<instructions>Your goal is to analyze the following comment and estimate how highly it will be upvoted by the Hacker News community.</instructions><comment><author>whatever1</author><text>E fuels can be 0 carbon. But they are still bad for air quality because of oxidizing Nitrogen during combustion. These Nitrous oxides then react in the atmosphere with other compounds (even terpenes from forests) then form the small  particles (PM2.5) that we now know are deadly because they pass though all of our body barriers.&lt;p&gt;The way I see it is that efuels will eventually be there to satisfy the demand of legacy hardware in the transition period, and maybe a bit later for recreational purposes (aka for car collectors, racing etc).&lt;p&gt;They are not a permanent solution for our transportation energy needs.</text><parent_chain><item><author>meesles</author><text>A dutch lawmaker in the article said that e-fuels still release carbon dioxide into the atmosphere. If the EU were to accept Germany&amp;#x27;s loophole, then there would be a known avenue for vehicle fuel pollutants to continue to damage our environment. Given companies will always prioritize profits, if that loophole exists and they can re-use their infrastructure, naturally they will heavily invest in this area and continue polluting the world. What&amp;#x27;s the point to all these changes if we just shift from one mode of pollution to another?&lt;p&gt;Maybe the loophole should be to allow fuels that generate 0 carbon emissions (+ other rules) when combusted.</text></item><item><author>tomas789</author><text>This is such a great move! Let me explain. What you care about is not EVs. It is carbon neutrality. You actions should be geared towards that. Not EVs. They are just one way of getting there.&lt;p&gt;Having commercially viable e-Fuels would have a few advantages. You can keep your old car and be net-zero, sport cars would be a thing, you can decarbonize other types of transport which are more complicated to decarbonize than personal vehicles. Like maritime, airplanes, long haul tracking and so on. Its like killing many many birds with one stone.&lt;p&gt;At the momeny, the fact that ICE cars would be banned could be a red flag for new projects trying to push for e-Fuels as it limits their customer base. This is important because at the beginning they will be more expensive that crude-based products so you need to find a niche market where poeple are willing to pay premium for net-zero. I think that companies like Google, Apple and so on would be willing to pay maybe even 2x or 3x for the fuel if it guarantees true net zero (no offsets).&lt;p&gt;As for the efficiency. It is true that the e-Fuel based chain would be less efficient than all-electric but there is a way around it. Efficiency is mostly important to keep the costs low. If you need 1kWh on the output and the efficiency is 20% instead of 90%, you will need 5 kWh instead of 1.11 kWh on the input. But what if the input is next to free? Two ways of getting that. One is by having a surplus electricity which we will have a lot as we inevitably have much more installed capacity in solar than peak load. The other one is to build renewables where they work very well (like Mauritania for solar), produce e-Fuels on-site and than ship them globally. Economy of scale will allow you to decrease cost of e-Fuels dramatically.&lt;p&gt;It might seem like a long shot for you at the moment but I gave it a lot of thought and discussions and research and I think that this very realistic and very likely scenario.&lt;p&gt;PS: If you want to start a business in this area, let me know. I&amp;#x27;d be very interested!</text></item></parent_chain></comment><story><title>EU was set to ban internal combustion engine cars, then Germany changed its mind</title><url>https://www.cnn.com/2023/03/24/cars/eu-combustion-engine-debate-climate-intl/index.html</url></story>
<instructions>Your goal is to analyze the following comment and estimate how highly it will be upvoted by the Hacker News community.</instructions><comment><author>tomas789</author><text>Yes, they emit CO2 when burned. The goal is not no-emissions but net-zero. Question is where does the carbon in the e-Fuel come from?</text><parent_chain><item><author>meesles</author><text>A dutch lawmaker in the article said that e-fuels still release carbon dioxide into the atmosphere. If the EU were to accept Germany&amp;#x27;s loophole, then there would be a known avenue for vehicle fuel pollutants to continue to damage our environment. Given companies will always prioritize profits, if that loophole exists and they can re-use their infrastructure, naturally they will heavily invest in this area and continue polluting the world. What&amp;#x27;s the point to all these changes if we just shift from one mode of pollution to another?&lt;p&gt;Maybe the loophole should be to allow fuels that generate 0 carbon emissions (+ other rules) when combusted.</text></item><item><author>tomas789</author><text>This is such a great move! Let me explain. What you care about is not EVs. It is carbon neutrality. You actions should be geared towards that. Not EVs. They are just one way of getting there.&lt;p&gt;Having commercially viable e-Fuels would have a few advantages. You can keep your old car and be net-zero, sport cars would be a thing, you can decarbonize other types of transport which are more complicated to decarbonize than personal vehicles. Like maritime, airplanes, long haul tracking and so on. Its like killing many many birds with one stone.&lt;p&gt;At the momeny, the fact that ICE cars would be banned could be a red flag for new projects trying to push for e-Fuels as it limits their customer base. This is important because at the beginning they will be more expensive that crude-based products so you need to find a niche market where poeple are willing to pay premium for net-zero. I think that companies like Google, Apple and so on would be willing to pay maybe even 2x or 3x for the fuel if it guarantees true net zero (no offsets).&lt;p&gt;As for the efficiency. It is true that the e-Fuel based chain would be less efficient than all-electric but there is a way around it. Efficiency is mostly important to keep the costs low. If you need 1kWh on the output and the efficiency is 20% instead of 90%, you will need 5 kWh instead of 1.11 kWh on the input. But what if the input is next to free? Two ways of getting that. One is by having a surplus electricity which we will have a lot as we inevitably have much more installed capacity in solar than peak load. The other one is to build renewables where they work very well (like Mauritania for solar), produce e-Fuels on-site and than ship them globally. Economy of scale will allow you to decrease cost of e-Fuels dramatically.&lt;p&gt;It might seem like a long shot for you at the moment but I gave it a lot of thought and discussions and research and I think that this very realistic and very likely scenario.&lt;p&gt;PS: If you want to start a business in this area, let me know. I&amp;#x27;d be very interested!</text></item></parent_chain></comment><story><title>EU was set to ban internal combustion engine cars, then Germany changed its mind</title><url>https://www.cnn.com/2023/03/24/cars/eu-combustion-engine-debate-climate-intl/index.html</url></story>