The Pros And Cons Of Ownership Of Electric Vehicles

I own an electric vehicle, I see this as a practical approach to accommodate my transportation needs. This “flannel ecology” at work, has given me many opportunities to discuss the pros and cons of ownership. The first thing I share with people is how economical ownership of an electric vehicle is and then I work my way into the topics of efficiency, environment and how it’s changed my transportation behavior. Finally, if people continue to express concern I ask a surprising challenging and personal question: Considering your transportation need, if an electric car meets 95% of your driving needs, why would you buy a vehicle to accommodate 5% of my driving? I have seen many people struggle to rationally answer this question and emotions arise. Kohak sums the emotions up perfectly, “To accept limits to our greed, to accept limits to our life, to accept death as a necessary part of life is the difficult challenge today” (2000, pg. 93).

Ethics and

I believe this is a strong driver to encourage behavior changes considering “Over 11,000 electric vehicles were sold in 2016, up 53% from 2015. (NRC, 2018). Although, this change may be shallow ecology, it’s a solution that allows people to support their existing habits with less impacts to the environment. This can also be a catalyst that can push more people towards a deep ecological mindset, as they begin to consider and adjust their driving behaviors to accommodate the limitations of an electric vehicle. By “Consider a vehicle that meets the majority of your daily driving needs, as opposed to the needs of the exceptional trip” (Anair, 2012) people can take this mindset and apply voluntary simplicity (Kohak, 2000) to other aspects of their life. The way I see it is, it takes practice to make sustainable decisions, and each one builds on the next. I believe consistent walk steps is a steady path towards