The Big Picture on Electric Vehicles
Fewer Vehicles and Driving Fewer Miles Needs to Be Our Future
The world is rapidly moving toward electric mobility — bikes, scooters, cars, buses, and trucks. New rules proposed by the Federal Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) for more rigorous tailpipe pollution reduction means that within 10 years, two-thirds of all new cars, half of new commercial vehicles, and up to a third of new 18-wheelers could be electric. California has set new standards that require manufacturers to sell an increasing number of zero-emission freight trucks and buses.
These moves are momentous in tackling the 28 percent of total U.S. climate pollution that comes from transportation. The truck and bus component represents about one-tenth of all U.S. vehicle traffic but accounts for more than half the sector’s air pollution.
A word of caution, however. The fossil-fuel industry, in spite of its public statements supporting clean energy and its massive spending on messaging, sends more lobbyists than any country to every national or international meeting on climate for the purpose of slowing or disrupting progress toward a cleaner energy future. Moreover, it collects $5.2 trillion in subsidies annually (6.5 percent of global GDP) and continues to develop every opportunity to extract more fossil fuel.
