THE BIG EV LIE. Why They Won't Save the Planet & All About Dirty Electricity | TheCarGuys.tv

you've all been wanting me to produce an episode about evs and in truth it has taken much longer than i expected if you're expecting me to spend the next 26 minutes slagging off electric cars then you may be disappointed but don't worry there's plenty of ranting to do and there's an awful lot to say i should stress of course that i'm not a scientist i do not have a team of researchers and everything i'm going to talk about is based on my own findings from credible sources when i started researching my eevee episode it was going to focus on all the ways that electric vehicles are worse than petrol cars range anxiety the cost of electric cars versus petrol environmental impact the lack of infrastructure etc etc and i guess that's what you all want me to rant about as well mainly because it's an easy target and also because you know you won't face the backlash from the eevee evangelists i will the environmental argument assumes that changing petrol and diesel cars to electric will help save the planet and that's why it's so important but it won't pretty quickly i realized i was missing the big picture and it seems most people and indeed governments are too though in the latter's case deliberately so so here's the big statement for this episode the whole move to electric vehicles will make no meaningful difference to global warming and the reduction of greenhouse gases if you don't address the main causes and right now we're not and if we don't stop the largest nations on earth increasing their share of greenhouse gases the planet dies anyway converting all cars to evs will give us what a few more months of life on earth not even that do i have your attention now good welcome to the car guys i appreciate it's a more serious episode than usual but i still hope you enjoy it [Music] quick definition check when it comes to global warming and climate change they are not the same thing global warming is what humankind through industrialization is doing to the planet to increase greenhouse gases and increase global temperatures climate change includes global warming but it also includes all the natural reasons for global temperature variation including cyclical ocean patterns like el nino and la nina volcanic activity changes to earth orbit and the sun's energy output remember the earth has been cooling and heating for millions of years before humans now before i get inside the car guys studio and for those of you who don't seem to be able to get through five or six minutes of our episodes without making a comment here's a quick primer on what i'm going to cover this week and i'll also add chapter markers so you can skip to the various parts of this episode one why evs are not the answer to global warming number two major causes of greenhouse gases and the countries producing them number three why do cars seem to get all the attention number four where does your electricity actually come from and number five what are the answers or solutions so lots to talk about i'm going to get inside in the warm and i hope you stick around first of all when it comes to electric vehicles or evs as they're known i should make it clear that i have no stake in this i'm not an ev evangelist i don't hold any stock and i don't care about them one way or the other i'm pretty sure you can all see that i'm a petrol head which is of course a non-threatening historic term not a statement of activism i'm happy to admit that i love petrol-powered vehicles i like the way they sound smell and accelerate they have soul character they empower us liberate us and they have for over 120 years they are fantastic and if you're a regular viewer of this channel you will also know that i'm not that bothered about joining clubs or being part of trendy causes or saying the right things just because it's the zeitgeist i could talk about how certain companies are preying on your own eco consciences to pay top dollar for poor build quality zero accountability and potentially wildly dangerous software but by the same token i could also mention incredible performance super cool technology and the possibility of being picked up by your own car when you're drunk that sounds pretty good to me in truth i don't really have a problem with evs if you want one that's fine by me and let's face it they have lots of amazing tech in them that makes life and driving easier i understand that many of you are buying evs for purely economic reasons they make sense for your lifestyle and because of a combination of subsidies lack of congestion charges and cheaper home electricity they are more cost effective to run than a regular car at the moment if i had that kind of lifestyle who knows even i might have one i also agree that if internal combustion engine cars are replaced with evs in dense cities that this will have a positive effect on air quality particularly in developing nations no question that makes sense in the same way that banning smoking on flights is a no-brainer so i'm not anti-ev yes i own lots of petrol cars and i want to continue to use them but i am pro-choice if you want to get one go for it but if you don't you shouldn't be forced into them either what i have a major problem with is how evs are being touted as the savior of the planet spoiler alert they're not i have a problem that governments are ignoring the real causes of global warming in favor of easy vote winning car bashing i do have a problem with banning internal combustion engine cars rather than allowing it to be a personal choice especially when any look at the data will show that they are not the problem and will make negligible difference to global warming and i also take great issue with that special kind of eevee evangelist who thinks that they are saintly righteous planet savers and petrol car owners should be vilified abused and censored in all but a few countries if you have an ev you are still using fossil fuels and spoiling the planet so take that smug look off your face that is the big ev lie and this week we're going to explore it in detail we are all being pushed towards electric cars and we are being told that this is to reduce co2 emissions and save baby koalas i'll go into how electricity is generated a little bit later but for now it's important to clarify that unless you live in a tiny number of countries like for example norway iceland and brazil the electricity for your car comes largely from fossil fuels that is unlikely to change especially if we're all forced into evs in the next 10 years there is simply not enough clean electricity to cope with demand and many countries do not and will not have the natural infrastructure to allow it to happen all the countries that generate over 90 percent of clean energy are defined by a small number of distinct factors they have a small population or are small geographically have abundant natural resources eg geothermal or have a mix of the above plus nuclear so that's large fast flowing rivers the ability to dam them lots of sunlight wind etc so for all other countries in the world the source of that electricity that you think is the answer to reducing our consumption of fossil fuels comes from fossil fuels and ev take up right now worldwide is nine percent of vehicle registrations imagine how much energy would need if governments get their way and force us all into them and where do you think that's all going to come from given that we can hardly cope now in terms of evs themselves as many smart people already know during manufacture they generate a huge amount of environmental damage mining for cobalt nickel and lithium and all the other materials required and there's not enough natural resources of those materials to make all the evs of the future and let's not forget the human rights abuses employed to mine all the material in areas of the world that you don't like to talk about at parties like the democratic republic of congo where batteries account for 60 percent of cobalt mined hard to feel virtuous about your new electric car when it was made with slave labor and questionable safety practices and if you keep replacing them every few years say on a lease agreement which is the most popular way of funding an ev right now you are making the problem worse not better but at least those new batteries are fully recyclable right oh if you really cared about the planet you would buy an older efficient reliable petrol car that's more than five years old and run it until it physically dies voila the smallest carbon footprint for a car just a shame that misguided political initiatives like cars scrappage schemes have robbed us all of those cars eh but let's assume you can build ethical volume electric cars by 2030 that will offer high range quick charging a lightweight and don't cover people in acid when they crash the simple fact is that will still make a negligible difference to combating global warming why because cars are a tiny part of the global problem yet they seem to get all the press attention and legislation there are far greater issues that if addressed would make a difference and far greater countries than the uk or even europe that are the main culprits and if we don't fix those we're all doomed regardless prior to the pandemic the world produced 51 gigatonnes of greenhouse gases a year in 2020 that decreased to 31 gigatonnes reflecting the reduction in commerce industry and worldwide travel a gigaton is one billion metric tons or 2.2 trillion pounds that's nine zeros so that's 31 billion tons of greenhouse gases in a quiet year 51 billion in for example 2019 a typical early 21st century year on earth and you'll note i'm not just talking about the uk where i'm from this is a global problem and the uk is well it's a bit small in fact the uk's total emissions in a year is 0.46 of a gigaton so what are the headline sources of global greenhouse gas emissions well number one is agriculture and forestry 33.2 the power industry 27.4 transport 16.2 other industrial 15.7 percent and buildings 7.6 percent so surprise surprise despite all the political focus resources and legislation levied at cars the biggest generators of global emissions is in fact industry accounting for 43.1 percent followed by agriculture and forestry at 33.2 transport including all forms of road sea and air is 16.2 percent of the global problem given the scaremongering in the press i bet you thought it would be more than that didn't you included in that 16.2 percent or 8.2 gigatons for the global transport category is hgvs vans buses trains domestic and international shipping aviation and not forgetting cars and if we chop out road cars specifically from the transport category they account for 45 or 3.6 gigatons and yet we've had draconian laws to ban internal combustion cars added congestion zones to our cities and lots of new transport taxes for cars as well so what's being done about the other 47.4 gigatons or 93 of the world problem in the uk the transport category accounts for 24 of greenhouse gases but that's only because we have very little industry and agriculture compared to other countries and we also have a drastically reduced number of power stations and increased reliance on gas which is piped in and so the greenhouse gases are produced elsewhere in the world all this means is that the energy supply figure is far smaller and pushes up the transport percentage compared to the global figures that's why it's important to look beyond one country and at the global picture that's the split of the global greenhouse gases by category dealt with now let's look at it by country and see which ones are most responsible and when it comes to global greenhouse gas emissions there's only one place to start china china currently has a 1058 coal-powered power stations and is building over 350 more according to the latest edgar greenhouse gases total emissions by country study of the 51 gigatonnes of greenhouse gases generated in 2018 pre-pandemic 13.7 gigatons was china alone which in 2020 was 32.5 of all of the earth's greenhouse gases the usa was 12.6 india 6.7 and russia was 4.7 so the top four greenhouse gas producing single countries equate to 56 of the global problem 56. europe incidentally contributes 7.3 percent so that's 27 countries contributing just over the amount of india so now you can see quite clearly that if we don't do something about those countries there is no point focusing on small gains in small countries who cares if europe hits its paris agreement targets when china has just grown its emissions by 250 percent since 1990 but even that's not the entire story because there are in fact two big mitigating factors for china number one it has a large population 1.4 billion and number two it already has and is growing its green energy far beyond many other countries so 0.1 means that you would expect china's emissions to be high because it has so many people america's emissions are half that of china's but it has less than a quarter of the population if you look at the emissions per capita i.e the size of population china is 51st with 9.7 tons per person qatar is number one with a staggering 66.2 tonnes per person australia is at number 10 canada at 15 usa at 19 and the uk at 68. bear in mind that china also produces 30 percent of the world's goods including a vast amount of the pointless western plastic items which means it shoulders the greenhouse gas burden of manufacturer whilst the country's buying the goods get away scot-free and in terms of 0.2 although china has more coal-powered power stations than anyone else and is busy burning through the world's coal reserves at the same time it is investing heavily in renewables so that it can be self-sufficient far more quickly than many other nations china is the largest manufacturer of solar panels and technology it's commissioned 48 new nuclear power stations since the year 2000 and it has 51 in total it has two massive hydropower projects at three gorges and the z ludu it now imports far more gas than coal gas has a lower carbon footprint and this has taken china's annual total renewable energy to over 30 percent in the last 20 years so there is every chance that china a country that is easy to demonize because of its energy consumption and emissions may actually become greener than all the other larger western nations far more quickly because the infrastructure is there and it's growing fast whereas in the west not so much this is a hot topic and it really goes to the core of the eevee argument and exposes the hypocrisy spouted by many seeking to demonize petrol there's no point moving to ev if the electricity that you use is dirtier than petrol and will actually become more expensive many ev owners believe they are participating in a utopian rose-tinted garden of eden style vision of the future where they are helping save the planet and that their energy is free and plentiful and that makes them better than you i loathe these people and it's important to see how deluded they are because of two very obvious factors number one where our electricity comes from and number two the current lack of tax on electricity and the certainty that it will increase significantly as petrol revenues decline as mentioned before and as seen here in this map of the world only a relatively small number of countries can claim to have anything even approaching low carbon energy it's basically brazil canada scandinavia france greenland new zealand the middle of africa and iceland depending on the country you are living in typically between 30 and 80 percent of your electricity is coming from gas and coal so if you're charging your ev you're actually burning fossil fuels to do so ev charging points also do not prioritize green electricity to power them it comes from the same mix as the plugs in your house we're all in agreement that coal and gas powered power stations need to go if we to reduce global carbon emissions and improve air pollution but currently in the uk for example they still provide 50 of the electricity gas in particular is a major source of energy anxiety because its cost is controlled by another country who can increase it at will the reason this is a problem for countries like the uk and a lot of europe is because nuclear power is in decline and in terms of global warming that is seriously stupid because nuclear is one of the safest ways to generate energy and it generates the least greenhouse gas emissions even less than wind and solar if you were serious about saving the planet you would all be protesting to build as many nuclear power stations as possible like china's doing in fact unfortunately the short-sighted ignorant anti-nuclear protesters have been successful in reversing many nuclear power programs most notably in france germany but also the uk and how about this for a up fact if we shut down all the nuclear power plants on earth we would actually emit an additional 2.5 gigatons of greenhouse gases why because you would need additional fossil fuel power sources to balance out the remaining solar and wind what about those green saviors then solar and wind certainly the uk is betting big on those mainly because our politicians have little understanding of what they're doing the biggest thing to consider with wind and solar is that they're both dependent on the weather so by definition they are not dependable at all if it stops being windy or sunny but yet you still need to turn the lights on in your house what do you do in theory wind solar and hydro power are the ideal solutions for clean energy particularly hydro power but as i've discussed earlier in this episode unless you are a small country or one with specific and natural features or climates they cannot provide a nation's entire energy requirements look at the uk it's almost always raining and cloudy and not always windy there are also other downsides of proliferating a nation with those oh-so-virtuous wind and solar farms such as you need a vast amount of land to be cleared killing everything there before they kill vast numbers of birds bats and other animals you need enormous resources like cement and concrete to build them solar panels are not recyclable or long lasting wind generator blades are not recyclable or long lasting so you cannot generate enough reliable energy with them to supply our needs especially if electricity demand soars like if for example we all buy electric vehicles so in summary then when it comes to where our electricity comes from to power all those evs there are no clean hands many of these so-called green energy sources are not as green as you think nuclear is actually not as bad as we've been told all these years and we definitely need to reduce our reliance on gas as we have done with coal make no mistake we are in an energy crisis with rising costs and the real prospect of shortages the move to evs at this precise time seems like a luxury we cannot afford especially since cars as we've shown are not really the problem to be focused on simple really they're an easy target we see cars every day so the majority of people can imagine the cumulative real world effect if we're told they're all evil we are used to replacing them so it's not a big step to think of replacing them with an ev we are used to them costing a lot of money so all those taxes are essentially already accounted for which means governments get away with increasing them incrementally and adding new ones the main causes of global warming are not in our backyard so we ignore them the main causes are largely unfathomable and so huge that our brains cannot comprehend how to deal with them and car drivers are not militant and so largely accept being bullied around without taking obstructive action unlike say climate change activists remember when diesel was meant to be a good idea we were all legislated and pushed into diesel vehicles in the 90s and 2000s with the promise of better fuel economy which meant we were using less fossil fuels what a complete lie that turned out to be we now know that diesels are far more harmful to the environment air quality and us than petrol cars and now we're all being told to get rid of them that they're evil who would want a diesel the biggest car you turn and lie in recent history i can't help but wonder if this is the dark future of evs when we all suddenly realize the true cost of making them running them on fossil fuel-based electricity and then of course trying to dispose of them like wind generator blades are evs all destined to be quietly buried in landfills will the downsides of evs be constantly downplayed until there's a replacement and then suddenly it'll be revealed that we were all fooled for years so we're almost at the end of this episode what have we learned and what can we do to help fix the problem well the answer for all of us is to force our elected officials and governments to focus on the real issues of global warming and to not try and modify us with climate window dressing the causes of global warming are enormous global and will require a fundamental change to our society and the way we've been living did you realize for example that this month royal caribbean international launched the largest cruise liner in history the wonder of the seas the greatest single polluting device on the planet this kind of climate hypocrisy has got to stop but it has very little if anything to do with cars which have been a humankind changing force for good and advancement cars and personal mobility is a fundamentally positive force in the world and it's time we all realized it and got behind them so in conclusion here are some possible solutions that we should embrace and look at with an open mind and a global long-term view number one stop demonizing car and van drivers most people cannot afford evs or don't have the ability to charge them at home so stop saying they are evil and work the problem instead of blockading motorways and ironically causing greater greenhouse gases focus on governments and not hard-working people number two evs need green electricity or it's pointless if you want enough electricity for people to charge evs then we need to massively increase clean energy production for countries without natural advantages it's the only way to generate enough green electricity before we crack fusion number three focus on nuclear expansion reverse the current trend for mothballing nuclear power plants and like china begin mass production of new nuclear power plants also increase significantly r d for the universe's most abundant free green energy source hydrogen instead of betting everything on batteries number four except that zero emissions is impossible for mankind to continue and evolve some global warming is necessary for mankind's development and is acceptable but if we reduce the majority of it the planet will recover number five stop protesting and actually get to work making a difference where is the worldwide concern to help countries like india swap coal-powered power stations into nuclear why aren't we helping countries of the world who are currently chopping down forests like in brazil and ivory coast after all that will make the biggest difference to global warming number six focus legislation on things that really make a big difference to global warming freight transport cruise liners industry buildings deep sea dredging deforestation removing coal powered power stations in favor of nuclear and lastly bring an end to pointless consumerism and fast fashion so there you have it folks not quite the eevee episode that you were expecting but hopefully you've enjoyed it and hopefully you found it thought provoking i hope you enjoyed this episode don't worry after this serious direction next week and beyond it's back to supercar city thank you for watching if you like what we're doing on the car guys please subscribe leave comments and likes there'll be another episode next week [Music] you

Channel: TheCarGuys.TV

Views: 1,751,661

Keywords: Supercar, Review, Supercars, Luxury, TheCarGuys.TV, youtube, electric vehicles, tesla, greenhouse gases, climate change, global warming, climate solutions, Ionic 5, electricity, china, nuclear power stations, big EV lie, EVs, climate crisis, climate emergency, planet earth, governments, hydro power, solar power, wind power

Id: sytWLB4-W-M

Length: 26min 46sec (1606 seconds)

Published: Fri Mar 11 2022