The Haney Energy Saving Group: Are green cars really clean?

Cars of the future have always been envisioned as running on electricity and sporting futuristic and compact designs. But while this thing of the future called electric vehicle is slowly entering the mainstream car market today because of climate change concerns, it is still worlds away from replacing the conventional internal combustion engines we've been using since the 1800s.

The thing is, owning an electric car is probably not for everyone -- for now. Aside from the fact that they are not widely available yet, there are many factors that affects someone's choice of owning one -- the main concern being its expensive price, even though there's a government subsidy in the form of income tax credit to those who will avail of an EV.

Moreover, you've got to have an outlet on hand in order to charge your car's battery for a minimum of 5 hours as advised by The Haney Energy Saving Group. While one manufacturer is offering access to a free charging station, it won't likely be present in every 5 miles so that's a real delimiter. And if you decide to have one installed at home, it will surely eat up on your electricity bill, what with the long charging time.

Further complicating matters is that most EVs are still limited when it comes to range: you'll normally get around 100 miles in one charge, depending on speed and weather among others.

Fortunately, the technology used in EVs is advancing every day so we can look forward to a cleaner future. But do they really cause less pollution like what we've been made to believe? Will patronizing EVs really make a difference as it is?

As The Haney Energy Saving Group previously reported, that depends on where its electricity will come from. In terms of carbon dioxide emissions, it's true that EVs can be environment-friendly because they have no emission at all. But you can't really convince yourself that you're supporting a greener future when the electricity being used to charge your EV comes from coal/gas powerplants. A powerplant relying on solar, nuclear, hydro or wind resources in generating cleaner energy will undoubtedly be a good step towards combatting climate change.

Granted, it's not really that easy to conclude just where your electricity is coming from. But it's still something we should consider in terms of what green energy really means, especially since the source of electricity for an EV to run is often overlooked.  Though it has no actual emission from itself, the carbon dioxide emitted by the powerplant to charge an electric car for a period of time would also count as carbon footprint.

Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) is currently developing a plan to lessen emissions from powerplants which should be a big help in cleaning up the electricity industry, as well as ensuring the future of green cars. Coupled with the efforts of car manufacturers to significantly add up on the average driving distance EVs can reach on a single charge, we can probably be assured of a good fate for green cars.