President Joe Biden’s executive orders reinserting the United States into the global effort to slow global warming naturally produced opposition from fossil fuel industries and their advocates in Congress.
But Thursday, General Motors demonstrated why Biden’s initiative makes sense not just environmentally, but in the marketplace.
GM CEO Mary Barra, who only a few years ago embraced the Trump administration’s efforts to roll back mileage standards and otherwise promote fossil fuels, announced that GM will make only electrically powered vehicles, about 30 different models, by 2035.
It’s not just a political position. GM will invest $27 billion in the project by 2025, including retooling factories to produce electric vehicles and battery research and development with LG Chem, a major battery producer based in South Korea.
Before GM’s announcement, other major manufacturers around the world, including Ford and major producers throughout Europe and Asia, had announced more than $100 billion in electric vehicle investments over the next decade.
Tesla, the largest producer of electric cars with 17% market share, delivered 499,550 vehicles in 2020. And the International Energy Agency projects that the global number of battery-powered and hybrid vehicles could increase from just over 5 million to nearly 140 million by 2030.
Vehicles account for 28% of global greenhouse gas emissions. It’s clear from existing trends that Biden’s initiative is a case of the government catching up to the market rather than bending the market to the government’s will.
— The Citizens’ Voice, Wilkes-Barre/TNS
