Electric Bicycles

• This article discusses the advantages and disadvantages of electric bicycles, their current usage in global transportation, and how many CO₂ equivalent emissions could be reduced if electric bike usage continues to grow.
• Students will learn that electric bikes have a motor that makes it easier to travel long distances, electric bikes have higher emissions than a regular bicycle, most electric bike usage is in China, and over a gigaton of carbon emissions could be prevented if electric bike use increases.

Positives

• This article does an excellent job of explaining how electric bikes can reduce emissions without too much technical language, making it easier for students to comprehend.
• This article also talks about the health benefits of riding bikes.
  

Additional Prerequisites

• Students need to understand the importance of carbon sequestration and how emissions from cars and other forms of transportation contribute to climate change.
• The link in the reference section does not work but it's not necessary to analyze this article.
  

Differentiation

• To engage students in the reading and assess prior knowledge, the teacher can ask students about their prior experience, if any, with e-bikes or bicycles in general.
• This resource pairs well with another Project Drawdown article titled Bicycle Infrastructure, or other articles found on the Table of Solutions.
• Teachers can ask students to list the times they used a car or other forms of transportation that week, then highlight all the trips that could have been achieved using an electric bicycle or regular bicycle.
• This article can support a lesson on various methods of reducing urban/suburban greenhouse gas emissions and pollution from combustion engines.
• The paper is in a scientific paper format, so science classes can use this as an example of this type of writing for labs, experiments, or as practice before reading more lengthy papers.