What are battery-electric and hybrid vehicles?
	Benefits
	Safety and performance
	Vehicle and fuel availability
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Benefits

Battery-electric vehicles

Battery-electric vehicles produce essentially no pollutants or greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions from the tailpipe or through fuel evaporation. But the production of electricity used to charge the batteries does have environmental costs.

Generating stations fuelled by coal, oil and natural gas produce carbon dioxide – the principal GHG – and pollutants such as particulate matter, sulphur oxides, nitrogen oxides, hydrocarbons and carbon monoxide. Fortunately, almost 60 percent of Canada's electricity is produced using hydroelectric generators, which create little or no air pollution. Another 12 percent is generated by nuclear reactors, which also produce no air pollution.

Hybrid electric vehicles

HEVs do produce GHG emissions, but such emissions are far fewer than those from conventional gasoline vehicles. HEVs reduce GHG emissions from vehicle operation and decrease upstream emissions by about 28 percent compared with conventional gasoline vehicles.

HEVs do not need electricity from another source (which may or may not produce emissions) because they use regenerative braking, the energy produced from coasting, and sometimes the gasoline engine to recharge their batteries.