Electric vehicle tires produce up to 20 percent more pollution than their gasoline-powered counterparts, experts have revealed, meaning electric vehicles could command a higher environmental price tag than many owners realize.
For decades, the impact of tailpipe emissions from gasoline-powered cars has been the main draw of battery-powered vehicles.
But experts warn that tires, often overlooked as a source of pollution, are releasing chemicals and microplastics into the environment. While switching to an electric car certainly helps reduce the amount of carbon you create, it actually exacerbates the tire emissions problem.
Electric vehicles typically weigh much more and accelerate faster than their gasoline-burning counterparts, so tiny particles are released into the air as the tire wears down.
According road tests According to research company Emissions Analytics, under normal driving conditions, a gasoline-powered car spits out about 73 milligrams per kilometer from four new tires. However, a comparable electric vehicle sheds an additional 15 milligrams per kilometer, up 20 percent.
Experts warn that tires, often overlooked as a source of pollution, are releasing chemicals and microplastics into the environment.
Electric vehicles typically weigh much more and accelerate faster than their gasoline-burning counterparts, so tiny particles are released into the air as the tire wears down.
“It’s a combination of weight and torque, which is essentially how aggressively the car can accelerate,” Nick Molden, founder and chief executive of Emissions Analytics told DailyMail.com.
“The thing about electric motors is that they have the ability to accelerate very quickly. If you add that and how heavy the vehicle is, that’s what creates the extra wear on the tire.’
The typical electric car weighs about 1,000 pounds more than gasoline models, according to Molden.
in a study Conducted by Emissions Analytics in March of this year comparing the Tesla Model Y, the most popular electric vehicle in the US, and the similarly sized Kia Niro hybrid, the company found that Tesla produced 26 percent more carbon emissions. tires.
“The hybrid Kia Niro offers a CO2 reduction of around 30 percent, whereas the Tesla is probably somewhere around 50 percent,” Molden said.
“The Tesla is better from a CO2 point of view, but not that much. So you’re looking at some extra CO2 reduction but worse tire emissions.’
according to a study 2017, the average American produces approximately 10 pounds of tire emissions each year. The global average per person is less than 2 pounds of tire emissions per year.
The International Union for Conservation of Nature says that tires are the second leading source of microplastic pollution in the oceans after textiles.
“People are spending a ton of money on these big monsters, when really we should be going with small, light, inexpensive vehicles,” Molden added.
It comes as the US grapples with an electric car revolution, led by a surge in Tesla sales.
Last week, the company, co-founded by billionaire Elon Musk, announced a record rise in sales in the second quarter of the year: it delivered 446,140 cars worldwide in the three months to June, beating its own prediction of 445. 000.
Nick Molden, founder and CEO of Emissions Analytics, warns that electric vehicle tires produce more emissions due to the weight and torque of the vehicles
Emissions Analytics compared the Tesla Model Y and the similarly sized Kia Niro and found that Tesla produced 26 percent more tire emissions.
Business in the US has been bolstered by federal EV tax credits, though experts have warned that it could take up to a decade to pay off the premium customers pay for an EV.
Although green engines tend to be cheaper to run, the average purchase cost of an electric car is just $20,000 more up front than one that runs on gasoline.
Despite the spate of interest in electric vehicles, major automakers said this week that President Joe Biden’s push for electric cars is doomed to fail because it “underestimates” key challenges, including the cost to consumers.
The White House has set a goal that requires two-thirds of new vehicle sales to be electric by 2032.
But in comments submitted to the federal government, Toyota and Stellantis, which owns Vauxhall, criticized the plan as “overly optimistic” due to inadequate charging infrastructure and high prices. Stellantis said the goal “significantly underestimates” the complexities of building a viable EV market.
Meanwhile, tire emissions are not the only environmental issue that has been raised around electric vehicles.
Experts have debated the ecological impact of lithium-ion batteries used to power electric vehicles, which require rare metals and enormous amounts of energy to manufacture.
For Molden, it’s obvious that the world should move towards hybrid vehicles.
“They are barely heavier than normal vehicles and they give you a huge CO2 reduction,” he said. ‘If you really want to address the environmental problem, the intuitive way to do it is to make smaller and lighter vehicles. Not bigger, heavier monsters.
