There are short term considerations and a longer term strategic one.
SHORT TERM the higher initial cost of EV needs to be made affordable through subsidy which has included - road tax, fuel taxes, car benefit tax, quota fines etc.
The price of EVs has been much higher than equivalent ICE. Subsidies were needed to attract purchasers. Prices now seem to be falling rapidly, and subsidies disappearing.
Comparing the whole life costs of EV vs ICE is not convincing - the buyer of a new car may keep it for (say) 2-4 years. If the purchase premium exceeds the savings over the ownership period the financial benefit falls away. The environmental one remains!
The problem always has been that it is mostly road users on lower incomes who've paid through various taxes to subsidise richer EV buyers who mostly could easily afford the first and second generation EVs without ANY subsidy. Given that such taxes affect the less well off far more because they are on essentials and where they have little if any surplus income, this is patently unfair.
LONG TERM transition to EV is inevitable. Best estimates are that over a lifetime they produce materially less pollution, and have performance and efficiency advantages,
Long term isn't 10 years. Long term is 30, maybe 50+ years. The current pace of change is not beneficial to most people, only those who cannot afford it and especially those with a financial stake or power in the ('green') industry
EV power could (with investment in infrastructure etc) come entirely from green sources. A virtual certainty is that fossil fuels will become increasingly scarce, expensive and remain vulnerable to international stability.
Speculation - it is likely that over time taxation of EVs will emerge to replace that lost from fuel duties. Timing and method (road charging, tax on charging etc etc) is debatable.
There's part of the problem - the taxation was 'supposed' to be to mitigate environmental degradation, and yet it's really to line the pockets of the rich and powerful and to keep the ordinary person in their place, as well as to keep the gravy train of the bureaucracy going.
RANGE anxiety is inconsequential for most. At present 80-90%+ charging is at home. Public facilities will need to evolve to provide those without home charging - note these are often urban locations where car ownership is lower.
Only at the moment. I'd estimate that 90%+ (maybe higher) of people living in flats don't have the space (never mind the money) to install chargers, assuming they have enough parking spaces for every car (which most don't).
Many people living in terraced houses do not either, and would have rely on on-road chargers or dangerous (maybe illegal) charging cables crossing public pathways, plus the security/vandalism concerns that go with such things.
Many of the rural poor will not have the money to install chargers at home, many also have old, dilapidated homes that don't have sufficient electrical supply to fit an EV charger, and also a heat pump - which (same issue with flats, also lease issues) which is also being mandated for the same time or earlier.
Notice how most of the above affect those on lower incomes, including the young, the overwhelming majority of which won't be able to afford an EV the way general car prices (and inflation) are going, never mind heat pumps for 'heating' their homes.
Many people would have to rely on public chargers, which to me sounds like a similar situation to the 1970s oil crisis and queuing for hours to get a small amount of petrol. All the while, the well off have no issue, including because they can afford are able to put PV panels on their nice big house's roof and take advantage of that and have the space for Tesla wonderwall battery backup.
If in-journey recharging is required several times a month this is clearly inconvenient. If longer journeys 2 or 3 times a year need a little bit of planning - so what!! The key is confidence that recharging facilities will be available and working when needed.
For some, e.g. retirees, maybe a small number of longer journeys per year is the case, but many people need to undertake longer journeys more often, and like I did at short / no notice.
'Planning' for such things would not always produce a good result (broken chargers, big queues, etc), and would also eat into valuable time used for other things - including when working. Business people cannot afford to take hours longer on a trip just because they need to stop for an hour or two to recharge their car. Wasted time = wasted money = less profits or passing on increased costs to customers = higher inflation.
Also, not everyone has / can afford a smart phone and high-use tariff. Why is it that all new tech forced on the public these days is only to benefit the well off? Up until the turn of the century, they benefitted everyone, including the less well off. Few if any required public subsidy to catch on, they did so organically.
Given how many parts of EVs or charging/power generation are unethically sourced and not very 'green' (when mined, made or disposed of / recycled), I'd dispute their 'green' credentials to some degree. The main benefit is less tail pipe pollution, though increased particulates from tyres, and possibly other environmental concerns from production of electricity to power them.
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