For all the political left’s squawking about the environment and climate change, they sure don’t seem to be doing a hell of a lot to do things better.
Take the electric vehicle, for example. Sure, the concept of using electricity to power vehicles instead of fossil fuels like gas is great.
But in this age, with our current technology, it’s just not practical.
And no, I’m not just talking about how long it takes the battery to charge, the fact that EVs can’t really haul things, and that charging stations just aren’t as plentiful as gas stations.
Instead, let’s look at what they actually do to the environment they supposedly save.
As the UK’s Telegraph recently reported, in reality, EVs cause far more road damage than their gas-powered counterparts. In fact, studies show that they cause twice as much damage, creating double the amount of potholes, cracks, and other forms of road surface degradation.
How?
Well, it all comes down to weight.
As the outlet notes, EVs require heavy, not to mention expensive, batteries. These alone can weigh up to 500kg or over 1,100 lbs. Add that to the weight of the rest of the car, and you end up with vehicles that can weigh over 2,000kg or 2 tons.
Naturally, this puts more pressure or stress on the roads they travel on. As the Telegraph says, “the average electric car puts 2.24 times more stress on roads than its petrol equivalent, and 1.95 times more than diesel.” They add that larger EVs can create 2.32 times more wear on roads.
That much weight and stress cause asphalt pieces to shift quickly, leading to more cracks and potholes.
Scotland officials have noted that due to this increase, should EVs become more widespread, wear on their roads would increase by about a third, which would end up costing them an additional $207 million a year in road maintenance costs.
That means more asphalt, big construction trucks, mining, etc. And yet we are to believe that EVs are still better for the climate?
Yeah, I think not.