The main goals of this Task were to:
The Task was a networking activity, which means that the experiences from the national projects were fed into the LCA platform and discussed on an international level. The main topics addressed were:
The activities in Task 19 focused on LCA aspects of Battery Electric Vehicles (BEV) and Plug-in Hybrid Electric Vehicle (PHEV) for passenger transportation services in comparison to gasoline, diesel and natural gas vehicles using current and future technologies.
The most important networking activity in this LCA platform was the organization of the five workshops in different member countries. – the aim was to involve the different stakeholders in the EV value chain. The organization of workshops with participation from industry, research organizations, and technology policy experts provides an international basis for the exchange of information on relevant activities.
These 5 workshops were:
Based on the LCA activities in the 18 member countries the Task 19 estimated the LCA based environmental effects of the worldwide electric vehicle fleet in 2014 in 33 countries. In a LCA of these vehicles using the different national framework conditions the environmental effects are estimated by assessing the possible ranges of environmental effects. Based on the emission inventory of CO2, CH4, N2O, CO, NMVOC, SO2, NOx, and PM the potential effects on greenhouse effect, acidification, ozone formation, and particles are estimated. The reference case is the substitution of modern conventional ICE vehicles (of which 50 % are gasoline and 50 % diesel). The environmental effects of the electricity for the EVs are estimated on the current national electricity production in the 33 considered countries including grid transmission and distribution, and vehicle charging infrastructure. Additionally, for some selected countries, a scenario with all additional installed renewable electricity from PV and wind is dedicated for use by the EVs.
The details (e.g. data, assumption, methodology) of the following results were published in two conference papers:
The main conclusions are:
The results show that the environmental effects depend on the national framework condition, e.g., national electricity generation. In most of the countries, a significant reduction of these LCA based emissions of up to 90 % is reached. So there is scientific evidence that under appropriate framework conditions, electric vehicles can substantially contribute to a sustainable transportation sector in the future.