Electric vehicles are taking over.. but for real, I want cleaner air, don’t you? pic.twitter.com/bKKpRXPrm2
— Teslaconomics (@Teslaconomics) September 27, 2023
Maybe. Not sure yet they are taking over. In Belgium, EV's make up perhaps 5% of the market for personal cars and that percentage is steadily rising. The trend is there, sure, but perhaps we are only seeing the higher incomes switch to EVs. When that slice of the market has made the transition, we may see a standstill or at least a pause, since purchasing power of especially the peasants (and I mean not only the peasants) is in decline and EVs aren't exactly cheap... and neither are new batteries. As for the technological and practical drawbacks: limited range and roadstress, queues at charging stations, faster degradation of batteries when fast charging, depletion of precious minerals... I don't think that's going to be a problem in the long term, since I expect graphene and solid state batteries to replace Li-ion ones by the mid-forties. When muskets and other handheld firearms were emerging, few if any thought that one day they would render the deadly longbows obsolete. But they did. I expect a similar evolution in the battle between EVs and ICE vehicles.
No, my biggest beef with EVs is that if a country becomes too reliant on electricity for ALL its needs, it risks to be almost literally paralyzed in case of war or another huge calamity. And don't say, 'that can't happen anymore': in early FEB 2022, I thought Putin was bluffing too. Consider this: in 1999 NATO bombed Serbia's power grid infrastructure with BLU-114/B graphite bombs, disabling 70 per cent. For the Serbs it was a disaster: no radio or TV, no electrical cooking, no traffic lights, no electrical trains etc... Today, not only are domestic and industrial requirements for electricity MUCH higher than in the Balkans 25 years ago (can you imagine missing the internet?), but suppose that almost all cars and trucks are EVs. If something REALLY BAD happens, the few dinosaurs who stuck to ICE vehicles will be like Ray Ferrier in War of the Worlds:
And that's why, if we do have to say ICEs using fossil fuels goodbye, I'm more sympathetic to hydrogen-fuelled vehicles. With all the bruhaha around EV's, one would tend to forget great progress is also being made in that field:
I fail to see how the increased range makes up for the downsides of hydrogen. EVs are the future for the majority of vehicles.
— 🐶 𝔼𝕒𝕣𝕝 of FrunkPuppy (@28delayslater) September 28, 2023
Hydrogen may work for specific situations but will never be common
pic.twitter.com/DmdsNOfZsu
The future will tell.
MFBB.
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