Reducing the Carbon Footprint of Electric Vehicles
Abstract
Electric vehicles (EVs) are widely recognized as zero-emission alternatives to traditional gas powered cars. However if we dive deeper into the emissions of EVs we reveal that they have significant greenhouse gas emissions during the upstream manufacturing and charging process. This research paper evaluates the net environmental impact of EVs across their full lifespan, focussing on the ecological effects of battery production and dirty energy sources. Upstream analysis indicates that battery manufacturing accounts for 60 percent of production emissions and creates substantial environmental degradation. Operationally, the climate benefit of EVs depends on the region’s power generation, as grids who rely heavily on non-renewable energy decrease the environmental benefits compared to grids powered by hydro, nuclear, and other clean energy sources. Finally, this study compares the current and emerging battery chemistries. This includes comparisons of different cathode and anode materials, different ions, different electrolyte states, and different emission free power sources all together. The analysis concludes that transition from NMC to LFP batteries, and eventually solid state electrolytes, paired with grid decarbonization and increased nuclear capacity, is essential to maximizing the sustainability of electric transportation.
Related
- Functional Tree Forest: A Hybrid Bagging-Boosting Ensemble Machine Learning Approach for Battery Fault Diagnosis in Electric Vehicles
- Hierarchical Multimodal Large Language Model-Based Interpretation and Aggregation of PDP and ICE Explanations for Battery State-of-Charge Prediction in Electric Vehicles
- The role of membrane properties and environmental footprint in shaping the cost-climate optimal carbon capture processes
- Electric Field Effects on Amine Regeneration in Post-Combustion Carbon Capture—Part II: Mode-Selective Infrared Laser Excitation Probed by Nonequilibrium Ehrenfest Electron-Nuclear Dynamics
- Investigation of thorium separation from rare-earth extraction residue via electrosorption with carbon based electrode toward reducing waste volume
BibTeX
@misc{cisneros2026reducing,
title = {{Reducing the Carbon Footprint of Electric Vehicles}},
author = {Rowen Cisneros},
howpublished = {ECSarXiv},
year = {2026},
month = sep,
doi = {10.1149/osf.io/5ah3c_v1},
url = {https://osf.io/preprints/ecsarxiv/5ah3c_v1/},
note = {CC BY 4.0},
}
RIS
TY - UNPB
TI - Reducing the Carbon Footprint of Electric Vehicles
AU - Rowen Cisneros
PY - 2026
DA - 2026/09/13
PB - ECSarXiv
DO - 10.1149/osf.io/5ah3c_v1
UR - https://osf.io/preprints/ecsarxiv/5ah3c_v1/
AB - Electric vehicles (EVs) are widely recognized as zero-emission alternatives to traditional gas powered cars. However if we dive deeper into the emissions of EVs we reveal that they have significant greenhouse gas emissions during the upstream manufacturing and charging process. This research paper evaluates the net environmental impact of EVs across their full lifespan, focussing on the ecological effects of battery production and dirty energy sources. Upstream analysis indicates that battery manufacturing accounts for 60 percent of production emissions and creates substantial environmental degradation. Operationally, the climate benefit of EVs depends on the region’s power generation, as grids who rely heavily on non-renewable energy decrease the environmental benefits compared to grids powered by hydro, nuclear, and other clean energy sources. Finally, this study compares the current and emerging battery chemistries. This includes comparisons of different cathode and anode materials, different ions, different electrolyte states, and different emission free power sources all together. The analysis concludes that transition from NMC to LFP batteries, and eventually solid state electrolytes, paired with grid decarbonization and increased nuclear capacity, is essential to maximizing the sustainability of electric transportation.
ER -