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THE ROAD TO ELECTRIC VEHICLES Where electric cars could help save coal
THE ROAD TO ELECTRIC VEHICLES
Where electric cars could help save coal
In states like North Dakota, giving up gasoline might not mean giving up fossil fuels
A coal car receives a load of lignite coal at BNI Coal's Center Mine. Once loaded, the car transports the coal to the adjacent Milton R. Young coal-fired power plant near Center, N.D. (Dan Koeck for The Washington Post)
By Will Englund
Yesterday at 6:53 a.m. EST
CENTER, N.D. — Disdain for electric cars runs deep in this state. In the Bakken oil fields, which have brought enormous riches to North Dakota, workers fume at them on Facebook discussion groups, calling them “worthless” or worse. The small number of drivers who do use electric vehicles — North Dakota has the fewest of any state — get “coal-rolled” out on the road, as pickup trucks pump out black exhaust in bouts of automotive spite.
Yet even in North Dakota, these zero-emission cars have an unexpected champion: the coal industry, which is seeking to shed its image as a climate change villain.
The thinking is straightforward: More electric cars would mean more of a market for the lignite coal that produces most of North Dakota’s electricity, and if a long-shot project to store carbon emissions in deep underground wells works out, it might even result in cleaner air as well.
“EVs will be soaking up electricity,” said Jason Bohrer, head of a coal trade group that has launched a statewide campaign to promote electric vehicles and charging stations along North Dakota’s vast distances. “So coal power plants, our most resilient and available power plants, can continue to be online.”
As many parts of the country attempt to shift their energy production away from fossil fuels and toward solar, wind and other renewables, what’s happening here shows how the electric car revolution might play out in parts of the country far less friendly to either clean cars or clean energy.
The automakers, which have pledged to move largely to electric vehicles over the next decade, will have to overcome cultural hurdles to convince consumers to buy them. The major social spending bill before Congress would increase the subsidy for purchases of EVs from the current $7,500 up to $12,500, if the cars are built in the United States by union labor. But in North Dakota, Wyoming, West Virginia — and in the nine other states where coal is the main fuel for electric power plants — electric cars will still rely on the combustion of ancient carbon-based deposits for their energy unless other sources of power come to the fore.
{snip}
By Will Englund
Will Englund, a former Moscow correspondent, covers energy. A winner of the Pulitzer Prize, he is the author of “March 1917: On the Brink of War and Revolution.” Twitter https://twitter.com/willenglund
Where electric cars could help save coal
In states like North Dakota, giving up gasoline might not mean giving up fossil fuels
A coal car receives a load of lignite coal at BNI Coal's Center Mine. Once loaded, the car transports the coal to the adjacent Milton R. Young coal-fired power plant near Center, N.D. (Dan Koeck for The Washington Post)
By Will Englund
Yesterday at 6:53 a.m. EST
CENTER, N.D. — Disdain for electric cars runs deep in this state. In the Bakken oil fields, which have brought enormous riches to North Dakota, workers fume at them on Facebook discussion groups, calling them “worthless” or worse. The small number of drivers who do use electric vehicles — North Dakota has the fewest of any state — get “coal-rolled” out on the road, as pickup trucks pump out black exhaust in bouts of automotive spite.
Yet even in North Dakota, these zero-emission cars have an unexpected champion: the coal industry, which is seeking to shed its image as a climate change villain.
The thinking is straightforward: More electric cars would mean more of a market for the lignite coal that produces most of North Dakota’s electricity, and if a long-shot project to store carbon emissions in deep underground wells works out, it might even result in cleaner air as well.
“EVs will be soaking up electricity,” said Jason Bohrer, head of a coal trade group that has launched a statewide campaign to promote electric vehicles and charging stations along North Dakota’s vast distances. “So coal power plants, our most resilient and available power plants, can continue to be online.”
As many parts of the country attempt to shift their energy production away from fossil fuels and toward solar, wind and other renewables, what’s happening here shows how the electric car revolution might play out in parts of the country far less friendly to either clean cars or clean energy.
The automakers, which have pledged to move largely to electric vehicles over the next decade, will have to overcome cultural hurdles to convince consumers to buy them. The major social spending bill before Congress would increase the subsidy for purchases of EVs from the current $7,500 up to $12,500, if the cars are built in the United States by union labor. But in North Dakota, Wyoming, West Virginia — and in the nine other states where coal is the main fuel for electric power plants — electric cars will still rely on the combustion of ancient carbon-based deposits for their energy unless other sources of power come to the fore.
{snip}
By Will Englund
Will Englund, a former Moscow correspondent, covers energy. A winner of the Pulitzer Prize, he is the author of “March 1917: On the Brink of War and Revolution.” Twitter https://twitter.com/willenglund