Wow, the debate goes on & on. The issue of EVs comes up regularly on another audio forum I visit, and it's amazing the resistance I see to EVs -- every sort of cherry-picked factoid spun against the EV concept.
One amazing titbit is that some EV objectors are touting fuel cell vehicles. One even pushes the idea of
natural gas fuel cells , though most a talking about hydrogen fuel cell.
Vis-à-vis hydrogen fuels cells, for me, a non-expert, couple of qualms come to mind:
- To be "green" hydrogen must be electrolyzed with a green energy source such as wind. In this scenario, at best, hydrogen may be seen as a way to store excess renewable energy produced off peak hours. Fine, but then exactly the same may be said of EV batteries where they are charge over night at the owners' homes.
- Hydrogen to drive the fuel cells would require a new or vastly revised distribution infrastructure replacing the gasoline filling stations we see today on every other corner.
I like to see myself as a low energy, green energy, and EV advocate but feel hypocritical doing so. My family lives in a house heated with natural gas and we get around only in two ICE vehicles. We do use air conditioning extensively in summer and we get our energy exclusively from the grid. The only good news is that our electricity is generated mostly by nuclear, hydro, and after that, by wind; (see the graph below).
Sadly I don't see any easy way out of our personal fossil trap. Our furnace and AC are fairly new replacing with, say, a heat pump, would be a huge capital cost with payback like likely to exceed my limited lifespan. Regarding our ICE cars, it's similar: they both have a few years remaining in their reliable lifespans and we aren't going to replace them for the sake of "virtue signaling", (as some might say). One car might be up for replacement in 2-3 years and we shall if EV prices are much reduced.