When Winter Storm Uri swept through Texas, the whole state shut down. Electricity was hit-or-miss for several days, with certain areas of the state (read: lower-income areas) hit the hardest. And that doesn’t bode well for introducing electric vehicles on a wider scale.
Austin, the state capitol of Texas, has spent the last two decades budgeting $650 million for electric buses and a charging facility for 187 of those vehicles. In 2022, if Austin needs to buy a vehicle, it’s going to buy an electric one. But city officials certainly didn’t plan or a winter storm to render those buses essentially inoperable because they couldn’t be charged. If there’s ever a surge in demand for power again in the future, the whole city could suffer.
Power grids across the country have been overtaxed for years. The switch to EVs will ultimately require grids to be taxed even further as a result of a more robust charging infrastructure. A multi-million dollar investment in EVs will require a multi-billion dollar investment in infrastructure to ensure the country keeps functioning.
Read the article at MSN.
