Staying Mobile When Everyone Else Is Standing Still

A few months ago, we wrote a crisis survival report on the topic of transportation. We covered the fact that evacuation plans for major cities are worthless because traffic jams emerge almost immediately. We suggested motorcycles or bicycles as practical alternatives because they can move between jammed cars and go off-road as needed. We also mentioned other survival techniques if you happen to be in a car when a crisis strikes.

In this issue of Crisis Survival Insider, we’ll take a more in-depth look at one particular form of transportation – electric vehicles, or EVs. While EVs are a small percentage of the automobile industry today, their share is growing. More importantly, a large percentage of Americans say they are considering buying their first EV in the coming year. What are the pros and cons of having an EV? And in what ways can an EV contribute (or not) to your chances of surviving a catastrophe whether it be a natural disaster or social collapse?

There are some good reasons to consider buying an EV, but climate change is not one of them. There are two reasons for this. The first is that there is no climate crisis; it’s a hoax. The second is that EVs do nothing to improve the climate and may make it worse in some ways. You won’t hear either of those facts in legacy media or from the global elites, so some explanation may be in order.

There is no climate crisis caused by human CO₂ emissions or other human activities. The earth’s climate warmed considerably during the Medieval Warm Period (MWP) from approximately 900 AD to 1300 AD. This was the period of Viking explorations to Iceland, Greenland and Canada. There was extensive farming in Greenland in areas today buried under ice. There were no automobiles in 1300 AD.

The earth’s climate cooled considerably during the Little Ice Age, also known as the Maunder Minimum from approximately 1645 to 1715. This is the period in which the canals in Rotterdam were routinely frozen in winter and the Dutch developed their love of speed skating. At times the Thames River in London was frozen and British subjects could cross from the City to the Southbank on the ice without using bridges. Sweden attacked Denmark across the ice. There were no automobiles in 1715 AD.

The point is the climate does change, sometimes radically. The best science is that such changes are due to a complex interaction of sunspot cycles, ocean currents, and volcanic eruptions among other factors. But there’s no evidence that human-caused CO₂ emissions or methane releases are impacting the climate in material ways. In fact, a slight warming trend from 1995 to 2005 is now ending and may soon be replaced by abrupt cooling and even a new Little Ice Age. That’s a big deal and deserves more study. Still, it has nothing to do with cars.

Even if we want to blame CO2 emissions for climate change, EVs do not reduce those emissions. EVs run on batteries. Those batteries have to be charged from the electric grid. About 90% of the energy carried on the grid is produced by oil, natural gas, or uranium. Every time you charge your EV batteries, you’re adding to the CO₂ emissions needed to power the grid. The situation is even worse in China, which is the world’s largest producer of EVs and produces over 55% of its electricity with coal-burning power plants. If you picture an EV pulling a wagon full of coal for fuel like a nineteenth-century locomotive, you’re on the right track.

Of course, this does not even consider the poisonous chemicals and rare metals needed to produce the EV batteries and the electricity needed to conduct the mining operations needed to produce those inputs. So, no, your EV is not reducing pollution and is not reducing CO₂ emissions. That’s not a reason not to buy an EV, but one should avoid the virtue signaling and ideologically driven claims of the typical buyer. (We don’t have space here to explore the real reasons behind the elite climate hysteria in-depth, but they have to do with controlling how much you spend, what you can do, where you can go, and much more about your life. Climate alarmism is a hoax designed to exert political power under a veil of “saving the planet”).

With that said, why might one buy an EV? One reason is they’re fun. They run quietly and accelerate quickly. From a standing stop, you can beat any car with an internal combustion engine (ICE) off the line except for a few street-legal versions of racing cars. EVs are also lighter, have far fewer parts, and are easier to maintain than ICE vehicles. Depending on the manufacturer, they also come with an array of digital features and options including autopilots, internet connectivity, state-of-the-art dashboards, and extensive legroom. EVs are more expensive than ICE vehicles, but you get a lot for the money.

The biggest disadvantage is range. Even the best EV models can only be relied on for about 250 miles of range compared with 400 or more miles from most ICE vehicles. Manufacturers of EVs frequently claim a longer range, but that’s under optimized conditions that rarely apply in the real world. Besides, you can’t run until your batteries are dead because there might not be a charging station at the endpoint. You’ll want to charge up at around 250 miles, even if you could drive further in order not to run out of juice at an inconvenient time or place.

Charging stations are becoming more common, but they are still relatively few and far between. EV manufacturers will offer an app that produces a map of charging stations and a route finder. EV owners quickly discover that they have to adapt to a new way of traveling where charging station locations are as important as maps and directions in planning your route. A typical charge takes about 45 minutes. EV fans will tell you about “super-chargers” that can charge up your batteries in about 15 minutes. Those super-chargers exist, but there’s usually a line of two or three cars so you may have to wait 45 minutes for the 15-minute charge. Reality bites.

So, the EV pros are that they are fun, fast, and simple. The EV cons consist of cost, range, and charging. (Forget climate change – there isn’t any and EVs have nothing to do with it if there is). What does any of this have to do with crisis survival?

The answer is that an EV car or pickup truck could be a lifesaver if the power grid fails. When the power’s out, the gas pumps don’t work because they’re powered with electricity. Credit and debit card payment systems don’t work either. Your ICE vehicle is only good for one tank of gas if the power is down. In a future calamity or social disruption, a power outage may last for more than a few days. It could also last for weeks or months.

How does an EV save you if the power grid is down? Don’t you need the same grid as the gas station to charge your batteries? The answer is, no. You can build your own mini-grid with solar modules. In effect, you build your own charging station that gets its electricity from solar power. (By the way, that’s the only truly “clean” version of an EV – power comes from the sun, passes through the solar modules, is stored in batteries, and can charge the batteries on your EV. That’s clean energy end to end).

You don’t need to build a solar module array to power your entire house. That might cost $300,000 or more. But you could build a small solar module array for about $10,000 that will keep a private charging station in operation that can be used to charge up your EV. With 250 miles of range, you can scout the area, acquire food for your family, perform rescues, and do other essential tasks. That’s plenty of range to get back to your solar-powered charging station in time.

So, yes, there’s a good case for having an EV as part of a crisis management strategy. Just make sure you have a small solar module-powered charging station to go with it. In a crisis, you’ll be going mobile when everyone else is standing still.

We’ll be back next month with more analyses of what types of catastrophes to expect and specific guidance on how to prepare for and survive them. Until then, stay safe.