Last Monday (26) Rádio Jovem Pan promoted in São Paulo another Forum Myths&Facts, this time with the theme Urban Mobility. Among the participants of the Forum were the mayor of São Paulo João Dória, who during his initial address addressed the theme of the electrification of the São Paulo fleet of light and heavy vehicles, arguing that the future of urban mobility in the main Brazilian metropolis is electrification, discarding, verbatim, sources such as ethanol and natural gas.
In the opinion of the President of Datagro Consulting and representative of civil society in the National Council of Energy Policy (CNPE), Plínio Nastari, the speech of the mayor Dória reflects a lack of information not only of him, but of several managers.
According to Nastari, in an exclusive interview with the UDOP News Agency, that the future of transportation is electrification, there is no doubt, but we must never rule out that today the best route for this electrification is biofuels, especially ethanol. “The route of electrification with biofuels is undoubtedly the most accessible, clean and that generates development for our country and the world,” said the president of Datagro.
One of the most active voices when it comes to fuels, Plínio Nastari stressed that in the world today, there are at least three routes for electrification: battery, hydrogen and biofuels.
“Each route has its own characteristic.We walked to a scenario where there is no doubt about the electrification, but we should not rule out, for example, that there is still a huge field in the optimization of internal combustion vehicles, which have a lot to contribute , mainly in the improvement of the engines driven to the ethanol, explained Nastari.
Citing the example of electric vehicles to the battery, Nastari enumerates at least four great obstacles. The first would be the source of electricity. “It’s no use talking about a less polluting electric car if we do not look, for example, if the source of electricity does not come from burning fossil fuels,” he argues, noting that this issue has been little explored by managers, such as Doria .
“I have a collection of cartoons published in the European media where they stand out, that is, what’s the use of having an electric car and finding yourself clean, if there’s a coal plant behind it,” argues one again.
Other negative aspects to battery cars would be the non-existent and expensive fueling infrastructure to be deployed, the low battery life, which corresponds to 40% of the price of cars and the difficult accessibility of these expensive cars, of cars sold in Brazil.
But among the worst factors that play against electric cars the battery, would be the origin of the materials of these batteries, lithium or cobalt. “Lithium is produced in a few countries, such as China, Chile and Australia, and cobalt accounts for 65% of its production from mines in the Congo,” explains Datagro’s chairman, this factor, in his view, would shift dependence today to oil-producing countries, for example, to these other nations, which would not be comfortable.
“To get an idea of the impact of the electric car on drums in Brazil, suffice it to say that if we changed the entire fleet for these vehicles, we would consume all the energy produced and consumed today in our country, which makes this route totally unfeasible,” the CNPE representative praises.
On the route that uses hydrogen, another important source for the electrification, Plínio Nastari also highlights some problems, such as a very expensive distribution, “in California a hydrogen spout costs on average 1.5 million dollars, is a very expensive network” , and also the risk of the storage of this energy, which requires titanium tanks installed in the middle of the vehicles, in order to avoid any risk of explosion.
The most viable route, as already highlighted by the president of Datagro would be precisely the electrification through sources from biofuels. Yes, in the view of the specialist, there is synergy, because we are talking about the use of energy already produced in the country, ethanol, biodiesel, biomethane and other biofuels, as a source of electricity production that will spin the engines of the future.
“The electrification of the biofuels route is safe, easy, has a distribution system in Brazil ready and the rest of the world with low implementation costs, and all the environmental benefits of the carbon footprint of these sources, since we are talking about an energy captured, stored and distributed safely and cleanly, “says Nastari.
At the end of the interview, Plínio Nastari once again emphasizes that both João Dória and many other managers need to understand that electrification must be looked at in all aspects, especially taking into account the carbon footprint of the energy source, thus, disinformation and dissemination of distorted concepts.
To view the Myths Forum&Facts with the participation of Mayor João Dória click on here . The talk to which matter refers is at the 24th minute of transmission.