Estimated Environmental Effects of the Worldwide Electric Vehicle Fleet: A Life Cycle Assessment in Task 19 of the International Energy Agency (IEA) on Hybrid and Electric Vehicles (HEV)

Electric vehicles have the potential to substitute for conventional vehicles to contribute to the sustainable development of the transportation sector worldwide, for example through the reduction of greenhouse gas and particle emissions. There is international consensus that the improvement of the environmental sustainability by electric vehicles can only be analysed on the basis of life cycle assessment (LCA) including the production, operation and the end of life treatment of these vehicles. Based on the LCA activities in the 18 member countries, the Task 19 “Life Cycle Assessment of Electric Vehicles - From Raw Material Resources to Waste Management of Vehicles with an Electric Drivetrain” of International Energy Agency (IEA) Implementing Agreement on Hybrid and Electric Vehicles (IA-HEV) analysed the LCA based environmental effects of the worldwide electric vehicle fleet in 2014 of about 700,000 Battery Electric Vehicles (BEV) and Plug-in Hybrid Electric Vehicles (PHEV). By the end of 2015 it is expected that about 1 million modern vehicles with an electric drive train are on the road worldwide. In the LCA of these vehicles using the different national framework conditions, the environmental effects are estimated by assessing the possible ranges of greenhouse gas emissions (CO2, CH4, N2O), acidification (NOx, SO2), ozone formation (NOx, CO, NMVOC, CH4) and particle matter (PM) emissions in comparison to conventional ICE vehicles (released in 2014). The results show that the environmental effects strongly depend on the national framework condition, i.e., national mix of electricity generation. In some countries a significant reduction of these LCA based emissions of up to 80%, compared to conventional ICE vehicles, is reached due to a high share of renewable electricity. So there is evidence that under appropriate framework conditions, electric vehicles contribute to a sustainable transportation sector today, and can play a substantial role in the future with the expected increasing renewable electricity generation