Volvo Cars CEO Jim Rowan has boldly claimed that electric vehicles (BEVs) will be on par with internal combustion engine (ICE) cars in price by 2025. Markus Schäfer, Mercedes-Benz's chief technology officer, and Luca de Meo, chief executive of Groupe Renault, countered that it was unlikely.
According to the International Energy Agency, electric vehicles will account for more than 60% of global car sales by 2030. But Benchmark Mineral Intelligence, a minerals market analyst, said that figure would be overly optimistic given the large quantities of lithium, cobalt and other raw materials needed to make electric vehicle batteries, unless nearly 300 new mines and associated refineries open by then.
Electric car owners should be encouraged to charge at night, not only saving money and reducing the impact on the grid, but also "saving the world," one headline said. Don't get excited, researchers at Stanford University have found that charging electric vehicles during the day is actually cheaper, better for the grid, and better for the environment.
Conflicting narratives abound in the transition to electric vehicles:
EVs will/will not crash the grid.
EVs will/will not cause mass unemployment among auto workers.
EVs will/will not cause more pollution than they eliminate.
Confused? Then come and have a look.
Sorting out such contradictory rhetoric is confusing. My reaction to each claim is usually to shrug and say "it depends".
Two years ago, I began investigating the veracity of various claims of a massive EV transition, resulting in a 12-article e-book, The EV Transition Explained, that explores the closely intertwined technologies , policy and social issues. In the course of writing, I conducted numerous interviews with managers and engineers in the auto and energy industries, as well as policy experts, academic researchers, market analysts, historians, and electric vehicle owners. I also reviewed hundreds of reports, case studies and books on electric vehicles and the grid.
What I found was a complex web of technological innovation, complexity, and uncertainty, mixed with equal parts optimism and dysfunctional policy. Policymakers have the rosy hope that the public will quietly acquiesce that greater disruption is inevitable in the years and decades ahead. In reality, the transition and transition to EVs will be messier, more expensive, and take longer than policymakers think.
My point is clear: the transition to electric vehicles and renewable energy is, in itself, an effective response to climate change. Significantly reducing the use of fossil fuels is key to achieving these goals. Yet attempting to achieve this transformation at scale in such a short period of time is fraught with problems, risks, and unintended consequences, and we need to acknowledge this honestly and openly in order to address them aggressively and realistically. Scale means not only producing millions of electric vehicles every year, but also supporting them from charging to servicing.
To achieve this, a huge effort will be required. For example, in January 2023, U.S. EV sales reached 7.83% of light new vehicle sales, including
66,416 battery electric vehicles and 14,143 plug-in hybrid electric vehicles (PHEVs). But also consider that, also in January, about 950,000 new light-duty ICE vehicles and another roughly 3 million used ICE vehicles were sold.
Simultaneous transformation of the energy and transport sectors will involve a large number of known and unknown variables that will delicately interact in complex and unpredictable ways. As electric vehicles and renewable energy expand, problems and solutions will expand in terms of population and geography. Every program proposal may bring new difficulties. In addition, scaling will threaten long-held beliefs, ways of living, and ways of earning a living, many of which will be altered or even made obsolete. Technological change is hard, social change is even harder.
However, the rush to transition to electric vehicles is logical. Parts of the world are already experiencing catastrophes related to climate change, and governments around the world have pledged to act under the Paris Agreement to limit global temperature rise to no more than 1.5°C above pre-industrial levels. The agreement requires all industrial sectors to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. Transportation is one of the largest contributors to global greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions, and many experts believe that replacing internal combustion engine vehicles with electric vehicles is the fastest and easiest way to achieve the 2050 goal of net zero carbon emissions.
However, in a 125-year-old auto industry, optimizing an internal combustion engine vehicle into an electric vehicle produced using nascent technology is a huge challenge in itself. Although automakers failed to recognize the impact of electric vehicles on their business models early, it is indeed extremely difficult to ask them to do so in 15 years or less. Electric vehicles will require automakers and suppliers to overhaul their supply chains, hiring workers with new skills in software, batteries, and electromechanics, and retraining or laying off workers whose skills are outdated and no longer needed.
This series of articles I have written addresses different aspects of the transition, including EV-related job losses, battery issues, EV charging infrastructure, and EV affordability. A not entirely surprising finding is that traditional automakers are electrifying their products while squeezing every last ounce of profit from the gas tigers. That is to say, they are constantly launching cheap electric car models, but their main goal is still to produce lucrative luxury electric car models, which are far beyond the affordability of ordinary households, while greatly stimulating the demand for lucrative gasoline SUVs. Sale.
Electric vehicles are not just a new technology to fight climate change. U.S. policymakers, for example, see electric vehicles as the spearhead of a sprawling government-led economic nationalist plan to wean themselves off fossil fuels and completely reshape the U.S.’s $26 trillion economic market to bring about economic, environmental, and social change. They argue that normal market forces are insufficient to meet climate deadlines. Therefore, with the encouragement of the Biden administration, California and several other states in the United States will ban the sale of gasoline vehicles in 2035. In this series of articles, I take a closer look at several such EV policies, and the obstacles that could stand in their way, such as improperly sized pole transformers and failure to issue permits for new transmission lines.
Of course, the US isn't the only country that sees electric vehicles as an economic driver. Around the world, nearly 60 countries and regions are imposing similar bans on the sale of gasoline vehicles. This forces electric vehicles to play another role: in the fierce geopolitical competition, electric vehicles will become a powerful weapon of economic advantage. For China, Japan, the UK, the EU and the US, electric vehicles are a must-have for "winning the future of transportation and manufacturing". In order to promote domestic electric vehicle manufacturing and energy security, the electric vehicle subsidy policy in the United States has recently changed. This decision deeply angered other countries and regions and triggered counterattacks.
Relying on electric vehicles alone is not enough to achieve carbon emission reduction targets. This means a huge change in the way many of us live, and each of us has a role to play in fighting climate change. We need to drive less, fly less, and take public transport, bike or walk more. We need to shift to a more plant-based diet and swap household appliances powered by fossil fuels for electric ones, are just a few of the looming adjustments. People's attitude towards these changes and the implementation of specific actions are the key to whether we can cope with climate change.
The introduction of any new system has unintended consequences, both positive and negative. We can safely say that the rapid and large-scale transition to electric vehicles will bring unpleasant "surprises" and prove the truth: "more speed makes waste".
While writing the articles in this series, what struck me most was the uncertainty surrounding the transition to electric vehicles. Transportation and energy policies are changing almost daily, battery technology is advancing rapidly, and automakers are constantly announcing their latest strategies. Coupled with the geopolitical impact behind the transformation, these uncertainties will increase.
These rapid changes also demonstrate the fragility of transition. The automakers' desperate plea for more government subsidies is deeply disturbing. Tesla's recent price cuts, for example, have sent the auto industry into turmoil. There are various indications that the market is not very sure about the status quo and the future.
This vulnerability is also evident when we look at the overly optimistic assumptions and caveats that lurk in EV and energy policy proposals. Many things need to be just right, and the margin for error in the EV transition is low. I'm always reminded of the admonition of Nobel Prize-winning physicist Richard Feynman: "For a successful technology, reality must take precedence over public relations, because nature is not fooled."
Both advocates and opponents of the electric vehicle transition are wasting their tongues over some stupid things. It's time to stop the nonsense and think systematically, taking into account reality and politics.
By Robert N. Charette
Scan and join the free "Smart City Smart Transportation" knowledge planet to learn more industry information and materials.
Welcome to the Intelligent Transportation Technology Group!
Contact information: WeChat ID 18515441838