Energy Secretary Jennifer Granholm gave a pithy response at a White House press briefing last week. A reporter asked her how the government would be responding in the wake of the recent Colonial Pipeline ransomware attack by Russian hackers.
“We obviously are ‘all in’ on making sure that we meet the president’s goals of getting to 100% clean electricity by 2035 and net-zero carbon emissions by 2050,” Granholm said.“And, you know, if you drive an electric car, this would not be affecting you, clearly.”
This response and this type of thinking are wrong for many reasons.
First, disruptions happen not just in pipelines, but in electricity grids, too. Sometimes, disruptions in one energy source disrupt another one — like in Texas, where frozen natural gas pipelines prevented gas from being supplied to generators in electric plants, which in turn caused disruptions in electricity grid supply. To imply that we’d be safe from disruptions if only we went “all in” on electric power is inaccurate.
Second, disruptions in electricity supply are as common, if not more common, than disruptions in gasoline supply. A storm or snowfall can easily cut overland power lines and cause a local blackout. No electricity means no charge for your Tesla. During an average year, the United States experiences about 150 significant incidents in electricity supply. From a reliability standpoint, it is actually good to use different sources of energy. Just imagine what would happen if your electric company’s emergency response crews drove electric trucks rather than diesel ones.
Third, the reliability of gas-powered cars stems from the fact that at current levels of technology, you can store much more energy in your gas tank than in a battery and drive farther, which is important when it comes to disruptions in energy supply. Perhaps this engineering issue will be resolved in the future — after all, battery technology is rapidly improving — but for now, gasoline is simply more reliable.
Fourth, if we all magically switched to electric cars tomorrow, we’d have a lot of different energy reliability issues. Many current grids in residential neighborhoods are designed to run fridges, TVs, and air-conditioning units — not fast-charge cars. If everyone plugged their Teslas in after coming back from work, the grid would likely not be able to cope.
British electric grid operators have to make special preparations to make sure there is no blackout when Brits turn on their kettles for tea after a soccer match. Fast-charging a Tesla draws a lot more energy than a tea kettle. Once again, this is a fixable problem, but the issue is more complicated than the energy secretary’s we’d-be-fine-if-only-everyone-went-electric quip.
Fifth, Granholm’s remark sounds a lot like “let them eat cake.” Many electric cars are still more expensive than their counterparts with internal combustion engines. Some electric vehicles’ sticker prices might balance out if you calculate lifetime cost because electricity is cheaper per mile than gasoline, but there are many caveats in this. And let us not forget that many households choose cars based on sticker price.
Sixth, and perhaps most importantly, the used car market is almost exclusively nonelectric. The number of used cars sold is two to three times higher than that of new cars. For people on tight budgets — i.e., most people — the choice is not a new Volkswagen versus a new Tesla, but rather a used car versus a new plug-in electric one. In that calculus, a used car is much, much cheaper.
In short, a diverse choice of technologies and fuels enhances energy security; it does not diminish it. And to ignore that most people still cannot afford a Tesla (average price: $40,000) or a Nissan Leaf (starting price: $31,670) ignores a crucial factor in the adoption of electric vehicles.
All this is bad energy policy and bad economics. But it’s also bad politics.
Jennifer Granholm telling people who are lined up for gas to switch to electric vehicles looks eerily reminiscent of Marie Antoinette telling people who could not afford bread they should simply eat cake.
Zilvinas Silenas is an economist and president of the Foundation for Economic Education.
