If you’re concerned about your car emissions like us at Untonne, you’ve probably thought a lot about how you can reduce your carbon footprint and have probably wondered, or already decided, to buy an electric vehicle. Electric vehicles are a critical part of decarbonization, so if you’ve bought one or want to buy one – good for you!
However, we wanted to compare the impact of our Individual Plan, at just $29.50/month, paired with keeping your conventional car, in terms of the environmental benefit of buying an electric vehicle.
For the average person who drives 12,000 miles per year, a conventional car produces about 5 metric tonnes of carbon dioxide emissions per year from burning gas. This will result in a little over 60 metric tonnes during the life of the vehicle.
In contrast, an electric vehicle is as clean as the electric grid it’s plugged into. Using the average U.S. grid mix as of the second quarter of 2022, an electric vehicle will produce about 20 metric tonnes of carbon dioxide emissions over its lifetime, or about ⅓ what a conventional car would create. As the electric grid gets cleaner, this number will get even better; on average an electric vehicle in West Coast states with abundant hydro and renewable energy mandates will create less than 10 metric tonnes of emissions in its lifetime.
Therefore, compared to a conventional car’s CO2 emissions, electric vehicles can save about 40 tons over the car’s lifetime, or 3.3 tons per year.
But how does this compare to Untonne’s Individual Plan per year?
Untonne’s individual plan creates 20 tonnes of emission savings per year and results in planting 96 trees. Over that same EV’s lifetime, which can save up to 40 metric tonnes of emissions compared to a gas car, the individual plan will create 250 metric tonnes of emission reductions, while additionally sequestering emissions from planting 1,200 trees! That’s over 6 times the impact!
Disclaimer: We do not discourage you from buying an electric car. Hopefully, you are even more knowledgeable today about buying an EV than you were before, and can see the impact it can have – up to 60 metric tons of emissions reductions over its lifetime!
However, we also hope this puts the climate impact of Untonne into perspective. You would have to replace four conventional cars with electric cars and run them on 100% clean electricity to have the same impact as one of Untonne’s Individual Plan, and even then, you’d also have to plant 1,200 trees.
Without changing your lifestyle, you can beat an EV’s emission savings by over 6x when you subscribe to Untonne’s Individual Plan here.