Joshua Graff Zivin on Charging Electric Cars
The Where’s and When’s of Charging Electric Vehicles
10/19/2012
Jonathan Marshall,
PG&E Currents
PG&E customers can drive electric vehicles (EVs) with the greenest of consciences, knowing that the power they draw comes from some of the cleanest sources in the nation. But residents of much of the rest of the country face a much more ambiguous choice when it comes to selecting a clean vehicle.
Experts have long pointed out that where you charge your EV has a big impact on its environmental footprint. Thus electric vehicles are no panacea In China, which burns vast amounts of dirty coal to make its power grid hum. The same goes for parts of the United States dominated by coal-fired power plants.
Now, compounding the problem, a new working paper by three economists points out that when you charge matters a lot for the environment, too.
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Joshua Graff Zivin is Associate Professor of International Relations and Pacific Studies and Affiliated Faculty of Economics. He is also a Research Associate at the National Bureau of Economic Research (NBER) and Research Director for International Environmental and Health Studies at the Institute for Global Conflict and Cooperation (IGCC).
