I am a renter, like 34% of Americans, 44% of Californians and 63% of residents in Los Angeles. Charging for an hour a week at a public charger is going to be inconvenient. I expect as more locals buy EVs, there will be long waits for chargers, basically ruining one day a week.
Doing the math, paying for a charge up in public will actually cost me more money than refilling my 2004 Prius. So I am not getting the savings always extolled about with regards to EVs.
Supposedly there will be less to break inside and require maintenance, but when I have spoken to EV owners they have told me how expensive damages cost to repair, I guess because they are not yet ubiquitous enough.
I have been wanting an EV for several years, but I don’t make a lot of money. And I don’t have a 220V outlet where I rent where I could plug one in. Newer apartment buildings have parking spots for EV charging. My unit is $2600 a month. Ones with chargers tend to cost more like $4K here. More costs.
Here’s my solution: mandate landlords install 220V outlets in renter parking spots by 2030.
Start with buildings with over 100 units. Give them till 2026.
Then those with over 50 have till 2027.
Those over 25 till 2028
Those over 10 till 2029
And all by 2030.
The IRA gives tax rebates for some of this. States should add more to reduce pushback from landlords.
Yes people want a choice. Yet we are being limited by tax-funded subsidies and incentives. I fully expect to own an electric car at some point -- although I put so few miles on my car so buying a new one is unlikely. My problem with the push to go electric is exactly that is IS being pushed. EVs would be adopted gradually anyway without taxation, subsidies, and compulsion. Pushing them is also a bad idea because it will require more electricity and the USA (like some other countries, especially in Europe) is pushing aside reliable energy sources in favor of highly dilute, intermittent, and unreliable sources. The grid also needs massive upgrades. If we had not all but destroyed nuclear, we would be in a much better position to more quickly adopt EVs --- and electric cookers, and heat pumps... and AI.
I understand why you didn't mention the 300 kilo gorilla in the living room, but it needs to be mentioned and no one else has mentioned this in comments, so I guess I'll have to do it.
Electric cars are the wrong answer to the wrong question. We need a massive investment in public transit. We need more dense cities with a better mix of commercial, residential, and, commercial properties---so people can walk, bike, and, take transit to shop and get to work. The only value I can see from electric cars is that they have built up the technology that is making electric bicycles affordable to the masses.
Reliance on personally-owned automobiles is an absolute blight on human society. It has led to grotesquely inefficient suburban sprawl.
I don't expect you to never talk about EVs---simply because a huge swathe of the population has been brainwashed into believing that they are in some sense 'a good thing' for them. But you should add a boiler-plate disclaimer to the effect of "the personal automobile is a blight on society and in a well-run society we would be moving heaven and earth to build better transit in more dense cities" before you write any article about EVs. Otherwise, you are just perpetuating more of the stupid nonsense that is screwing up the planet.
Cars and car culture evoke a lot of emotion in the U.S, especially for us baby boomers who grew up during the muscle car craze of the 60's. They are intertwined with our feeling of freedom and independence. However you feel about them, I hope you enjoy my "Ode to ICE."
“Ode to ICE” – A Parody of “To all the girls I’ve loved before”
To all the cars I’ve loved before, They burned gas and so much more,
I’m kind of sad they’ll soon be gone, I dedicate this song, To all the cars I’ve loved before.
I still loved them when they would not start, I was always looking for a certain part,
I cannot work on my EV, No points or plugs to foul you see, To all the cars I’ve loved before.
To all the cars that caused me strife, You were such a big part of my life,
Why am I sad you’ll soon be gone, I dedicate this song, To all cars I’ve loved before.
To all cars that carried me, I had to drive them, don’t you see,
No computer at the heart, I used to be an important part, Of all the cars I’ve loved before.
To all the cars I’ve loved before, They burned gas and so much more,
I’m kind of sad they’ll soon be gone, I dedicate this song, To all the cars I’ve loved before.
Technology is not the enemy, CO2 is the enemy. I continue to advocate that people should buy the car with the lowest lifecycle emissions that meets their needs and budget. One of my favorite sites that allows people to make that assessment is MIT's, https://www.carboncounter.com/#!/explore . I also continue to believe that incentives or emission targets/regulation should be based on lifecycle emissions not mandating percentage of one technology over another.
I live in NM and have owned a Toyota RAV4 Prime, a plug-in hybrid, for over 2 years and I love it. My personal best is getting 2200 miles on a single tank of gas, i.e., 11 gallons. I bought it when it was still eligible for the $7500 tax credit.
Automobiles make up less than 10% of all emissions that are “killing” our planet. Transportation of goods and manufacturing create much much more — fingers in ears, “la la la la la, I can’t hear you.”
To the autos…
Road wear, tire wear, hilly/mountainous terrain, towing capabilities, lack of rural charging stations, ambient temperatures below freezing (32*F) — there is not an honest assessment of EVs out there. Everyone’s got an agenda, attempting to benefit from their own or paid-for “research.”
I’m all for change when the country has the infrastructure to support it, when car manufacturers/dealers aren’t fleecing nearly every customer they can, when citizens can afford it and when the change is not off the backs of the mid and lower class citizens.
Price will always be an issue if input costs continue to rise and as companies focus on shareholders over customers. This isn’t an automotive contagion, it’s universal. Incomes may have increased and inflation (a sum of it’s metrics year over year) may have slowed but the greed is still rampant.
EVs may be only a few years away from price parity with ICE vehicles bit that would be because American’s are forced to buy vehicles with more “safety for the sake of spying”, “convenience” and “luxury” items in the NOW lowest trim vehicles. Let’s not forget manufacturers are completely nixing base models from their lineups.
Forcing change for the sake of change and lying about it’s overall impacts to humanity while protecting industries that pollute more than fleets of gas-burning cars is disingenuous, dangerous and deceitful.
“You will be poor and own nothing” seems pretty close when you throw the taxes in on top.
So, if we have to rely on high import tariffs to remain competitive with the Chinese and large subsidies (which we don’t give for gas powered cars), then how can you suggest with confidence that EV’s will reach price parody with gas powered cars? If we’re being honest about the Cost of the vehicle, we should be talking about the actual cost of building the car, not the tax payer subsidized cost. Also, you talk about dependence on foreign oil, but we are no longer dependent on foreign oil or Nat gas. In fact, we (US) are the largest producer of both oil and Nat gas. We could make an actual difference to the environment if we converted our vehicle fleet to hybrids burning natural gas instead of gasoline.
Just returned from a trip to England, and saw a lot of hybrids and fully electric. I also saw the gas price of 1.50 GBP per liter, which is roughly $6.75 per gallon, double the US (New England) average price, hence double the "stick" incentive. Also, I'm a plug-in owner (Toyota RAV4 Prime) for 2.5 years now and I love it, it's much more satisfying in every way to drive. I get ~40 electric miles in winter and ~60 in summer, and charging at home is half the price of gas. I recognize the difficultly for many (esp. renters) in charging at home. But I also think that the US tax incentive system is so poorly designed that it's obvious to anyone making a regular paycheck that it's another tax giveaway to the well-off. You have to OWE $7500 in taxes at year-end in order to get a credit of $7500. For me, a retiree, that meant withdrawing $40,000 from my IRA and dump it in checking/savings just to owe $7500. Just back-of-cocktail napkin math: for a married couple to owe $7500 in fed income tax, your income has to be $75k beyond the standard deduction of $30k, or $105,000. No wonder we're worried about opening the domestic market to China (10k to 15k small electrics)! It's like the second coming of VW bugs and Toyota Coronas! (We're not worried about these small foreign imports, GM said at the time; we know what the American buyer really wants).
Interesting survey data on American attitudes for sure! But it doesn't seem like it's such a hard market to crack: EV sales are highest in jurisdictions that give the most "carrots" - the U.S. as a whole just isn't giving out a whole lot of carrots. Future Positive Investor tackles some of the main assertions about EV adoption challenges here: https://futurepositiveinvestor.substack.com/p/evs-a-statement-or-solution
Great article Hannah! Thank you for sharing the public perception and dispelling myths. EVs certainly will have adoption challenges, but most new technologies do. I've been driving an EV for years and I'm looking forward to the improved air quality from replacing diesel engines with EVs. No more "rolling coal" for personal entertainment that harms us all.
Many people point to lack of charging infrastructure as a problem for EVs. But as EVs become standard, the economic incentive to build chargers will make them ubiquitous. And these chargers can be located in remote areas, charged by solar panels, eliminating the need to have liquid hydrocarbons delivered to gas stations by trucks. That alone saves primary energy resources.
Yes, many don’t have dedicated parking spots or off-street parking. Those people will need to use public chargers for the foreseeable future.
The more people we can get charging at home, like you and renters who do have dedicated parking spots, the shorter the lines at public chargers will be. I’m worried about the frustration and backlash EVs are going to receive when people are wasting hours per week to charge up. I don’t want a repeat of the 70s gas lines, after which Americans threw out Democrats.
« The amount of materials we’ll need to mine will probably go down in a low-carbon transition, even when we account for ore concentration and waste rock »
That assumption feels very short sighted. This is debatable especially with renewables. Not to say we shouldn’t strive for low carbon, but we have to acknowledge that EV’s, especially with USA’s bigger car sickness, won’t replace ICE 1:1. The amount of materials needed with 10 billion humans living with renewables if we keep the same energy consumption is undoubtedly bigger than what we mine today (you may be familiar with Kaya’s equation ?). Yes, tools and processes might get a bit better, but I do not believe in any groundbreaking progress on the mining side and also renewables efficiency (batteries may have a wider technological progression capacity).
EVs need to be small and task oriented, as you said, most people travel less than 30 miles a day, let’s produce at least an affordable low range EV small car for commuters, not some monstrous F150 electric. Then we’ll be a bit more environmentally friendly.
Then the real debate the US is not having becomes(The EU either although it might have crossed our minds) is how do we change our way of doing city planning, help people live closer to their jobs and invest massively in public transportation ? So they don’t need cars so much.
Transportation is just one of the many problems we have to solve to alleviate the climate crisis. We don’t need to do the same without fossil fuels, we need to fundamentally change our ways. It’s obvious any of the EVs produced in the US and most EVs produced in the EU don’t fit the agenda of selling less and smaller cars. 🙃
Using renewables to commit murder is still committing murder and that’s what we are selling to the people, the same with a different flavor.
I just wrote about the environmental consequences of EV batteries. It seems that many people, specifically the governments, refuse to acknowledge the depth of environmental destruction and human pain caused by mining for materials needed for EV batteries. Until new sources are tested and identified, I don’t think we can argue EVs are good for the environment.
Great blog Hannah. I'm planning a blog on the current adoption rates myself... my current view is that we're seeing a temporary cyclical downturn in an exponential EV growth curve. It's interesting what the current key barriers to adoption are. It gives me hope because historically, these pale in comparison to the barriers that other technologies (inc. the Model T Ford) surmounted in rapid fashion.
I'm not sure whether incumbent buggy whip manufacturers were in engaged in an intense lobbying effort to deny the existence of horse dung though 😂
Thanks for this breakdown of data! Anecdotally, I can say that I love driving an EV so much and the reason is something I didn't anticipate when buying it - no gears. Acceleration is smooth and powerful. Just a joy to drive!
Charging.
I am a renter, like 34% of Americans, 44% of Californians and 63% of residents in Los Angeles. Charging for an hour a week at a public charger is going to be inconvenient. I expect as more locals buy EVs, there will be long waits for chargers, basically ruining one day a week.
Doing the math, paying for a charge up in public will actually cost me more money than refilling my 2004 Prius. So I am not getting the savings always extolled about with regards to EVs.
Supposedly there will be less to break inside and require maintenance, but when I have spoken to EV owners they have told me how expensive damages cost to repair, I guess because they are not yet ubiquitous enough.
I have been wanting an EV for several years, but I don’t make a lot of money. And I don’t have a 220V outlet where I rent where I could plug one in. Newer apartment buildings have parking spots for EV charging. My unit is $2600 a month. Ones with chargers tend to cost more like $4K here. More costs.
Here’s my solution: mandate landlords install 220V outlets in renter parking spots by 2030.
Start with buildings with over 100 units. Give them till 2026.
Then those with over 50 have till 2027.
Those over 25 till 2028
Those over 10 till 2029
And all by 2030.
The IRA gives tax rebates for some of this. States should add more to reduce pushback from landlords.
Yes people want a choice. Yet we are being limited by tax-funded subsidies and incentives. I fully expect to own an electric car at some point -- although I put so few miles on my car so buying a new one is unlikely. My problem with the push to go electric is exactly that is IS being pushed. EVs would be adopted gradually anyway without taxation, subsidies, and compulsion. Pushing them is also a bad idea because it will require more electricity and the USA (like some other countries, especially in Europe) is pushing aside reliable energy sources in favor of highly dilute, intermittent, and unreliable sources. The grid also needs massive upgrades. If we had not all but destroyed nuclear, we would be in a much better position to more quickly adopt EVs --- and electric cookers, and heat pumps... and AI.
I understand why you didn't mention the 300 kilo gorilla in the living room, but it needs to be mentioned and no one else has mentioned this in comments, so I guess I'll have to do it.
Electric cars are the wrong answer to the wrong question. We need a massive investment in public transit. We need more dense cities with a better mix of commercial, residential, and, commercial properties---so people can walk, bike, and, take transit to shop and get to work. The only value I can see from electric cars is that they have built up the technology that is making electric bicycles affordable to the masses.
Reliance on personally-owned automobiles is an absolute blight on human society. It has led to grotesquely inefficient suburban sprawl.
I don't expect you to never talk about EVs---simply because a huge swathe of the population has been brainwashed into believing that they are in some sense 'a good thing' for them. But you should add a boiler-plate disclaimer to the effect of "the personal automobile is a blight on society and in a well-run society we would be moving heaven and earth to build better transit in more dense cities" before you write any article about EVs. Otherwise, you are just perpetuating more of the stupid nonsense that is screwing up the planet.
Cars and car culture evoke a lot of emotion in the U.S, especially for us baby boomers who grew up during the muscle car craze of the 60's. They are intertwined with our feeling of freedom and independence. However you feel about them, I hope you enjoy my "Ode to ICE."
“Ode to ICE” – A Parody of “To all the girls I’ve loved before”
To all the cars I’ve loved before, They burned gas and so much more,
I’m kind of sad they’ll soon be gone, I dedicate this song, To all the cars I’ve loved before.
I still loved them when they would not start, I was always looking for a certain part,
I cannot work on my EV, No points or plugs to foul you see, To all the cars I’ve loved before.
To all the cars that caused me strife, You were such a big part of my life,
Why am I sad you’ll soon be gone, I dedicate this song, To all cars I’ve loved before.
To all cars that carried me, I had to drive them, don’t you see,
No computer at the heart, I used to be an important part, Of all the cars I’ve loved before.
To all the cars I’ve loved before, They burned gas and so much more,
I’m kind of sad they’ll soon be gone, I dedicate this song, To all the cars I’ve loved before.
Technology is not the enemy, CO2 is the enemy. I continue to advocate that people should buy the car with the lowest lifecycle emissions that meets their needs and budget. One of my favorite sites that allows people to make that assessment is MIT's, https://www.carboncounter.com/#!/explore . I also continue to believe that incentives or emission targets/regulation should be based on lifecycle emissions not mandating percentage of one technology over another.
I live in NM and have owned a Toyota RAV4 Prime, a plug-in hybrid, for over 2 years and I love it. My personal best is getting 2200 miles on a single tank of gas, i.e., 11 gallons. I bought it when it was still eligible for the $7500 tax credit.
Transitions take time. 20 years ago the Prius was the car that evoked a lot of emotion on both sides of the issue. Today, hybrids are common and have become accepted and seem to be the hot ticket in the U.S., https://www.reuters.com/business/autos-transportation/toyota-outshine-rivals-more-consumers-opt-hybrids-amid-ev-slowdown-2024-02-02/ .
Automobiles make up less than 10% of all emissions that are “killing” our planet. Transportation of goods and manufacturing create much much more — fingers in ears, “la la la la la, I can’t hear you.”
To the autos…
Road wear, tire wear, hilly/mountainous terrain, towing capabilities, lack of rural charging stations, ambient temperatures below freezing (32*F) — there is not an honest assessment of EVs out there. Everyone’s got an agenda, attempting to benefit from their own or paid-for “research.”
I’m all for change when the country has the infrastructure to support it, when car manufacturers/dealers aren’t fleecing nearly every customer they can, when citizens can afford it and when the change is not off the backs of the mid and lower class citizens.
Price will always be an issue if input costs continue to rise and as companies focus on shareholders over customers. This isn’t an automotive contagion, it’s universal. Incomes may have increased and inflation (a sum of it’s metrics year over year) may have slowed but the greed is still rampant.
EVs may be only a few years away from price parity with ICE vehicles bit that would be because American’s are forced to buy vehicles with more “safety for the sake of spying”, “convenience” and “luxury” items in the NOW lowest trim vehicles. Let’s not forget manufacturers are completely nixing base models from their lineups.
Forcing change for the sake of change and lying about it’s overall impacts to humanity while protecting industries that pollute more than fleets of gas-burning cars is disingenuous, dangerous and deceitful.
“You will be poor and own nothing” seems pretty close when you throw the taxes in on top.
So, if we have to rely on high import tariffs to remain competitive with the Chinese and large subsidies (which we don’t give for gas powered cars), then how can you suggest with confidence that EV’s will reach price parody with gas powered cars? If we’re being honest about the Cost of the vehicle, we should be talking about the actual cost of building the car, not the tax payer subsidized cost. Also, you talk about dependence on foreign oil, but we are no longer dependent on foreign oil or Nat gas. In fact, we (US) are the largest producer of both oil and Nat gas. We could make an actual difference to the environment if we converted our vehicle fleet to hybrids burning natural gas instead of gasoline.
Just returned from a trip to England, and saw a lot of hybrids and fully electric. I also saw the gas price of 1.50 GBP per liter, which is roughly $6.75 per gallon, double the US (New England) average price, hence double the "stick" incentive. Also, I'm a plug-in owner (Toyota RAV4 Prime) for 2.5 years now and I love it, it's much more satisfying in every way to drive. I get ~40 electric miles in winter and ~60 in summer, and charging at home is half the price of gas. I recognize the difficultly for many (esp. renters) in charging at home. But I also think that the US tax incentive system is so poorly designed that it's obvious to anyone making a regular paycheck that it's another tax giveaway to the well-off. You have to OWE $7500 in taxes at year-end in order to get a credit of $7500. For me, a retiree, that meant withdrawing $40,000 from my IRA and dump it in checking/savings just to owe $7500. Just back-of-cocktail napkin math: for a married couple to owe $7500 in fed income tax, your income has to be $75k beyond the standard deduction of $30k, or $105,000. No wonder we're worried about opening the domestic market to China (10k to 15k small electrics)! It's like the second coming of VW bugs and Toyota Coronas! (We're not worried about these small foreign imports, GM said at the time; we know what the American buyer really wants).
Interesting survey data on American attitudes for sure! But it doesn't seem like it's such a hard market to crack: EV sales are highest in jurisdictions that give the most "carrots" - the U.S. as a whole just isn't giving out a whole lot of carrots. Future Positive Investor tackles some of the main assertions about EV adoption challenges here: https://futurepositiveinvestor.substack.com/p/evs-a-statement-or-solution
The single largest problem of EV initial is that it is mandatory. The lack of economic savvy in Washington DC is the worst part.
Great article Hannah! Thank you for sharing the public perception and dispelling myths. EVs certainly will have adoption challenges, but most new technologies do. I've been driving an EV for years and I'm looking forward to the improved air quality from replacing diesel engines with EVs. No more "rolling coal" for personal entertainment that harms us all.
Many people point to lack of charging infrastructure as a problem for EVs. But as EVs become standard, the economic incentive to build chargers will make them ubiquitous. And these chargers can be located in remote areas, charged by solar panels, eliminating the need to have liquid hydrocarbons delivered to gas stations by trucks. That alone saves primary energy resources.
Yes, many don’t have dedicated parking spots or off-street parking. Those people will need to use public chargers for the foreseeable future.
The more people we can get charging at home, like you and renters who do have dedicated parking spots, the shorter the lines at public chargers will be. I’m worried about the frustration and backlash EVs are going to receive when people are wasting hours per week to charge up. I don’t want a repeat of the 70s gas lines, after which Americans threw out Democrats.
« The amount of materials we’ll need to mine will probably go down in a low-carbon transition, even when we account for ore concentration and waste rock »
That assumption feels very short sighted. This is debatable especially with renewables. Not to say we shouldn’t strive for low carbon, but we have to acknowledge that EV’s, especially with USA’s bigger car sickness, won’t replace ICE 1:1. The amount of materials needed with 10 billion humans living with renewables if we keep the same energy consumption is undoubtedly bigger than what we mine today (you may be familiar with Kaya’s equation ?). Yes, tools and processes might get a bit better, but I do not believe in any groundbreaking progress on the mining side and also renewables efficiency (batteries may have a wider technological progression capacity).
EVs need to be small and task oriented, as you said, most people travel less than 30 miles a day, let’s produce at least an affordable low range EV small car for commuters, not some monstrous F150 electric. Then we’ll be a bit more environmentally friendly.
Then the real debate the US is not having becomes(The EU either although it might have crossed our minds) is how do we change our way of doing city planning, help people live closer to their jobs and invest massively in public transportation ? So they don’t need cars so much.
Transportation is just one of the many problems we have to solve to alleviate the climate crisis. We don’t need to do the same without fossil fuels, we need to fundamentally change our ways. It’s obvious any of the EVs produced in the US and most EVs produced in the EU don’t fit the agenda of selling less and smaller cars. 🙃
Using renewables to commit murder is still committing murder and that’s what we are selling to the people, the same with a different flavor.
I just wrote about the environmental consequences of EV batteries. It seems that many people, specifically the governments, refuse to acknowledge the depth of environmental destruction and human pain caused by mining for materials needed for EV batteries. Until new sources are tested and identified, I don’t think we can argue EVs are good for the environment.
Great blog Hannah. I'm planning a blog on the current adoption rates myself... my current view is that we're seeing a temporary cyclical downturn in an exponential EV growth curve. It's interesting what the current key barriers to adoption are. It gives me hope because historically, these pale in comparison to the barriers that other technologies (inc. the Model T Ford) surmounted in rapid fashion.
I'm not sure whether incumbent buggy whip manufacturers were in engaged in an intense lobbying effort to deny the existence of horse dung though 😂
Thanks for this breakdown of data! Anecdotally, I can say that I love driving an EV so much and the reason is something I didn't anticipate when buying it - no gears. Acceleration is smooth and powerful. Just a joy to drive!