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Are electric cars more fuel-efficient?

I know that electric cars don’t run on gasoline, but are they more “fuel-efficient” than gas-powered cars? As in, are they better about conserving energy while you’re driving them?

avatar
Jason Crosby · Updated on
Reviewed by Shannon Martin, Licensed Insurance Agent.
Definitely. Electric cars are about 4x as energy-efficient as their gas-powered counterparts. Electric cars use regenerative braking and a single-speed transmission to minimize battery drain. This means that they’re able to use, in the best of cases, nearly 60% of a battery’s energy output to move the car.
Some energy is unavoidably lost while the car accelerates and when the driver applies the brakes, but with regenerative braking, some of that energy is transferred back into the engine. This means that electric cars can accelerate faster without using as much juice from the
battery
in order to do so. With gas-powered vehicles, energy isn’t used very efficiently at all. It’s estimated that only 17-21% of a gas-powered car’s fuel is used effectively.
Electric cars aren’t as fuel-efficient when it comes to production emissions, though. These vehicles require more intensive processing of everything from precious metals, polymer plastics, and computer circuitry, which releases between 30-40% more CO2 into the atmosphere than gas-powered car production would.
Additionally, electric cars rely on an electrical grid that is, in many cases, powered by coal or fossil fuels. This is what’s known as upstream emissions—pollution that isn’t caused by the vehicle itself, but the infrastructure and production process that it currently relies on. But as the
U.S. pushes for renewable energy sources
, this will hopefully change.
You can start pushing for your own changes, too, by using
Jerry
to swap out your current overpriced policy for a cheaper one. A licensed broker, Jerry does all the hard work of finding cheap quotes from the top name-brand insurance companies and buying new car insurance.
MORE: The Hidden Benefits of Owning an Electric Vehicle
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