reasons I can think of.

the lab tests are highly flawed.
the marketing is downright misleading.
people aren’t charging them.
people are using them in ways that don’t take advantage of the battery.

Hybrids are really only “green” when you use them for very short trips at low speed. In that context, any other form of transportation will be better, in my opinion.

Bytemeister Mar 23, 2024

PHEVs should be able to charge off of regenerative braking. You don’t need to plug them in to get benefits from the hybrid system. The stated fuel economy for the vehicles assumes that there will be a certain amount of electric-only travel. The article doesn’t say it, but most PHEVs advertise that you can use the battery for most of your day to day travel, and only use the ICE when you are making longer trips. So the takeaway from this article shoud not be “hybrids are bad, just keep making gas cars” but instead should be “testing and assumptions about the fuel use of these vehicles needs to be changed to more accurately reflect reality.”

hobovision Mar 23, 2024

Plug in hybrids usually do worse in mpg when in hybrid mode compared to standard hybrids, so if someone buys a plug in but doesn’t charge it, it’s actually worse than buying a standard hybrid. Regen braking is awesome but it won’t charge a plug in’s battery. The energy you get from braking 45-0mph would likely only get you back up to 15 to 30mph due to all the efficiency losses, plus you still need more energy to maintain speed.

Bytemeister Mar 23, 2024

As long as the system offsets it’s additional mass, it is a net benefit to the total economy of the car. Consider that an equally sized ICE vehicle loses 100% of that braking energy, and still has to accelerate that same 15-30 mph. You’re also leaving out that electric motors are much more efficient at accelerating a vehicle at low speeds than an ICE.

hobovision Mar 23, 2024

I’m just comparing a plug in that never gets charged to a standard hybrid. If you aren’t going to charge it regularly, you’re better off with a non-plug-in. Both are better than a non-hybrid, but if only the last 5% of battery capacity is being used that all the resources that go into the other 95% of the battery are wasted.

Bytemeister Mar 24, 2024

Makes sense to me. Not much point in hauling around more battery than you are going to use.

ByGourou Mar 23, 2024

Yes, I think EVs in general (and especially hybrids) are a way to justify not investing in alternative modes of transportation. You feel good about being “clean”, but in reality you are still polluting 10x as much as with public transportation.