Electric car sales are up 66% this year.
President Joe Biden promotes them, saying things like, “The great American road trip is going to be fully electrified” and, “There’s no turning back.”
To make sure we have no choice in the matter, some left-leaning states have moved to ban gas-powered cars altogether. [bold, links added]
California Gov. Gavin Newsom issued an executive order banning them by 2035. Oregon, Massachusetts, and New York copied California. Washington state’s politicians said they’d make it happen even faster, by 2030.
Thirty countries also say they’ll phase out gas-powered cars.
But this is just dumb. It will not happen. It’s magical thinking.
In my new video, I point out some “inconvenient” facts about electric cars, simple truths that politicians and green activists just don’t seem to understand.
“Electric cars are amazing,” says physicist Mark Mills of the Manhattan Institute. “But they won’t change the future in any significant way (as far as) oil use or carbon dioxide emissions.”
Inconvenient fact 1: Selling more electric cars won’t reduce oil use very much.
“The world has 15, 18 million electric vehicles now,” says Mills. “If we (somehow) get to 500 million, that would reduce world oil consumption by about 10%. That’s not nothing, but it doesn’t end the use of oil.”
Most of the world’s oil is used by things like “airplanes, buses, big trucks, and the mining equipment that gets the copper to build the electric cars.”
Even if all vehicles somehow did switch to electricity, there’s another problem: Electricity isn’t very green.
I laugh [when] talking to friends who are all excited about their electric car, assuming it doesn’t pollute. They go silent when I ask, “Where does your car’s electricity come from?”
They don’t know. They haven’t even thought about it.
Inconvenient fact 2: Although driving an electric car puts little additional carbon into the air, producing the electricity to charge its battery adds plenty.
Most of America’s electricity is produced by burning natural gas and coal. Just 12% comes from wind or solar power.
Auto companies don’t advertise that. “Electric vehicles in general are better and more sustainable for the environment,” says Ford’s Linda Zhang in a BBC interview.
“She’s a Ford engineer,” I say to Mills. “She’s not ignorant.”
“She’s not stupid,” he replies. “But ignorance speaks to what you know. You have to mine, somewhere on earth, 500,000 pounds of minerals and rock to make one battery.”
American regulations make mining difficult, so most of it is done elsewhere, polluting those countries. Some mining is done by children. Some are done in places that use slave labor.
Even if those horrors didn’t exist, mining itself adds lots of carbon to the air.
“If you’re worried about carbon dioxide,” says Mills, “the electric vehicle has emitted 10 to 20 tons of carbon dioxide (from the mining, manufacturing, and shipping) before it even gets to your driveway.”
“Volkswagen published an honest study (in which they) point out that the first 60,000 miles or so you’re driving an electric vehicle, that electric vehicle will have emitted more carbon dioxide than if you just drove a conventional vehicle.”
An electric Volvo C40 needs to be driven around 68,400 miles to have a lower carbon impact than the petrol version… if powered by a global electricity mix – but only 30,000 miles if powered by wind-generated electricity. #ZeroOmissions #COP26 https://t.co/AIoAaZECIo pic.twitter.com/WxngqPvQqe
— Volvo Car UK (@VolvoCarUK) November 2, 2021
You would have to drive an electric car “100,000 miles” to reduce emissions by just “20 or 30%, which is not nothing, but it’s not zero.”
No, it’s not.
If you live in New Zealand, where there’s lots of hydro and geothermal power, electric cars pollute less. But in America, your “zero-emission vehicle” adds lots of greenhouse gasses to the atmosphere.
Politicians and electric car sellers don’t mention that. Most probably don’t even know.
In a future column, three more inconvenient facts about electric cars.
Read more at Townhall
No mention about how many battery replacements will be needed to reach 100,000 miles driven. Each new battery is going to reset the CO2 clock. I drove my Honda CRV over 100,000 with only standard maintenance and tire replacements. And I got over 30MPG average during that time. My son now owns it.
Steve, when a BEV battery needs replacing, that could cause the vehicle to be written off because the price of a new battery is likely to exceed the value of the car.
We have a 1989 Mitsubishi 4×4 that’s travelled 300,000kms. We had the engine rebuilt and it goes really good for such an old vehicle. Engine rebuild cost $4,400. I expect this car will last another 10 years at least.
I’ve never owned a lava lamp, pet rock, a pair of earth shoes, a Segway or a Peloton. Why should I buy an EV?
Electric cars are like fibre optic internet compared to a dial-up modem
I don’t care how much of a motor head you are, once you drive an electric vehicle, you will not want to drive anything else
It wouldn’t be the same experience for me that it is for you, that smugness you experience driving around powered by other people’s money.
Have a look around and under your vehicle. Where does a tow rope get attached? Had an insurance chap visit. He got stuck in soft sand leaving our place. Tow? Not possible. Digging and planks.
So, stay in the city and on the freeways, don’t even think of going off pavement. (That way I won’t meet you at my favorite trout stream.)
David, I have no problem believing that many people really like driving electric cars. The issue is affordability. In an interview Elon Musk volunteered that the average American family can not afford one of his cars. Here is our situation. We typically pay $4,000 to $6,000 for a used car that we drive for 100,000 miles. For an EV to be feasible, we would have to be able buy a used one in same price range, same size, and with a battery that has a life expectancy of 100,000. It is true that some advances might reduce the price of electric cars, but currently the prices are increasing rapidly. It is less expensive to maintain electric vehicles, but this doesn’t even come close to compensating for the greater purchase cost and the batteries needing to be replaced. Electric car sales will increase as the wealthy buy them, but this will hit a plateau as most families can not afford them.
“This is just dumb. It will not happen. It’s magical thinking”
The first part is true, unfortunately the rest of the statement could be correct. If the green blob retains it’s influence in those states and countries that want to ban gas powered cars they will be banned. The magical thinking part is the belief that less well off people will still be able to afford to own a car and mass EV ownership will improve the environment on a global scale.
Unfortunately,, as Stossel points out, the “Greens” have mono-vision, which restricts their ability to see beyond the basic, desired outcome. Mostly children or immature adults, they have committed to major errors; They belief that climate change is man-made and they spend no time assessing where the electricity to power EVs comes from. Probably the best all-around source of sustainable electricity is nuclear, but the greenies never would allow this.
Let the bastards freeze in the dark.
Ralph