Grand Canyon Times

President Joe Biden's renewable energy agenda includes a push toward electric vehicles, despite a recent Wall Street Journal Report which says that not only are EVs more expensive, but they’re also not much cleaner than their gas-powered alternatives.

According to Bjorn Lomborg's recent commentary piece in the Wall Street Journal, EVs are not only costly, but during their lifetime, EVs emit a little less than half as much CO2 as their alternative, estimates from the International Energy Agency say. In addition, only 2 percent of Americans own EVs, according to Kelley Blue Book reports.

"In reality, electric cars are driven less than half as much, which means they’re much costlier per mile,” Lomborg wrote in the editorial. “In part this is because electric cars are often a luxury item. Two-thirds of the households in the U.S. that own one have incomes exceeding $100,000 a year.

“For 9 in 10 of electric-vehicle-owning households, it’s only a second car. They also have a gasoline-powered car—usually a bigger one, such as an SUV, pickup truck or minivan—that they use for long trips, given its longer range," Lomborg added.

Still, many Democrats, such as Sen. Mark Kelly (D-AZ), are supporters of the move to EVs. He took to Twitter in February to advocate for the Bipartisan Infrastructure bill, which includes EV infrastructure funding: "Expanding our electric vehicle charging network means cleaner travel and new good-paying jobs. Our bipartisan infrastructure law is helping us rebuild and grow Arizona’s economy." Kelly voted in June for the Inflation Reduction Act of 2022, which included a $4,000 tax credit that could be used toward electric vehicle purchases.

If 90% or more of EV owners also have a gas-powered car as their primary vehicle, as the Journal pointed out, that means only .002% of Americans solely drive electric vehicles. That means, in places like California, which is attempting to "ban gasoline-powered cars", this poses a major issue, Lomborg said.

Lomborg argued that the climate effects from EV efforts would be "trivial.”

"If every country achieved its stated ambitious electric-vehicle targets by 2030, the world would save 231 million tons of CO2 emissions. Plugging these savings into the standard United Nations Climate Panel model, that comes to a reduction of 0.0002 degree Fahrenheit by the end of the century," he wrote.

In a WSJ letter, Rae Rosen points out that, during hotter months, California residents are asked to reduce their electrical usage during certain hours of the day in addition to being constantly asked to reduce their electrical usage. Meanwhile, the state is urging its residents to buy an electric vehicle, which begs the question, "How will [they] charge all these electric cars with such a massive increase in demand for electricity?"

Biden has sets goal of 50% of all vehicle sales to be electric by 2030, according to The Guardian.

Politicians across the country are pouring hundreds of billions of dollars into EVs, despite some saying they are encouraging people to switch to EVs "for virtually no climate benefit."