Economic and Energy Efficiency of Electric Motor Scooters

Wikipedia gives an estimate of the US national average 1.28 lbs CO2/kWh for electricity generation: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battery_electric_vehicle

This would mean 14.84 kwhrs of generated electricity release as much CO2 as a gallon of gasoline which can produce 36.4 kwhr. Applying this modifier you are still getting equivalent to 160 mpg in terms of CO2.

But the real kicker is you can invest in renewables or generate your own to power your scooter. Try powering an ICE from renewables, it just ain't going to work! This effectively reduces your CO2 output to nothing or 1,000,000,000,000,000... mpg. It kind of gives a different perspective when you look at it in terms of infinity. A hybrid car can't do that, and neither can a plug in hybrid, but when you take gasoline out of the equation you open up new possibilities.

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Avatar taken from http://www.electricmotorbike.org/
Anyone got one they want to sell?
My KZ750 Project: here

KZ750 Motorcycle Conversion
900 watt scooter
Pic from http://www.electricmotorbike.org/

"11 and half cent a kw, what the heck is up in PA"

It's called "deregulated markets" or more to the point "deregulated monopolies"

- 6.303 cents per kwh generator fee, .87 cents transmission fee, and 4.231 cents distribution = 11.404 cents per kwh

We were supposed to be able to shop and choose our power generator, but in reality, all the generators pulled out of the residential market, so, unless you are a big corporate industrial user, you now must simply buy the generation portion from Duquesne light's power-broking division at whatever rate they want to charge us. Actually it was even higher, we were paying a separate "stranded costs" fee to Duquesne light for a few years after deregulation.

I presume in Virginia you still do it the old fashioned way - Virginia Power (or PEPCO?) generates, transmits, distributes, and all prices are regulated under the State PUC. You should keep it that way.

At least high costs encourage conservation.

And, back to the topic, thanks for the info!

I knew coal - almost 100% carbon - produces a whole lot more CO2 per unit of energy than gasoline, which is eight parts carbon and eighteen parts hydrogen. But thankfully, it looks like the e-scooter is still about twice as CO2 efficient as a gas scooter - and we still haven't considered the energy usage and and CO2 emitted transporting and refining the oil into gasoline.

Like I wrote, I buy new-wind energy "offsets" from Community Energy located near Philly. They're now a subsidiary of Iberdrola, S.A. a big Spanish wind energy developer (sounds like they might be a nice outfit to work for). Basically, for a "promise" to add 100 kwh of wind energy to the grid, you send then 2 dollars per 100 kwh per month. This is reportedly to offset the higher cost of this new energy source compared to the going market price. I buy 6 shares, so potentially, my carbon emissions from my scooter usage is zero.

Now, if we can get more that one household in the in the entire western two-thirds of Pennsylvania to start doing this, and we might get somewhere.

Yes, I also have a flat fee on the bill too - in addition to the gen, trans and dist. charge per kwh, there is also a flat $7.00 customer charge per month. But fortunately, compared to the DC area (I grew up in Fairfax), summers in the Pittsburgh are quite moderate, so I get away with little or no A/C use for the summer. If you're lucky enough to live down in a hollow or on a wooded north facing hillside, you need a warm blanket every night. Last month's bill was only $38.00 and the scooter use is not even noticeable on the electric bill.

More on topic, the big expense we are forgetting to include are the battery pack costs. The crappy factory "silicone" batteries lasted only a bit more than 3000 miles so I'll throw out that their performance as not representative. My new EB20-12's are supposed to provide 800 cycles to 60% capacity at 50% DOD - that would be about 9000 miles - probably optimistic. Replacing the pack costs about $500. So that's an extra 5.5 cents per mile - now we're down to only 55 equivalent mpg. Of course, a gas scooter's engine has maintenance costs too, but nothing like those batteries. Gasoline is only going to go up in price, and better batteries are just around the corner. But for now, our motivations for maintaining and riding these things have to lie elsewhere than saving money.

PJD, I wouldn't be so quick to discount the maintenance cost for a gas scooter. I know that oil changes and other scheduled maintenance for an ICE car play a big factor when comparing operating costs. I think I also read somewhere that the first service on a Vespa was $600. Now, it's true that's probably 80% profit and that a lot of us could do the job ourselves - however, most folks would take it back to the $tealer (I mean, dealer). A battery change is easier and cleaner than an oil change so maybe one could persuade the consumer to DIY...

However, like you, I agree that being an early adopter in this game isn't about saving money. Personally for me it's more about public awareness and education. I've already talked to a dozen folks about EVs and shown them my XM. True no ones bought one yet but I've only had the thing 2 weeks. If during my ownership I can persuade 5 other folks to switch at least some of their miles to EV miles I'll be very happy!

John H.
Blue XM-2000
Ann Arbor, MI

There are other costs you could save. Less wear on the truck, so when it comes time to sell it you will get more. You might be able to save on insurance for the truck if your insurance company knows you use the scooter a lot more. There's not as much of a vehicle liability if the scooter is vandalized or stolen while parked in-city as the truck.

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Avatar taken from http://www.electricmotorbike.org/
Anyone got one they want to sell?
My KZ750 Project: here

KZ750 Motorcycle Conversion
900 watt scooter
Pic from http://www.electricmotorbike.org/

PJD,

great post. Your calculations are correct, though I was surprised to see the high energy consumption of 57 Wh/km. I would have guessed around 45 Wh/km, including charger- and battery losses.

I guess people on this forum are mainly concerned with the environmental impact. Comparable ICE scooters take around 3 L/100 km, so even if the electricity is generated 100% with oil, you are slightly ahead. But, most importantly, the conclusion that electric scooters account for almost the same amount of CO2 as ICE scooters, assumes a 100% static scenario. It assumes that generation and transmission of electricity will never change, and we will continue burning oil and coal forever. In reality, it is a lot easier to shift electric power plants to renewable energy (or perhaps nuclear-), than to do this with ICE scooters. So if we do the job to convert to electric vehicles, someone else can do the job to supply 100% clean electricity. In fact, they are already working on it. I too am looking at buying shares in wind power plants, corresponding to my own consumption. Though in my country, only a few percent of the electric power comes from oil, gas and coal. Does that make my electric scooter more environmentally friendly than electric scooters elsewhere? Of course not.

About the costs, if one is really looking for cheap transport it's hard to beat the ICE scooter. Especially if you do the maintenance yourself. Otherwise maintenance is expensive because it's very frequent - most have intervals of 5000 km, some as low as 3000 km. And it's not rare that scooter engines break down before 20 000 km, with repair costs so high that it's better to buy a new scooter.

Personally, I am struggling to get my calculations to show that the scooter costs less than the car, per km. The main cost is the scooter itself, remains to be seen how many km you can drive before it's scrap. Batteries come second. The electric power doesn't even enter into the equation, because I am leaching it in the garage below the apartment building.

Regards,
Rolf

"I was surprised to see the high energy consumption of 57 Wh/km. I would have guessed around 45 Wh/km, including charger- and battery losses."

This figure includes the time period the charger is on float. The e-max charger plus the 12V booster battery charger will consume about 25 watts on float, and sometimes the scooter is left overnight on float. So I could achieve 45 wh/km if I "minded" the chargers more and always unplugged as soon as charging is complete.

"Though in my country, only a few percent of the electric power comes from oil, gas and coal. Does that make my electric scooter more environmentally friendly than electric scooters elsewhere? Of course not."

Why not?

Thankfully, my previously stated 70% coal use in generating electricity in the USA is, an overestimate. If you can trust Wikipedia, about 50% of US electricity is generated from coal. Still way too much of course.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Sources_of_Electricity_in_the_US_2005_New.png

But, 70% is probably correct for the Appalachian coal-mining region where I live - although the coal-rich Allegheny plateau is also being developed for wind energy by the firm I buy my shares from.

Just to help back up those Wikipedia numbers, the US Department of Energy sent me to the Energy Information Division where they had a nice helpful study. And all sorts of fun links which distracted me from work. In 2005 coal was 49.7% of the energy. And while the output from coal is growing, it is growing slower than everything else so the percentage is declining a bit. It was 52.1% in 1994.

http://www.eia.doe.gov/cneaf/electricity/epa/epa_sum.html

Also fun was the average residential price of electricity by state:

http://www.eia.doe.gov/cneaf/electricity/epa/fig7p5.html

Now I'm going to go find one on Washington's production/use because I'm curious...

Please don't forget the battery costs. I have heard that a new set of batteries for the XM-2000 cost about $645 + tax. Let's say that the batteries can be charged 400 times and the average range per charge would be 25 miles. The depreciation costs are roughly $.06/ mile, thus one charge depreciates the scooter by about $ 1.50 . Is this correct ?
Andreas

Here is where I disagree with many naysayers of electric propulsion when they compare ICE maintenance to Battery maintenance. Replacing batts should be part of the maintenance costs, not part of the fuel costs. Just like replacing oil and antifreeze on an engine (or failing to) to preserve the life of the engine, batts have to be maintained within their tolerance levels to get effective and longer lasting charge/recharge cycles for the life of the batts. I.e. if you over rev and overheat an engine while failing to change the fluids you shorten its life dramatically. While failing to maintain batts by over draining and overheating the batteries between charging, shortens the life.

For batts, the disparity can best be seen in the forklift and golfcart industry with ppl claiming replacing batteries after 5 or more years while others are replacing after one.

If you want to add in the CO2 from burning coal to produce electricity that’s fine, but don't forget that the petroleum industry is the single largest consumer of energy in the United States. Mostly natural gas, but they are way up there for electricity as well. So the pollution from refining a gallon of gas, before it is burned to move you X miles, is already more then pollution from driving an EV what would be that same distance.

I found this article while looking for something else
http://www.templetons.com/brad/transit-myth.html
For tihs discussion, it is interesting because it compares,amoung others, electric scooters to ICE cars, electric cars, ICE motorcycles and othes.

While this is not a total zero based cost, by that I mean whole cost from build to operations, it is interesting.