LPG-powered vehicles would be a better and simpler alternative

WE shouldn’t get too carried away with the electric car razzmatazz.

They still use fossil fuels, mainly natural gas; renewable energy simply displaces fossil fuel use. They use it less efficiently because of losses in generation, transmission, distribution and battery chargers; it would be better and simpler to convert cars to run on LPG.

Nor can it be claimed they are “zero emission”; the emissions are produced at the power station

For a mileage of 16,000km/year, the energy consumption would be 90kwh per week (twice per capita domestic consumption) which would require an installed wind turbine capacity of about 3kw. Including the grid connection and strengthening the grid, this would cost at least €10,000.

Electricity consumption has been increasing at 3% and traffic by 7% per annum. Every 10% of electric vehicles adds 10% on top of this. The goal of most vehicles being electric and powered by renewables is unlikely ever to be achieved. The only reason electric cars are cheaper is because they pay no tax, but they still require road infrastructure, which costs about €2,000/year/car. Is it right, with a crippled economy, to subsidise motorists?

The big advantage of electric cars is they reduce exposure to air pollution, which causes 50,000 early deaths in Britain according to a government audit commission. It is very odd that no one seems bothered about this public health issue, which is more serious than road accidents.

Michael Job

Rossnagrena

Glengarriff

Co Cork