A Clean and Quiet Revolution

By Steve Heckeroth, May 2006

The technologies exist to clean the air, stabilize the climate and maintain our standard of living all at the
same time. By relying on clean renewable technologies we can eliminate much of the US trade deficit
and the reason for war while achieving energy independence.
A quick study of the chart below shows the overwhelming advantages of plug-in hybrid (PHEV) and
battery electric vehicles (EV). EVs are zero emission and can be charged from zero emission renewable
energy sources like the sun and wind. By adding more batteries to hybrid electric vehicles (HEV) plug-in
hybrids (PHEV) can be built which offer the range of gas vehicles (400 Mi.) with the environmental
benefits of electric vehicles for short trips.

The main assumptions used to produce the values in the chart are:
1. The average cost of gasoline over the next year will be approximately $3.50/gallon.
2. The Time of Use (TOU) rate for nighttime charging is approximately $0.05/kWh.
3. There are about 40 kWh of energy in a gallon of gasoline.
4. Burning 1 gallon of gasoline produces approximately 23 lbs of CO2.
* This column includes upstream CO2 emissions for exploration, extraction, transport, refining and
distribution of gasoline, as well as CO2 emissions from the California mix of power plants that produce
electricity to charge electric vehicles.