cross-posted from: https://wolfballs.com/post/30313
So on my perception of the issue, in the last couple decades, EVs were thought to be a "suppressed alternative" good thing, technology that had been around for a century but which wasn't being used so that oil companies could keep making money burning fossil fuels and with countries like the U.S. fighting wars in Iraq to secure such fuels. With documentaries like "Who Killed The Electric Car?" the message seemed to be that this technology had some superior characteristics that could liberate us from being dependent on other countries for fuel (like, we could have our own solar panels to power them and could be energy independent): https://infogalactic.com/info/Who_Killed_the_Electric_Car%3F
Lately though I see conservatives arguing that EVs are bad and that lots of energy is used to create them and they frequently run on fossil fuels anyway still.
I guess my question is, could both sides be right to some extent?
I still think EVs have some positive characteristics. But how they will be rolled out will just have people unnecessarily upgrade while gas powered (ICE) cars are still ok for the time being. Plus they'll add all kinds of bad software to the designs which is unnecessary (but ICE cars also probably have some of these things, or could). So EVs still seem ok to me but it's probably how they'll be presented today that will be "problematic".
Less controversial I guess is ebikes, which are a pretty good use of EV tech for shorter distances. But a problem is batteries in general don't really seem that sustainable, although they are working on new battery designs. I guess some of the discussion is tied up waiting on technological innovations, or dependent on innovations being made.
Anyway what do you think is "really going on" with EVs?