This has been the reality of ICE since its existence.  In 1886, when Carl Benz patented the first automobile, life was different. It was the norm for people to wake up before dawn, do chores, tend to their livestock, and work the fields. It was backbreaking labor that relied heavily on livestock. With the invention of the automobile, much of the burden of heavy physical labor was removed from the backs of men, women, and horses. It was a leap forward from the inefficiency of using livestock to travel or plow fields. Fuel, known as “motor spirit” or “lightning oil” was just in its dawn at the time, but modernization brought us more equipment and more fuel.  The 1908 Model T got up to 21 miles per gallon.

As the oil demand increased, oil fields began to spring up, and oil companies moved to take advantage of this moneymaker. 

The car production industry did its part to produce the “gas guzzlers,” with fuel efficiency dwindling to 14 mpg in the 1930s. We were moving backward! With the 1973 oil embargo, we saw a national shortage of petrol with rationing and price gouging. It had been seven decades since the Model T, and our society had sent astronauts to the moon and invented nuclear weapons, and still, the average US car only drove 12 miles to the gallon. Don’t forget the 100 years that the oil/ gas and auto industry were knowingly poisoning the planet with leaded gasoline.

So let’s get our foot off the metaphorical brake of common sense.  Let’s move away from the inefficient, obsolete internal combustion engine. The electric vehicle is a large part of the solution.  In 2022, the efficiency of the EV engine was over ~90%. Ninety percent of the electricity you buy to charge your EV engine is used to propel your vehicle, as opposed to ~23% for gasoline and ~29% for diesel fuel.  That is an astounding leap in technology. The EV will allow us to move away from our dependence on oil companies and foreign governments. 

Can you imagine your tax dollars not going to oil companies to the tune of billions of dollars every year?  Can you imagine an energy source for our vehicles that is not polluting our air and water? With solar-powered EV charging, this can be our future. 

In August of 2022, Fed Chair, Jerome Powell said that American households and businesses can expect to experience “pain” due to inflation.  When pulling up to the gas pump, I feel the pain; especially knowing how little I am getting for my money. You can be a die-hard ICE self-described realist who doesn’t want to hear an argument about pollution, global warming, our dependence on foreign countries for oil, etc. So let’s get down to the indisputable facts. We are all spending more money at the gas station now than we did three years ago. Perhaps we should focus our attention away from ICE and move in the direction of renewable, more efficient, and cheaper energy.