Environmental Benefits
In the world today roadway transportation is the most used by people. Many people use gas
powered cars, or I.C.E.'s (Internal Combustion Engine), to get around. However, I.C.E.'s
create more pollution than any other human-made machine. Gasoline powered cars give off
very bad emissions like carbon monoxide and dioxide, methane, nitrous oxide, and chlorofluorocarbons (CFC's).
CFC's are a major problem right now with the aspect of global warming, which is the increasing
of average temperatures all over the world. The poisonous gas emissions that are given off
by I.C.E.'s are the cause of many diseases like cancer, premature deaths, and sometimes
severe aggravation to chronic respiratory systems. If we started driving electric vehicles
for one year we could reduce hydrocarbon emissions by 17 pounds, nitrogen oxides by 14 pounds,
and carbon monoxide by 200 pounds.
Another big problem created by gasoline powered vehicles is water pollution. The overall
quality of water has diminished greatly over the past several years. A few reasons are that
there have been oil spills, acid rain, and the expansion of offshore drilling. However,
since electric vehicles don't use oil than there would be no risk of any spills or leakage
in the underground storage tanks.
A positive fact that the electric vehicles have over I.C.E's is that an electric vehicle
is recyclable. The pollution by conventional motorcars increases as the car ages, however,
an electric vehicle uses lead-acid or lithium-ion batteries. Batteries of an electric vehicle
will last probably longer than the car chassis itself. Even after the batteries wear out
more than 95% of the batteries are recycled, 85% of which are used again in other electric
vehicles. Automotive vehicles contribute about 2/3 of the air pollution. If we started to
switch to electric vehicles it would lead to good health in the coming years.