By Jo Nova
History shall record the ignominious boom and bust of a car genre forced on citizens so they could produce better weather.
Things are so bad, Joe Biden has even put the brakes on his aggressive EV scheme, stepping away from the 2030 deadline. “It’s just a delay” of course. The plan would have forced car manufacturers to sell 3 EV’s for every 2 cars with a combustion engine by 2030. If customers didn’t volunteer to buy enough EV’s, companies would be forced to jack up prices of the cars everyone wants in order to cross-subsidize the discounted sales of the unpopular EV’s. Car dealers were appalled and said so.
EV sales growing in some places but falling in others. The shift has been so fast the full length of the supply chain is in turmoil. The price of lithium has fallen 90% from it’s peak, nickel has halved. Ford has sacked 1,400 people. GM has cut its workforce by 1,000. Hertz is selling one third of it’s electric fleet and cancelling $3 billion dollars worth of forward orders. A month ago, the biggest political party in the EU decided it would rather drop the ban on petrol and diesel cars.
Meanwhile EV drivers in China are learning the same awful lessons the US learned a month ago. EV batteries don’t go as far during freezing cold weather and are extremely hard to charge. During the Lunar New Year holiday Chinese drivers have been forced to push their EV’s for miles in the snow, while traffic jams formed at charging stations. Drivers were so desperate they lit fires on roads to stay warm, rather than use their car heaters and drain the battery. EV’s were banned from the Hainan Ferry due to the fire risk. It must have been sudden. Some Chinese EV manufacturers offered to help rescue cars, but it will take weeks to ship the cars back to owners.
China has placed big bets on EV demand. It would get burnt badly if the West wakes up:
Biden’s lofty EV requirements might not survive the election year
Nora Neughton Business Insider
The Biden administration is poised to dump controversial rule that would require Americans to buy more electric cars sooner,…
America’s EV boom goes bust!
Lithium and nickel producers begin mass layoffs and pause multi-billion-dollar projects as US says no to electric car push
Daily Mail
…as interest in EVs has slipped, lithium and nickel facilities – metals used in lithium-ion batteries for electric vehicles – are taking cost-cutting measures including mass layoffs and suspending operations.
The demand for electric vehicles surged in 2022, rising by 76 percent in April of that year, but by the end of 2023, the number of vehicles sold dropped to just 50 percent.
The price of lithium has fallen 85% from the peak:
[Credendo]: According to the US Geological Survey (USGS), in 2022, batteries dominated the global end-use markets, absorbing 74% of the global lithium production. Indeed, the main driver behind lithium demand is the global transition towards a greener economy.
Global lithium production has doubled in the last six years, but even fans of the green revolution admit that the fall in lithium prices is largely due to the lack of demand because of the unexpected fall in EV orders. According to the USGS batteries used three quarters of the global lithium production.
The same pattern is happening in Germany — From NoTricksZone:
Blackout News here reports how German software giant SAP “no longer wants to use Tesla electric cars as company cars in future.” and is “removing the electric car manufacturer from its list of suppliers”.
Cuts at German Ford plant
In another article, Blackout News reports that Ford is cutting 3500 of 4500 jobs at its Saarloius, Germany plant, citing a “restructuring program.” Deindustrialization is accelerating in Germany.
Production slowdown at Opel
German car manufacturer Opel has announced reduced work-hours at its Eisenach plant “due to low demand” as a “direct response to falling demand for the Opel Grandland SUV, which is offered in variants including an innovative plug-in hybrid.”
Even as Chinese EV companies have aggresssive expansion plans, bad news is popping up:
Long Charging Lines, Snow Stymie EV Drivers in China New Yearhttps://t.co/eyBFMpu0mA
— Marc Morano (@ClimateDepot) February 20, 2024
Long Charging Lines, Snow Stymie EV Drivers in China New Year
Long waits at highway charging stations, rapid battery depletion in freezing snow and limits on electric vehicles on car ferries because of safety fears have combined to make the Lunar New Year holiday a frustrating experience for China’s growing number of EV drivers.
In central Hubei province, some drivers were forced to push their EVs for miles after heavy snow and freezing rain closed roads, and their batteries — which lose charge faster in cold weather — ran out of juice. According to local media reports, some even resorted to building fires on the road to keep warm because they were concerned using the car’s heater would deplete the battery even faster.
On the tropical island of Hainan — one of China’s most popular tourist spots — the local government restricted the number of EVs and plug-in hybrids on car ferries because of fears of fire or explosions, stranding thousands of cars.
Meanwhile with uncanny timing, the Australian Labor government are aiming to copy the US policies we already know have failed, just as Joe Biden backs away from them:
Labor will press ahead with vehicle emission cuts based on US standards, despite reports the Biden administration is trimming the scale of its own electric vehicle ambitions, amid a growing political clash over the cost of popular utes and SUVs.
Reuters on Monday matched the story, noting the US Environmental Protection Agency in April 2023 proposed requiring a 56 per cent reduction in new vehicle emissions by 2032. Under the initial EPA proposal covering 2027-2032, car makers were expected to aim for EVs to constitute 60 per cent of their new vehicle production by 2030. EVs now make up about 7 per cent of the US car fleet.
The Australian opposition will take that electoral gift and run with it:
Opposition Leader Peter Dutton, campaigning in Victoria ahead of next month’s byelection, accused Prime Minister Anthony Albanese of “proposing a great big new car and ute tax, which is going to drive up the cost of a HiLux or a Ranger by somewhere between $10,000 and $15,000”.
Car crash photo by Alexa from Pixabay
Australian flag by Phillip Barrington