When we first read about the goal for Sonoma County to see 138,000 new electric vehicles (EVs) replace gas-powered cars by the year 2030, we chortled in disbelief. We wondered about how realistic the Center for Climate Protection was being in its new “Beyond Combustion” white paper on the county’s goals to reduce greenhouse gas emissions by 25 percent below 1990 levels.
But then we did some imagining on how this bold public challenge might actually come to be. We quickly stopped laughing and started believing.
Imagine what our roadways, daily work commutes and power grid infrastructure will look like in just 13 short years. Most car manufacturers will stop making gas-powered cars by then. We will be sharing Highway 101 with a growing fleet of self-driven vehicles. Lithium-ion battery technology will keep improving and getting cheaper. Sonoma Clean Power will become the main source of fuel for our vehicles, maybe replacing gas stations at busy roadside locations with quick-charge EV stations. EVs will cost less than gas-powered cars in just a few years.
All new houses will be built with electric vehicle chargers and older homes will be retrofitted, some with new solar collectors that will plug directly into car chargers.
The SMART train might be competing with electric-powered high occupancy trams or pods zipping along the same right-of-way. Car-sharing will replace car ownership for many of us and the need for places to park cars will be reduced.
In this near-future scenario, we will finally have well-maintained roads because we will replace our gas tax with a VMT (vehicles miles traveled) tax.
Believing all these things are about to happen is like believing in carriages that don’t need horses. What would Henry Ford say?
The Climate Protection report acknowledges a “rapid acceleration” of EV ownership will be required to reduce greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions. “The quickest path to reducing fossil fuel combustion is to electrify everything from home heating to transportation, and use renewable energy for electricity generation,” the report concludes.
The County of Sonoma and all nine cities set a goal in 2002 to achieve a “dramatic” reduction of GHG and carbon emissions by 2030. The county and its voters created Sonoma Clean Power as a citizen-owned power utility devoted to using as much renewable energy sources as possible. Because transportation totals 65 percent of all carbon emissions, the move to electric vehicles has become the program’s top goal.
Currently there are 417,076 gas-powered passenger vehicles in the county and just 4,500 EVs. Cost incentives to purchase an EV keep improving, with $10,000 now available in rebates and tax credits per vehicle. Used EVs are now available for $7,000 to $10,000. Electric cars have fewer parts and lower maintenance costs. It is estimated the county’s 4,500 EV owners are saving $5 million in fuel costs per year.
Perhaps more important than increasing the fleet of EVs will be building a new energy grid where solar and other renewable energy can be collected in residential, commercial and public storage installations based on lithium-ion battery technology. Instead of spending money on foreign fossil fuels, county motorists will buy their energy from themselves and recirculate it through their own Sonoma Clean Power utility.
Think of your future car as the Energizer Bunny that will run your kitchen appliances and help heat your home. The horseless carriage in your driveway will soon become a solar-powered, self-driven computer on wheels.
Almost none of us is too old to imagine that our next car will be electric. It is predicted that heavier commercial and agricultural fleets will continue to be gas-powered for years to come while our passenger fleet converts to zero carbon emissions.
Right now, the local Center for Climate Protection is below its goals and carbon emissions over Sonoma County are increasing, not decreasing. That means it’s time for more of us to start plugging in.
