Because of the power of the oil and gas lobby, fossil fuels have dominated our lives for over a century. But it all could have been so different.
Thomas Edison was working on an alkaline battery that could power a vehicle as early as 1899. It took him a decade to perfect his invention - which never went into production - and by then Ford had released their Model T, revolutionising our conception of transport in the process. The rest, as they say, is history.
I am still sceptical that in 2023 EVs are the panacea to our climate ills many paint them as. As the thread below shows, there are still plenty of drawbacks to going electric - not least the fact that they don't help some of our current transport problems like urban space, parking and congestion.
Then, there's this kind of problem, which also doesn't go away by supposedly going greener:
And don't even get me started on this problem, which, let's be honest, has nothing to do with cyclists:
But the biggest issue of all is that even replacing all cars with EVs isn't enough to help with the climate on its own - car and battery manufacturing and the particulates that are produced through the wear of tyres and roads by vehicle use, are still major sources of carbon and pollution.
Ultimately, promotion of EVs helps take the focus away from having less cars on the road because manufacturers are keen to sell them to the public as an "easy" silver bullet solution - and thus replace the revenue they currently get from petrol and diesel vehicles.
There are no silver bullets. (I'm a software developer, so I should know.)
Comentarios