An Aug. 3 front page article in the Press Herald compared EV ownership costs to a gas-powered vehicle (“Clearing the air: Figuring out the costs of owning an electric vehicle”). Vehicle emissions impact was missing. On average, a gas-powered passenger car will emit more than four metric tons of CO2 from its tailpipe each year. EVs don’t have tailpipes. Battery manufacturing and charging will create some emissions, but those will shrink as clean-energy use continues to rise.

The global warming impact of greenhouse gas emissions from tailpipes is felt by all inhabitants of our planet. Loss of fisheries from ocean acidification, growing deadly heat waves, destructive ocean storms, more forest fires, catastrophic flooding, the list goes on. Tailpipe emissions are one of many fossil fuel contributors. When governments spend money in response to these climate events, we all pay for it.

The cost of EVs need to come down, and it will. Unfortunately, decades of political pushback against anything green slowed U.S. advancement in clean tech. U.S. companies and scientists led the early development of these technologies, but now China may reap the benefits of our innovations.

China recently announced an EV hatchback selling for less than $10,000 there. They’re filling their vast deserts with wind and solar farms to bring lower energy costs to their various industries. President Biden had to levy tariffs on incoming Chinese EVs and other clean-energy products to give American manufacturers more time to get their production volumes up and costs down. It may not be enough. The U.S. should have “owned” this market.

Chinese companies must smile when they hear, “drill, baby, drill.”

Fred Egan
York Harbor