How Much Energy Does a Car Consume, Well to Wheel?

Energy Chain Analysis of Passenger Car Transport (28 page pdf, Morten Simonsen and Hans Jakob Walnum, Energies, Feb. 17, 2011)

Today’s review article looks at the entire energy chain direct and indirect used to build, run and support the automobile. A major conclusion is that no fuel alternative offers more energy efficiency in exchange for fewer emissions, including the biofuels, natural gas, hydrogen and ordinary car gas. Quite remarkable is the very high energy consumption of ethanol on the one hand and the very low energy consumption with electrical power.



Key Quotes:

“global energy consumption will increase by 2.1 percent annually, a growth rate that is higher than for any other sector. The high energy consumption means that transportation accounts for nearly 30 percent of CO2 emission in OECD countries and is also one of the main sources of regional and local air pollution.. With this background, it is generally agreed internationally that we currently have an unsustainable transport system“

“Except for the case of electric cars, .. no single car scores favourably on both energy consumption and greenhouse gas emissions”

“sustainable mobility cannot be achieved by simply switching from one fuel to another; sustainable mobility is not feasible without a reduction in overall mobility level”

“gross direct energy (Well to Tank) chain:

1. Extraction/production of the energy source;
2. Transportation of the energy source;
3. Production of the energy carrier (fuel, electricity);
4. Distribution of the energy carrier;
5. The net direct energy consumption, this is the energy applied for passenger car propulsion”

“indirect energy consumption ..covers the life cycles of the vehicle and the infrastructure. For passenger cars, this includes the energy required to build and operate the roads as well as energy required to manufacture and maintain the car itself.. We have calculated an energy use of 14,000 GJ (959 tonne CO2-equivalents) for construction of 1 km of road over its entire lifetime”

“Except for electric cars, there is no single fuel that scores consistently lower on all indicators than any other fuel. This indicates that lower energy consumption and emissions reductions from passenger car transport cannot be achieved by simply switching from one fuel to another”

Related articles

• EU: Clean Vehicle Portal To Identify Greener And More Energy-Efficient Vehicles (egovmonitor.com)
• China Will Consume 20% of Global Energy in The Next 20 Years (socyberty.com)
• What is the most common alternative fuel? (greenanswers.com)