Environmental Analysis of Petrol, Diesel and Electric Passenger Cars in a Belgian Urban Setting

Abstract

Abstract:The combustion of fossil fuels in the transport sector leads to an aggravation of the air quality along city roads and highways. Urban air quality is a serious problem nowadays as the number of vehicles increases on a yearly basis. With stricter Euro emission regulations, vehicle manufacturers are not meeting the imposed limits and are also disregarding the non-exhaust emissions. This paper highlights the relevance of non-exhaust emissions of passenger vehicles, both conventional (diesel and petrol) or electric vehicles (EV), on air quality levels in an urban environment in Belgium. An environmental life cycle assessment was carried out based on a real-world emission model for passenger cars and fuel refinery data. A cut-off was applied to the models to highlight what emissions, both from the refinery to the exhaust and electricity production for EV, do actually occur within Belgium's borders. Results show that not much progress has been made from Euro 4 to 6 for conventional vehicles. Electric vehicles pose the best alternative solution as a more environmentally friendly means of transportation. The analysis results target policy makers with the intention that regulations and policies would be developed in the future and target the characterization of non-exhaust emissions from vehicles. These results indicate that EVs offer a valid solution for addressing the urban air quality issue and that non-exhaust emissions should be addressed in future regulatory steps as they dominate the impact spectrum.

Cost Projection of State of the Art Lithium-Ion Batteries for Electric Vehicles Up to 2030

“…Throughout the last decades, the emission of greenhouse gases have increased dramatically; however, their negative impact on the climate has been demonstrated [1,2]. To limit these adversary effects of climate change, several actions are undertaken on a worldwide scale, for example it has been agreed at COP21 in Paris to keep the temperature rise limited to maximum 2 • C [3].…”

Influence of Nitrogen Dioxide on Defoliation Process Within the Traffic Areas of Different Intensity / Azoto Dioksido Įtaka Defoliacijos Procesui Skirtingo Intensyvumo Eismo Zonose

“…Didžiausias azoto dioksido koncentracijas išskiria sunkiasvorės ir keleivinės transporto priemonės, tačiau išmetimai priklauso ir nuo kuro rūšies bei intensyvumo, todėl vertinama mišraus transporto srauto įtaka kiekybiniams ir kokybiniams rodikliams (Hooftman et al 2016;Guttikunda et al 2015;Aigner, García-Herrera 2010). Atliktų tyrimų metu gauti rezultatai patvirtino, kad sunkiasvorės transporto priemonės ir autotransporto intensyvumas stipriai veikia NO 2 koncentraciją ore.…”

In-Life Range Modularity for Electric Vehicles: The Environmental Impact of a Range-Extender Trailer System

“…Therefore, a full-scale LCA for both the impacts on climate change and human health is complemented with a well-to-wheel emissions analysis for which all emissions produced outside of Belgium's national borders are excluded from the scope. Therefore, refinery-to-tank (RTT) emissions are applied instead of the conventional well-to-tank (WTT) emissions, as discussed earlier in Hooftman et al [41]. For a graphical overview of the methodology, please refer to Figure 3.…”

“…The advantage of separating the different product life stages enables the identification of the causes of specific impacts and emissions per stage in the product's value-chain. The original inventories have been updated to reflect the real-world fuel consumption and regulated emission data based on the discrepancies found in literature, and have been supplemented with emission factors for the most important non-regulated pollutants based on Hooftman et al in [41]. A deliberate divergence from the official emission factors was chosen to allow a fair comparison between the different technologies.…”

“…In this case, however, the full potential of such batteries will potentially only be addressed in rare cases. Thus, the respective EV will have to move a 'dead mass' for most of the time, diminishing its inherent environmental impact due to high energy consumption, a higher manufacturing impact and higher tyre and road wear [41].…”