Journal article
Stochastic comparative assessment of life-cycle greenhouse gas emissions from conventional and electric vehicles
International Journal of Life Cycle Assessment, Vol.20(6), pp.854-864
2015
Abstract
Purpose
Electric vehicles (EVs) are promoted due to their potential for reducing fuel consumption and greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions. A comparative life-cycle assessment (LCA) between different technologies should account for variation in the scenarios under which vehicles are operated in order to facilitate decision-making regarding the adoption and promotion of EVs. In this study, we compare life-cycle GHG emissions, in terms of CO2eq, of EVs and conventional internal combustion engine vehicles (ICEV) over a wide range of use-phase scenarios in the USA, aiming to identify the vehicles with lower GHG emissions and the key uncertainties regarding this impact.
Methods
An LCA model is used to propagate the uncertainty in the use phase into the greenhouse gas emissions of different powertrains available today for compact and midsize vehicles in the US market. Monte Carlo simulation is used to explore the parameter space and gather statistics about GHG emissions of those powertrains. Spearman’s partial rank correlation coefficient is used to assess the level of contribution of each input parameter to the variance of GHG intensity.
Results and discussion
Within the scenario space under study, battery electric vehicles are more likely to have the lowest GHG emissions when compared with other powertrains. The main drivers of variation in the GHG impact are driver aggressiveness (for all vehicles), charging location (for EVs), and fuel economy (for ICEVs).
Conclusions
The probabilistic approach developed and applied in this study enables an understanding of the overall variation in GHG footprint for different technologies currently available in the US market and can be used for a comparative assessment. Results identify the main drivers of variation and shed light on scenarios under which the adoption of current EVs can be environmentally beneficial from a GHG emissions standpoint.
Details
- Title
- Stochastic comparative assessment of life-cycle greenhouse gas emissions from conventional and electric vehicles
- Authors
- Arash Noshadravan (Corresponding Author) - Massachusetts Institute of TechnologyLynette Cheah - Singapore University of Technology and DesignRichard Roth - Massachusetts Institute of TechnologyFausto Freire - University of CoimbraLuis Dias - University of CoimbraJeremy Gregory - Massachusetts Institute of Technology
- Publication details
- International Journal of Life Cycle Assessment, Vol.20(6), pp.854-864
- Publisher
- Springer
- Date published
- 2015
- DOI
- 10.1007/s11367-015-0866-y
- ISSN
- 1614-7502
- Organisation Unit
- School of Science, Technology and Engineering
- Language
- English
- Record Identifier
- 991029390302621
- Output Type
- Journal article
Metrics
6 Record Views
InCites Highlights
These are selected metrics from InCites Benchmarking & Analytics tool, related to this output
- Collaboration types
- Domestic collaboration
- International collaboration
- Web Of Science research areas
- Engineering, Environmental
- Environmental Sciences
UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs)
This output has contributed to the advancement of the following goals:
Source: InCites