Current and Future Greenhouse Gas Emissions Associated with Electricity Generation in China: Implications for Electric Vehicles

Abstract

China's oil imports and greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions have grown rapidly over the past decade. Addressing energy security and GHG emissions is a national priority. Replacing conventional vehicles with electric vehicles (EVs) offers a potential solution to both issues. While the reduction in petroleum use and hence the energy security benefits of switching to EVs are obvious, the GHG benefits are less obvious. We examine the current Chinese electric grid and its evolution and discuss the implications for EVs. China's electric grid will be dominated by coal for the next few decades. In 2015 in Beijing, Shanghai, and Guangzhou, EVs will need to use less than 14, 19, and 23 kWh/100 km, respectively, to match the 183 gCO2/km WTW emissions for energy saving vehicles. In 2020, in Beijing, Shanghai, and Guangzhou EVs will need to use less than 13, 18, and 20 kWh/100 km, respectively, to match the 137 gCO2/km WTW emissions for energy saving vehicles. EVs currently demonstrated in China use 24-32 kWh/100 km. Electrification will reduce petroleum imports; however, it will be very challenging for EVs to contribute to government targets for GHGs emissions reduction.

Assessment of electrical vehicles as a successful driver for reducing CO2 emissions in China

“…It would be therefore our next step to narrow down our research and investigate potential impacts of EVs penetration at provincial and city levels. It is also meaningful to analyse EVs penetration based on regional carbon burden of electricity [41,43,44] as the introduction of EVs would be less useful in Chinese regions with high proportion of coal-fired electricity. Currently, all Chinese provinces have 70% -85% of coal based electricity generation.…”

“…Given that there were 700,000 vehicles in the programme, the authors estimated that the fuel consumption would decrease by 280 gallons per year per car, which according to Kagawa et al [37] accounts to a reduction of 2.4 Mt of CO2 a year. Knittel [33] re-examined the CARS programme and confirmed not only a positive impact on CO2 emissions, but also a reduction of other criteria pollutants, such as NOx, VOCs, PM10 and CO. For the same programme, With regards to evaluating environmental impact of EVs in China, the majority of studies use LCA to assess energy consumption and the CO2 emission impacts of electric versus conventional gasoline vehicles [32,41,42,43,44,16]. All studies agree that EVs are able to reduce CO2 emissions and successfully displace petroleum-based fuels in the economy.…”

Prospects of Electric Vehicles in the Developing Countries: A Literature Review

“…For E4Ws, the price of one joule of energy from electricity, regardless of its energy mix, is lower than the price of the gasoline. The consumption for E4Ws is around 0.2 kWh/km [51][52][53][54][55]. The price of 100 kilometres would only be 20 kWh for E4Ws.…”

Electric Vehicles in China: Byd Strategies and Government Subsidies

“…According to Gao et al (2008), the potential for development of the electric car industry in China is due to its own national characteristics and global stance regarding energy demands. However, according to Shen et al (2014), it will be very unlikely for EVs to significantly reduce greenhouse gas emissions because electric power generation is still heavily dependent on thermal power plants that employ fossil fuels.…”