John Phipps: The Surprising Outcome of the Slow Switch to Electric Vehicles and Equipment

Oct 10, 2023

U.S. Farm Report 05/20/23 - Johns World

As the tiny number of electric cars trickle out into the U.S. fleet, multiple attempts have been made to compare cost of ownership and more specifically cost of maintenance for these new machines. It's hard to put much stock in these estimates – the number of battery electric vehicles (BEVs) is small, these are the earliest technology, and a couple of years is too short to approximate a car's lifetime expenses.

Luckily, we do have an entire country to act as a pilot plant for this experiment – Norway. Last year 80% of all car sales in Norway were BEVs. Norway is about the size of California with only 5.5 million people, so the government has been working hard to install charging stations to ease range anxiety.

The trickiest problem has been high-density housing like apartments where parking is already a premium, let alone parking with a charger. Gas stations like Circle K are adding high speed chargers and lucrative additional dining areas for people waiting.

Early reports are some consumer confusion on how to operate the charging kiosks, not unlike the introduction of self-serve gas pumps or self-checkout at stores. Coffee and snack sales are way up though. Their power grid shows little sign of strain as most BEV owners charge at night, prompted by cheaper electricity.

To my surprise even heavy construction machinery is beginning to be introduced, mostly for urban areas where regulations are strictest.

Even with a relatively small proportion of BEVs in their fleet, there are already some obvious, but largely unanticipated outcomes.

The biggest change has been for car dealers, as empty showrooms have far fewer ICE vehicles clearly because they won't be sold after 2025. The switch has upended the car sales rankings with Tesla, Volkswagen and now relatively inexpensive Chinese brands replacing traditional manufacturers.

Thanks to places like Norway and China, a lot of arguments about comparative advantages between the two technologies will soon be grounded in real-world data.