“The obvious answer to this is that it needs to be balanced better. Not frightening people away with nerdy concerns over climate change matters, but taking that to the extreme and not injecting any urgency into going electric at all is a mistake. The customer-facing side of this will have to differ from the business side.”
… being scared that life on earth can be fucked up forever and lead to human extinction is a nerdy concern? We don’t want to be a normie in that case…
I get that switching to an EV is better than a fossil fueled powered car, but shouldn’t we be focusing more on public transportation, and generally not needing a car?
I agree however it will take some time to shift from car infrastructure to multimodal design, as there is a balance that’s needs to be met for North America.
Public transit, Active transport and 3-4 storey houses should be prioritized over electric cars.
Yes, literally the ONLY solution that will impact climate change. But people prefer paying for indulgences so they can continue to sin.
That’s literally not the ONLY solution that will impact climate change, because electric cars are already measurably reducing the amount of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere.
As for “indulgences” and “sin”: Yikes. Now is not the time for medieval thinking. In 2024, nobody is paying for indulgences. Because the people who buy EVs don’t think driving is a sin, and the people who think driving is a sin don’t buy EVs.
Ah, I see you think we can buy our way out of the oncoming disaster. Good luck with that.
FYI, I’m an EV driver, you don’t need to tell me anything about ev drivers.
No, I think we can mitigate the effects of climate change with effective regulation. And part of that includes replacing ICE vehicles with EVs.
BEVs do not reduce emissions enough. That is the point. Not even close to enough. And that’s putting aside all of the physical space requirements, lack of water absorbtion, pollution, and personal injury caused by vehicles.
It’s not an overnight fix, but the fact remains that people have magical thinking and believe EVs are fixing or addressing climate change. They ARE NOT, they continue to exacerbated the issue. Being marginally better isn’t fixing or fighting anything, it just lets you feel better.
Nothing, by itself, “reduces emissions enough”.
Climate change is a multifactorial problem and it will require multipronged solutions. This includes transition to EVs, transition to solar/renewable electricity production, higher efficiency homes, higher efficiency industry/agriculture, and more.
It includes a transition away from individual transportation.
Light duty vehicles account for 57% of transportation emissions. https://www.epa.gov/greenvehicles/fast-facts-transportation-greenhouse-gas-emissions
This is the kind of take I would expect from corporations trying to maximize sales of both electric and gas vehicles. Zero interest in actually addressing climate change, just bare minimum posturing.
I tried an electric car for the environment, but I bought it for the acceleration. Best driving car I ever tried. Feels great all the time.
This, I feel like even if you don’t care about the environment, they’re still way more fun to drive. (And “fuel” is a lot cheaper when driving sporty).
I used to spend 20 a week on gas, now I spend 4 a week on electricity and it’s just so much more fun, and like you say, sporty.
