It'll Cost the U.S. Hundreds Of Billions to Reach Its 2030 EV Goal: Report

July 11, 2023

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by Lawrence Hodge and Lalita Chemello (Jalopnik) In a scenario where 33 million EVs are on the road within the next decade, we’re going to need millions more and billions to make it happen. ... According to a recent report by Automotive News, it will cost the U.S. upwards of $127 billion dollars to supply the millions of chargers needed to support the 2030 EV deadline.

The National Renewable Energy Laboratory — a research and development center that receives federal funding and is sponsored by The Department of Energy — conducted the study, whose findings were shared by Auto News. In this scenario, the lab assumed there would be 33 million EVs on U.S. roads by 2030, along with the high hopes that public and private companies will continue to work together (financially especially) to build up this idealistic infrastructure to support that many electrified vehicles. The grand total to make this transition happen successfully ranged from $55 billion to upwards of $127 billion. And after the national debt ceiling events that transpired most recently, you have to wonder where all that money will be coming from.

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Experian says there’s about 2.4 million EVs on the road as of the first quarter of 2023, which is already a long way off from the 33 million ideally expected to be on the road by that big 2030 deadline.

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And that’s not even taking into account the maintenance or upgrades maybe needed for existing infrastructure in that time either. That, with Biden’s current goal is to get 500,000 chargers across the U.S. by 2030, and with only 148,000 actually installed at this time — when you look at the math we just laid out, nothing is really adding up, at all. READ MORE

Millions of charging ports needed to support EVs by 2030, U.S. study finds -- A cumulative public and private capital investment of $53 billion to $127 billion in charging infrastructure — including private residential charging — also would be needed by 2030, the study found. (Automotive News)

Electrifying America’s Macho Trucks Is Still Too Hard (Washington Post/Bloomberg)

China’s EV Startups Are Going Bust. That’s Good (Bloomberg)

The Electric: The EV Industry Confronts the Valley of Death (The Information)

US EV market struggles with price cuts and rising inventories (Reuters)

US government agencies target purchasing 9,500 EVs in 2023 (Reuters)

Electric cars will cost more to make, BMW warns (The Telegraph/Yahoo!)

BMW closes in on EV target but 'too soon' to call end of combustion engines (Reuters)

BMW CEO explains decision to invest in internal-combustion engines -- "We don't want to write off the combustion engine" (Auto Blog)

Excerpt from Bloomberg/Washington Post: Consider the Ford F-150 Lightning, the electric version of its marquee model. As Kevin Tynan of Bloomberg Intelligence points out, the sticker price was slightly below $40,000 when orders launched in January 2022, but that has since jumped to almost $60,000, with an average transaction price of around $85,000. Rivian Automotive Inc.’s R1T starts at about $73,000. Forthcoming electric trucks from GM and Tesla aren’t likely to be cheap, either.

Even with bigger batteries, having your vehicle do much more than just drive you from A to B can seriously cut into the advertised range. Drivers of any type of EV will be familiar with what cranking up the air conditioning for an extended period can do to how far you can go on a charge. But loading up a truck or having it tow something — ostensibly what pickups are there for — seriously limits range. In one towing test conducted by Car and Driver last summer, the Lightning, the RT1 and GM’s Hummer EV saw their regular ranges cut to about 100-140 miles, much lower than the 200-300 that seem more palatable to drivers.

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Moreover, fleet owners, along with pickup drivers who do use them to haul stuff around, value the backing of an established brand with a large maintenance network.

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As for that other hotly anticipated pickup, Tesla’s Cybertruck, it is debatable how applicable the term “pickup” really is for this vehicle. While it does sport a flatbed, its unique styling means you probably won’t see too many of them tooling around the local construction site — maybe not many period. When they arrive that is. Tesla unveiled the Cybertruck — complete with faulty “armor glass” — almost four years ago. Deliveries are scheduled to begin later this year, and they sure won’t be selling for the $40,000 figure Tesla touted back in 2019.

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This week’s sharply-worded call from an industry lobbying organization to scale back the Environmental Protection Agency’s new EV-focused tailpipe standards speak to the dilemma they face. READ MORE

Excerpt from Reuters: U.S. government agencies are targeting buying 9,500 electric vehicles in the 2023 budget year, but face supply issues and higher costs, a federal report said on Wednesday. READ MORE