General Motors recently announced that the company is “aiming to eliminate tailpipe emissions from new light vehicles by 2035.” This is a laudable goal, but it needs much more than the desire to make real progress in cleaning our country ‘s cars and lorries.
Many in the media quickly gave credit to GM for this news, but it is important to remember that aspirations are only the first (and easiest) step in any plan. As a breath, I may want to run a marathon this fall. But if all I do is browse a line of running shoes and make vague promises, I’m not going to cross a finish line. Instead, I had to take a concrete task: sign up for a race, buy the shoes, and put in some hard work with months of training runs.
So far, GM has stated their vision and made suggestions about the models they could make, but we have yet to see real examples of what it will take to replace the high-gasoline trucks with zero-emission vehicles. and their SUVs. And based on what we’ve seen from GM over the past 5 years, there is a guarantee about their promises. GM was at the forefront and center during the last U.S. presidential administration in pushing for lower fines for falling short of fuel economy standards, advocating weak emissions standards and zero-emission vehicle standards , and threatens California’s authority to protect state residents from pollution.
Early start, but slow progress on electrification
GM led other traditional manufacturers with one of the first major market plug-in cars with the introduction of the Chevrolet Volt hybrid plug-in at the end of 2010. Now ten years later, how many Chevy, GMC, Cadillac, and Buick EVs available in the US? But just one, after the Volt and other low EVs stopped.
Today’s strategy is gas power
GM’s future may be in electric vehicles, and I certainly hope they succeed by moving away from gasoline. But what are they doing now? They are trying to sell so many gasoline trucks and SUVs. For example, according to ad tracking company iSpot.tv, GM spent more than $ 6 million this month on one Chevy Silverado Trail Boss TV ad. In total, GM sold less than 21,000 electric cars in the U.S. by 2020, selling more than 2.5 million gasoline and diesel cars, trucks, and SUVs nationwide. It is good that GM wants to move into the future of electricity, but in the period between now and these proposed new models, millions of gasoline burning vehicles will be sold, ensuring more air pollution and emissions climate change across the vehicles’. Average 12-to-15-year lifespan.
GM is nowhere near the worst
While GM has a lot of work to do to get from where they are now to the zero-income vision, they are far from the worst. For example, domestic competitor Stellantis (formerly Fiat Chrysler and model maker Jeep, Dodge, and Ram) has made almost no progress on electrification and has a pre-existing leadership that eliminated chargers plug-in. Other companies are also working against EVs, such as Toyota’s support of the administration’s advance efforts to restore fuel economy and greenhouse gas regulations.
We want Automakers to show more of a vision
So what can GM do, other than the obvious step of selling electric cars at a much higher rate?
In the short term, GM could turn aspirations into action by supporting regulations that will ensure they meet their goal of 100 per cent delivery cars and trucks by 2035 and support measures to make gasoline cars to be cleaned over the next ten years.
Make no mistake, I want GM to succeed in their plans to get to zero emissions. But in the company’s second decade of making modern plug-in cars, we need to move them much faster away from high-end commitments towards filling sales and driveways. with electric cars. If we want to reduce the worst effects of climate change, we need to make that transition from gasoline to electricity as fast as possible. Companies like GM can help lead the way in achieving that, but it will go beyond knowledge and aspirations.
David Reichmuth is a senior engineer at the Union of Critical Scientists.
This article originally appeared on The Union of Concerned Scientists blog. It is used by permission.