April 6, 2013

e Trikes as high priority renewable energy project?

From Sci Dev | December 2012

The Philippines, having been funded by ADB is scheduled to launch E trikes project which is projected to cut carbon dioxide emission by 250,000 tonnes a year.  The tricycles which use petrol has been one of the major pollutants of MM.   There are about 3.5 million tricycles in the Phil and use up to about $5 billion of fuel annually.  Every 20,000 e trikes will save about $50 million of fuel annually.

The trikes will use lithium ion batteries and can be recharged 2,000 times.  Those who have used the e trikes have reported 2x income compared to gasoline powered trikes (depreciation not included?)

Other infrastructures needed are charging stations (including off grid - solar powered stations)

This move has been severely criticized by environmentalists because this is short term focussed.  The CO2 emissions will be reduced;   however the more serious emissions coming from coal powered power plants in the PHL emit much more carbon dioxide and is viewed as a political gimmickry because this makes more impact because of huge number of tricycle drivers

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