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Karma’s a Botch.

Part V in the Series "It's Not Easy Going Green"

By: Steve Maley (Diary)  |  October 24th, 2011 at 01:00 PM  | 

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Image from Wikipedia.

Last week, we heard about the Fisker Karma, the new electric vehicle being built in Finland using a $529 million loan from U.S. taxpayers. Beneficiaries of this deal include one Albert Gore, partner in the “green” venture capital firm Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers.

Now Forbes contributor Warren Meyer weighs in with an analysis of the Karma’s true energy efficiency, rate in miles-per-gallon equivalent according to a DOE formula:

Update: Fisker Karma Electric Car Gets Worse Mileage Than an SUV

The Fisker Karma electric car, developed mainly with your tax money so that a bunch of rich VC’s wouldn’t have to risk any real money, has rolled out with an nominal EPA MPGe of 52 in all electric mode (we will ignore the gasoline engine for this analysis).

Not bad? Unfortunately, it’s a sham. This figure is calculated using the grossly flawed EPA process that substantially underestimates the amount of fossil fuels required to power the electric car, as I showed in great depth in an earlier Forbes.com article. In short, the EPA methodology leaves out, among other things, the conversion efficiency in generating the electricity from fossil fuels in the first place [by assuming perfect conversion of the potential energy in the fuel to electricity, the EPA is actually breaking the 2nd law of thermodynamics].

In the Clinton administration, the Department of Energy (DOE) created a far superior well to wheels MPGe metric that honestly compares the typical fossil fuel use of an electric vs. gasoline car, using real-world power plant efficiencies and fuel mixes to figure out how much fuel is used to produce the electricity that goes into the electric car.

As I calculated in my earlier Forbes article, one needs to multiply the EPA MPGe by .365 to get a number that truly compares fossil fuel use of an electric car with a traditional gasoline engine car on an apples to apples basis. In the case of the Fisker Karma, we get a true MPGe of 19. This makes it worse than even the city rating of a Ford Explorer SUV.

[Emphasis added.]

Fortunately for Fisker, the sacrificed efficiency is somewhat transparent to the Karma owner, as it occurs in the power plant and transmission lines. At $87,400 a copy, the Karma is obviously targeted at a well-heeled elite, few of whom will ever notice the true cost of the vehicle on their electric bills.

This is the latest item in the series “It’s Not Easy Going Green”. Lots of technologies work well on a small scale, in a lab, or before you audit the true cost. Scalability is the stumbling block; the quest to replace petroleum as a transportation fuel has to scale up to put a dent in the quarter of a billion vehicles on the road in the U.S. That’s easier said than done.

Coincidentally, $529 million is the same amount as the Solyndra default.

Cross-posted at stevemaley.com.


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  • izoneguy
  • izoneguy
    • acat

      To everyone surprised by Fisker, go look up Citicar.

      Here, let me provide the Wikipedia article…

      Mew

  • jaykali

    The Solyndra thing is really bad, but at least they can make the defense, ya these guys were our pals but we really need some solar panels around here and we gave it a shot.

    How does team Obama or the DOE explain building luxury electric cars overseas? This sort of thing I would think would be enough for some congressional action to put the whole loan program thing on hiatus indefinitely if it isn’t already.

  • throwback59

    -Someone had to say it.

    • macbookben

      …just ran over my green dogma.

      • valrobex

        with nothing but net…LOL

  • papabear

    Warren Meyer carries over a very old assumption of electrical power plaant efficiency of 32.8%. Today’s combined cycle power plants are typically 50-55% efficient. There are a couple of power plants that are in the 60% range.

    However, even if you assumed a 50% average efficiency, the multiplication factor would be .556. This would yield a net fuel economy of 28.9 MPG.

    I do not think that I need to comment on the business case for spending $529 MILLION to get 28.9 MPG!

    • kjb486

      Not sure whether you are being sarcastic. Are you saying $529 million for 28.9 MPG is good? I certainly hope not. How many miles (years) must one drive using an incremental 10 MPG factor in order to save $529 million. And just how many of these vehicles must be sold in order to achieve this savings?

      • papabear

        There are many luxury sedans that get better FE in both city and highway driving (Lincoln, Audi, Lexus). Adding insult to injury, these alternatives are cheaper and have ZERO government support.

        As a side note, the assumptions in my OP reflect the idea that almost every new power plant that will get built in the future will be a combined cycle power plant. However, one thing that is completely missing from all the government assumptions is the cost to upgrade the nation’s electrical infrastructure. If you work through the math, this is an enormous cost. If the US were to replace all fossil fuel used for transportation with electrical power, we would need to increase our electrical transmission and generation capability by well over 50%.

        How much money would that cost?

  • rbdwiggins

    Four score and three years ago: The unavoidable fate of the modern green movement foretold…

    “If someone points out to you that your pet theory of the universe is in disagreement with Maxwell’s equations?then so much the worse for Maxwell’s equations. If it is found to be contradicted by observation?well these experimentalists do bungle things sometimes. But if your theory is found to be against the second law of thermodynamics I can give you no hope; there is nothing for it but to collapse in deepest humiliation.”

    ? Sir Arthur Stanley Eddington, Gifford Lectures (1927), The Nature of the Physical World (1928).

    I know. I know… My observation presupposes that at least some of those entranced by the green movement actually possess a measurable degree of humility.

    • valrobex

      Eddington said that so long ago… and we’ve learned so much since then… and, and who says the second law of thermodynamics is correct…it’s no better than the first…so there! I told you so! – A. Gore.

      • rbdwiggins

        “we?ve learned so much since then”

        We’ve learned that the theory of atmospheric CO2 induced global warming is bunk. It requires a closed system, and that planetary mechanism can never exist.

        We’ve learned that a significant portion of the scientific community, willfully and purposely, sacrificed all credibility and integrity in order to advance their green agenda and secure what they apparently believed would be a perpetual revenue stream. “Hide the decline.”

        We’ve learned that the entire planet owes an enormous debt of gratitude to the East Anglia whistleblower(s).

        We’ve also learned that catastrophic climate change looks something like this:

        If you can’t see the video, look here.

  • logoad

    Excellent comment, and an inarguable point to anyone who considers facts and not feelings. Wishing and hoping we can eliminate our dependence on oil by driving electric cars does not make it so, and the dishonesty and misinformation presented by those profiting off of these “green” status symbols is criminal. Using these high profile but inefficient projects to rally support for “green” is distracting from, and inhibiting interest and growth in REAL progress in energy efficiency.
    So sad that the majority of people think that as long as a new electric car comes out every year, we are making progress toward energy independence.
    Wake up America – before it’s too late.

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