THE FACT-CHECKING ENTERPRISE, INDIFFERENT TO TRADE-OFFS.

Just for fun, I posted some captioned train photographs to Facebook.  The first showed an active four track railroad.

Yes, I was having some fun, because there was a second, less railroad-magazine worthy captioned image I also posted.

The railroad magazine editors would prefer either some sort of arty shot, or a well-lit image of the motive power and the consist.  My motive, though, was to see how Facebook's rivet counters would react.  Sure enough, within a few minutes of my posting it, there was a "partially misleading" label on it, complete with a link to what the algorithm thinks is the proper nuance.

Posts on social media suggest electric cars do not help lower climate-changing emissions because people rely on coal power to charge them. This is misleading; data shows that they still produce fewer emissions over their lifespan than gasoline-powered vehicles, even in regions where coal is burned to produce electricity for the grid.

That reminds me of a train-off petition filed by the South Shore Line in the early 1970s in which the regulator concluded that, with so few commuters using the electric cars, the additional exhaust fumes from automobiles would for the most part be offset from the reduced exhaust fumes from power plants supplying the electricity.

It's a fair point that there are other sources of electricity to recharge those batteries.  "'Generating the electricity used to charge EVs... may create carbon pollution. The amount varies widely based on how local power is generated, e.g., using coal or natural gas, which emit carbon pollution, versus renewable resources like wind or solar, which do not,' the US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) says."  That is where the analysis ends, there's no consideration of the fossil fuel use in creating those windmills and solar panels in the first place, and it's apparently nyekulturny to bring up nuclear power plants.

Consider, dear reader, whether the inconvenience of using an electric car might contribute to the smaller carbon footprint, even for cars recharging on pure Powder River Low Sulfur juice.

Analyses of emissions data indicate that electric vehicles (EVs) over their lifespan produce lower greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions than regular gas-powered cars, said Jarod Cory Kelly, research engineer at Argonne National Laboratory, a US Department of Energy science center.

"Research at Argonne has indicated that even for long-range EVs (300 miles), the EV, utilizing the average US electrical grid emissions rate, has a life cycle GHG emission rate of about half that of a comparable gasoline vehicle," he told AFP.

Kelly said that accounted for all stages of vehicle and battery production as well as all stages of energy production.

How sensitive is that research to the shorter range of electric vehicles having an effect on driving behavior?  We can have less fossil fuel energy used and less total miles travelled simply by converting to less convenient cars.  What is the boundary between conservation and deprivation?

Worldwide, governments have been pushing for low-carbon energy to prevent dangerous global warming caused by humans burning fossil fuels. Analysts expect electric cars' carbon impact to get lower as new measures come into force.

On top of their efficiency, electric cars in the United States are a more sustainable means of driving than gasoline-powered vehicles as "there are low- and zero-emission means to produce electricity," said David Reichmuth, senior engineer in the Clean Transportation program at the Union of Concerned Scientists.

"New measures." Watch that, carefully, whenever anybody with an interventionist bent gets involved.  There is a cohort within the walk-bike-ride-transit-live-densely coalition that is not impressed with traffic jams of electric cars taking the place of traffic jams of internal combustion cars, as that does not address what they perceive as the many flaws of suburban sprawl facilitated by personal transportation.  Within, or overlapping with, that cohort, are the people who see some sort of antisocial personality bundled with large cars, three-row sport-utes, or pickup trucks.

The head of the National Transportation Safety Board expressed concern Wednesday about the safety risks that heavy electric vehicles pose if they collide with lighter vehicles.

The official, Jennifer Homendy, raised the issue in a speech in Washington to the Transportation Research Board. She noted, by way of example, that an electric GMC Hummer weighs about 9,000 pounds (4,000 kilograms), with a battery pack that alone is 2,900 pounds (1,300 kilograms) — roughly the entire weight of a typical Honda Civic.

That part looks like the laws of physics, but you can expect the metrofexual types to use the laws of physics to reinforce their sissy aesthetics. If the resulting lighter electric cars also have limited range, that's a feature.

Michael Brooks, executive director of the nonprofit Center for Auto Safety, said he, too, is concerned about the weight of EVs because buyers seem to be demanding a range of 300 or more miles per charge, requiring heavy batteries.

Setting up a charging network to accommodate that may be a mistake from a safety perspective, Brooks said.

“These bigger, heavier batteries are going to cause more damage,” he said. “It's a simple matter of mass and speed.”

It might be, as is the case with your gas range, that Nobody in Authority is mandating banning large electric trucks or limiting your urban runabout's range. At least for now.  "This is almost certainly a regulatory agency responding to an issue under its remit and proposing regulations to deal with said issue."  Yes, and unless we're alert to the agency proposing new regulations, the day might come when there will be no gas ranges in your houses, and tiny cruising ranges for your electric runabouts.