The electric car revolution has been mired in building larger and heavier vehicles, which dilutes its advantages over conventional cars.
A transition to electric car manufacturing is underway to reduce carbon emissions from transportation.
But there’s a problem, larger electric cars have more built-in carbon emissions than smaller cars, mainly because of the battery’s manufacturing process. In fact, today’s largest electric cars, such as the Hummer EV, Ford F-150 Lightning, and other electric pickup trucks from traditional American manufacturers, can emit more emissions than the most efficient gasoline-powered vehicles.
Whether powered by a gasoline engine or powered by electricity, larger vehicles require more energy to build and move. An electric pickup truck may have carbon emissions per kilometer equivalent to its internal combustion, but it may still have higher total emissions than some smaller, lighter and more efficient cars.
Of course, there aren’t many small to mid-sized cars available to buy today. Over the past decade, SUVs, pickup trucks, and off-road vehicles have become increasingly popular.
Heavier vehicles, whether gasoline or electric, have been shown to be more dangerous in the event of a crash to people outside the vehicle, including drivers of small cars and pedestrians, cyclists, and wheelchair users. Heavy vehicles hit pedestrians and other road users with more force. Large and tall vehicles in front, such as many pickup trucks, also limit the driver’s visibility.
The Hummer EV may be the clearest example of excessive excess in terms of an electric car., Its battery is so large that it uses the same amount of lithium per passenger as three small car batteries or 240 electric bike batteries, according to a recent report. It also uses about half the lithium needed to power an electric bus.
What good is an electric car that isn’t efficient?
The only certain thing about an electric car is that it is far more efficient than a car with an internal combustion engine. However, the Hummer and other similar vehicles in the pipeline are disappointing in terms of efficiency.
Building bigger and bigger cars is not sustainable for our planet. We need to electrify everything, but we also need to extract and refine less primary materials and transport them over shorter distances. Simply switching to electric so we can all run 4 tons of batteries on wheels everywhere is not the solution to global warming.
