Why are electric cars not the future
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If you take a look around, you might get a strong impression that electric vehicles are definitively the future. In fact, Tesla's skyrocketing share price briefly made Elon Musk the world's richest man, and the company reported its first profitable year since it was founded in 2003.
Municipalities are also installing charging ports and adding electric vehicles to their fleets. Further, legacy auto manufacturers like Ford and GM are pledging to scale back on gasoline-powered cars and only produce electric vehicles from as early as 2035, and direct competitors to Tesla-like Lucid are beginning to spring up.
The first electric cars appeared in the late 19th century, and electric vehicles date back even further than that. In 1899, Belgian Camille Jenatzy used an electric vehicle to break the land speed record, hitting 65 MPH. That may not sound too significant to anyone who isn't willingly driving around in a Fiat 500, but back then, breaking the 100 KM/H barrier (just over 62 MPH) was a major achievement.
But is the future really electric? Possibly not. The main driving force behind the hype has been global concern over carbon emissions and a desire to limit them before the situation gets beyond humanity's control.
That's as good a reason as any, but there are other ways of achieving these goals, and electric vehicles aren't as green as they seem in the first place.
Electric Vehicles Aren't As Clean As They Look
They are cleaner than fossil fuel-powered cars over a lifetime, of that there is no doubt. But just because your vehicle isn't releasing any emissions doesn't mean the car hasn't had any impact on the planet. 5-10% of a car's lifetime CO2 can be contributed to carbon emissions coming from the production of the vehicle itself.
Electric cars are on the higher end of the chart due to their batteries. Those batteries are also something that will need replacing, as all car parts do, should someone want to keep their car on the road and reduce its environmental impact.
To their credit, Tesla does work to either extend the life of, or recycle, all of the lithium-ion batteries used in their vehicles.
However, when the vehicle hits the road, the energy to power it has to come from somewhere. As around 60% of electricity generated in the United States comes from oil, coal and gas, fossil fuels are still effectively getting you from A to B in most cases.
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It Also Comes Down To Range
An electric car is well suited to most situations. If you're smart about charging, there isn't much chance of finding yourself stranded on the roadside halfway through your daily commute. But, there is a notable chunk of the population who struggle to keep an eye on their gas gauge, and the consequences of an empty tank aren't as severe.
If you find yourself stranded in your driveway or on the road, you can always get to a gas station, fill a can with fuel, and have enough juice to get your car to the pump and fill up properly. A flat battery on a Tesla requires a generator or a tow truck.
The Tesla will, of course, do its best to warn its driver that it needs to be charged. It will highlight local charging points that are still in range and limit its own speed to conserve energy. But you can still run one flat. People ignore fuel warning lights on standard cars and their cell phones, begging for a charge all the time.
Then there's range. Tesla managed to get over 400 miles out of some of their models, and electric rival Lucid promises to smash through the 500-mile range barrier.
Once again, that's great for everyday use (as long as you're not the electric equivalent of a quarter tank person). But it's not great for long road trips. Yes, not everyone needs to drive from New York to Florida in one blast, but those that do would probably pick five minutes filling a tank over several hours sitting in a truck stop waiting for their battery to recharge.
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What Are The Alternatives?
The two current contenders are hydrogen-fueled cars and hybrids. Hydrogen runs into similar environmental issues as electric, primarily that our current methods of extracting the gas uses a lot of energy. It's also the most expensive of the three options. This may change when hydrogen extraction methods are refined and the cars themselves become more common, but there is a long way to go yet.
Positives include the ability to refill your tank with actual gas in about the same amount of time it takes to refill your current tank with "gasoline". It's also the most abundant element in the universe, so we're unlikely to run out of it any time soon.
Then there are hybrids. A standard hybrid powertrain can be powered by petroleum and battery power, to provide you with extra range. It's a simple concept and works well. It's still not as green as an electric or hydrogen-powered vehicle, but it is better for the environment than a regular car.
You can refuel it in about five minutes, the same way you refuel your regular ride. Plug-in hybrids are also a thing, so you can enjoy the benefits of an electric vehicle but still have that gas tank get out of jail free card when you need it.
Add biofuel into the mix (which can burn up to 86% cleaner than gasoline), and not only do you have a way to make hybrids an even better choice, they make keeping current gasoline-powered cars on the road viable.
Nationwide, electric vehicles are on average 60% cleaner than gas-powered cars, which makes them less clean than both cellulosic and sugar cane ethanol biomass rides.
Electric vehicles have come a long way, but their limitations aren't shared by many other transportation methods. They are going to get better, but plenty of other vehicles could go so much further.
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Electric cars are not the future
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Think of a city you know, and try to picture it five years from now. Will its streets be full of electric cars, some of them self-driving? If so, then the current travails of electric vehicles (EVs) will have been a mere speed bump. US sales have slowed well below the governments target, EVs share of the British market has stopped growing and only 1.2 per cent of European passenger cars in 2022 were battery-powered.
We know that some vehicle is going to replace the combustion-engine car. The EU, UK, California and several other US states will ban sales of new petrol and diesel cars by 2035, with the phasing out starting much earlier. So what will most drivers shift to? Will they take up electric cars in effect, just a cleaner version of what they already had or switch modes of transport altogether? My bet is that, in cities at least, the e-car wont be the vehicle of the future. I suspect it will keep falling further behind e-bikes, e-mopeds and e-scooters.
Electric cars biggest downside is the upfront price currently 30 or 40 per cent higher than for combustion vehicles. EVs may simply be too expensive to expose to the daily vicissitudes of city streets. (The car rental agency Hertz is selling a third of its electric fleet partly because of high damage costs.)
EVs also emit more carbon over their life cycle than any form of urban transport except petrol cars. They are still worthwhile for people in sprawling suburbs, who drive long distances every day and who will earn back the emissions and the financial outlay by never buying gas again. Heavily used communal vehicles, such as buses and taxis, should go electric, too.
But an electric car doesnt make sense for individual urbanites. Few of them drive enough. European car mileage has been falling since 2000. In Britain, 57 per cent of cars are driven less than 100 miles a week, calculates the consultancy Field Dynamics. Even in the US, about half of car journeys in the busiest cities are less than three miles. Many urbanites now probably drive a car because they have a car. But if they can find a way not to pay $50,000 for an EV (or in some places, to buy just one rather than two) they will slash their cost of living.
EVs face many other obstacles. Cities are reclaiming space from cars. Paris, where I live, is holding a referendum on February 4 on a special parking tax for heavier SUVs. In a few years, mayors might start tackling self-driving cars. These are so convenient that if they ever became affordable for the mass market, almost everyone would buy one, and they would clog up cities.
Then theres the problem of charging EVs. Suburbanites with home garages can install chargers, but the lack of public chargers on city streets hasnt become a major issue yet only because so few people own EVs. (The same goes for the shortage of lithium for batteries.) Even if you find an urban charger that works, charging can take hours.
Crucially, too, most of the worlds EVs are made in China, so there wont be an aggressive western lobby easing their way. On the contrary, governments may well raise tariffs to block them rather than let China devastate yet another western industry.
For a city-dweller ditching a petrol car, the calculation then becomes: instead of an EV, can I buy a much cheaper, health-giving e-bike that I can charge in my flat, and supplement with the odd taxi ride? That is the trend. European and US car sales peaked in 2019. About 5.5 million e-bikes were sold in the EU in 2022, against just two million electric cars. Many car-owners now use bikes for short trips. E-bikes are even making the self-preserving leap tostatus symbol, with Lamborghini and Maserati producing fancy models, and Porsche developing bike motors, batteries and software.
Bikes are also becoming a cultural urban norm. I see this in Paris, where only one in three households now owns a car, and cycle paths are full even in January, something that I used to be told would never happen. Bikes move faster in Paris than cars, city halls statistics show.
Then there are all the other electrical options. Worldwide, according to Bloomberg, there are 280 million electric mopeds, scooters, motorcycles and three-wheelers compared with just 20 million passenger EVs. Looking back in five years, we may conclude that electric cars were made for American suburbia and for almost nowhere else.
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Letters in response to this article:
Analysis of Norway EVs overlooks its hydro riches/From Phillip Hawley, La Jolla, CA, US
No stopping Norways embrace of electric vehicles / From Harald N Rstvik, Professor Emeritus, Sustainable City Planning, University of Stavanger, Norway
This is Why Electric Cars will NOT be the Future!
Its easy to get the sense that electric vehicles are clearly the way of the future just by walking in the town. As a result of Teslas rapid share price rise, Elon Musk momentarily became the richest man on Earth, and the firm declared its first profitable year since its inception in 2003.
Charging stations and solar farms are also being installed by municipalities, which are also expanding their fleets of Evs. Ford and GM, as well as direct competitors to Tesla, like Lucid, are committing to phase out gasoline-powered vehicles and solely create electric vehicles from as early as 2035.
Does this mean that the future is going to be all-electric? Possibly not. Fear of carbon emissions and a desire to minimize them are the primary driving forces behind this market push. But is this enough for the switch?
However, there are alternative methods to achieve these objectives, and electric cars arent as environmentally friendly as they appear at first glance. Lets find out why EVs might not be the future of transportation.
EVs and Environment Concerns
Compared to fossil fuel-powered vehicles, they are cleaner over time. However, just because your car isnt emitting any pollutants doesnt imply that it hasnt had an influence on the environment.
CO2 emissions from automotive manufacturing account for 5% to 10% of a vehicles lifetime CO2 emissions. And here comes the problem with electric vehicles.
The batteries in electric vehicles put them at the top list affecting the environment. Like all car parts, those batteries will need to be replaced after some time if you want to keep your car on the road.
But we should mention though that Tesla had at least made an effort to either extend the life of its lithium-ion batteries or even recycle them. However, the problem doesnt stop here. Once the car is on the road, it will require some form of power source to keep it moving.
Fossil fuels still provide a reliable means of moving from point A to point B around the world. On the other hand, this is not the case with electric vehicle charging stations that many places around the world still lack.
Lower Range
Electric vehicles may be used in a range of places and conditions. As long as youre careful with your charging, you wont find yourself stuck midway through your daily route.
Its true that many people have trouble keeping an eye on their gas gauge, but the consequences of running out of petrol arent as serious as an empty battery. Its always possible to reach the nearest gas station, fill a can with gas, and have enough power to bring to your car and continue your trip.
On the other hand, a Tesla with a dead battery is a headache. It requires the use of a tow truck to move it to the nearest station or find some electricity generator to charge it.
Of course, Tesla will do everything it can to alert the driver when its time to recharge. It will also show nearby charging stations that are still within reach while reducing its speed to preserve more power.
Then theres the issue of range. Some Tesla models have a 400-mile range, and electric competitor Lucid claims to break the 500-mile threshold.
As long as youre not the person with usually long trips, thats perfect for everyday use. For extended road journeys, though, it isnt the best option.
Despite the fact that not everyone needs to travel from New York to Florida in one go, those who do would instead love to spend five minutes filling a tank than spend hours waiting for their battery to charge.
Better Alternatives?
Currently, hydrogen-powered vehicles and plug-in hybrids are the front-runners. However, there are environmental concerns with hydrogen extraction technologies compared to electric, mainly because they use a lot of energy. Maybe this is one of the reasons why we dont have more hydrogen cars.
Additionally, its the most expensive of the three choices. There is still a long way to go before hydrogen extraction technologies, and hydrogen-powered automobiles become popular.
The advantage of this technology is that you can replenish your tank with real gas (hydrogen) in approximately the same amount of time as it takes to refill your current tank with gasoline. Plus, our supply wont run out any time soon because its the most plentiful element in the universe.
Hybrids are also a possibility. A typical hybrid powertrain can be fueled by gasoline and battery power to extend your range. Its an easy-to-understand idea that actually works.
It is still more environmentally friendly than standard vehicles, but not much as all-electric or hydrogen. Fueling takes around five minutes, much like refueling your regular car.
If youre looking for a vehicle that combines the advantages of an electric car with the flexibility of a gas-powered car, plug-in hybrids are an option.
Although electric cars have gone a long way in recent years, many other modes of transportation do not have the same limits. However, they are getting better every year with new technologies, but with these limitations, I see that electric cars might have NO FUTURE!
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