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Monday, April 30, 2012

Valuation of plug-in vehicle life-cycle air emissions and oil displacement benefits

 “ We assess the economic value of life-cycle air emissions and oil consumption from conventional vehicles, hybrid-electric vehicles (HEVs), plug-in hybrid-electric vehicles (PHEVs), and battery electric vehicles in the US. We find that plug-in vehicles may reduce or increase externality costs relative to grid-independent HEVs, depending largely on greenhouse gas and SO2 emissions produced during vehicle charging and battery manufacturing. However, even if future marginal damages from emissions of battery and electricity production drop dramatically, the damage reduction potential of plug-in vehicles remains small compared to ownership cost. As such, to offer a socially efficient approach to emissions and oil consumption reduction, lifetime cost of plug-in vehicles must be competitive with HEVs. Current subsidies intended to encourage sales of plug-in vehicles with large capacity battery packs exceed our externality estimates considerably, and taxes that optimally correct for externality damages would not close the gap in ownership cost. In contrast, HEVs and PHEVs with small battery packs reduce externality damages at low (or no) additional cost over their lifetime. Although large battery packs allow vehicles to travel longer distances using electricity instead of gasoline, large packs are more expensive, heavier, and more emissions intensive to produce, with lower utilization factors, greater charging infrastructure requirements, and life-cycle implications that are more sensitive to uncertain, time-sensitive, and location-specific factors. To reduce air emission and oil dependency impacts from passenger vehicles, strategies to promote adoption of HEVs and PHEVs with small battery packs offer more social benefits per dollar spent.” Read more at http://www.cmu.edu/me/ddl/publications/2011-PNAS-Michalek-etal-PHEV-Valuation.pdf

posted @ Monday, April 30, 2012 10:15 AM | Feedback (0)

British Standards Online database

The Library has a new database – British Standards Online. It is very easy to use and you can print or download a copy of the standard.  It is a great addition to our online resources and will make life a lot easier for those who use British standards. You can access it from the A-Z list of databases now and we will be adding it to our engineering subject guide pages shortly. 
Take a look at it here:
http://www.library.auckland.ac.nz/databases/learn_database/public.asp?record=BriStaOnl  Type the number or keyword of the one you require in the search box and click on Open document
 

posted @ Monday, April 30, 2012 10:14 AM | Feedback (0)