ICE Motorcycle and Electric Motorcycle: Environmental and Economic Analysis

The increasing concern to reduce greenhouse gas emission has prompted a demand to increase by increasing energy usage efficiency and reducing energy demands in various sectors. Introducing electric vehicles which would give the user more choices to acquire energy for the use for transportation vs. that of internal combustion engine would be a way to reduce such greenhouse gas. Since the most popular transportation mean in Thailand, motorcycle, upsurges to over 58% of all registered vehicles which is interesting to see that electric motorcycle would be able to help reduce greenhouse gases and whether the cost of owning electric motorcycle is exceeding the normal internal combustion engine motorcycle. This research elaborates fuel consumption rate and emission of the internal combustion engine by using the Economic Commission of Europe (ECE-101) standard driving cycle vs that of the electric motorcycle. ICE motorcycle's fuel consumption was found to be 1.94 Lge/100km with the release of CO₂ equals to 43.59 g/km. On the other hand, the electric motorcycle selected was found to be 0.27 Lge/100km with the release of CO₂ (well-to-tank) is at 20.67 g/km if electricity used is generated from coal, and 10.7 g/km if electricity used is generated from natural gas. Analysis of the total cost of ownership over 10 years shows electric motorcycle could save up to over 20%.