From what this article says OPEC and the oil and the oil/gas industry in general are in for a fall (the article calls it a “death spiral”) in the next 5-15 years and the only thing that might slow it down is the western nations reluctance towards EVs although it doesn’t come out and say so
IS this some sort of "wishful thinking " ? Becuase the only way I see a real penetration of EVs in America is some sort of “cash for clunkers” plan where you tradei n your gas car and get a voucher for the EV of your choice …
Very broadly speaking, I agree: ICE manufacturers are in for a hard time, and we will see a tipping point where the slow movers get caught in a death spiral.
The timing is the big question. 5 years is too short outside of a few key areas like California. But 10 is probably when we’ll start seeing signs of real pain among those over-invested in fossil fuels.
Tesla is now the top seller in California across all brands (Toyota is #2). And Toyota in particular is in rough shape due to their useless EV offerings. Tesla won’t retain their current market share forever–but it’ll be eaten by the upstarts, not by Toyota, etc. They’re too slow and backwards to catch up now. Who the actual contenders are remains to be seen.
It’ll take longer to happen in other states, but I expect the same pattern to emerge.
I think the Saudi’s can read the writing on the wall and they’v been working on finding other avenues for revenue. I don’t know how quickly it’ll happen, but eventually OPEC will be a shadow of what they were.
To me the ones who set oil world prices are usually not the friendliest to the US and also usually filthy rich. This is a power from a foreign, and somewhat hostile, elite (usually ruling) class that is used to influence our politics to their favor through price manipulation of oil, who seems to try to sway our votes to the red side i.e. it was hard to find a gas pump without a ‘I did this’ Biden sticker placed on it pointing to the price. This gave them way too much power over our politics, but until recently we had no alternative. Now with practical EV’s we do, and I think that is a big part of the push towards EV’s and other things like heat pumps over fuel burning heating systems. It’s a way off the ‘drug’ of oil and the political support the right has had over the years from favorable oil prices (or unfavorable when the left is in power) is a part of the resistance we see from the right in switching to alternatives of oil. So in addition to climate issues I do feel there is a second elephant in the room that no one really talks about and that is national sovereignty and eliminating foreign influence in domestic politics.
There are a LOT of uses for petroleum besides personal transport. Even if EVs do become common enough in that timeframe to tank the price of oil, that’s going to make certain other uses of oil more attractive.
Plus other major players, such as Mexico and Venezuela, are not producing nearly as much as they were in past years. That will mitigate the effect on OPEC countries.
Personally I’m not sold on EVs yet, because there isn’t really a used market, and I’m not sure if there ever will be. If my experience with phones and laptops is any indication, lithium ion batteries are disposable. And that’s the bulk of what you’re paying for with an EV car.
I personally know many people who have never spent more than $5000 on a car, and never bought a new car in their lives. And they’re not a small fraction of the driving public. If ICE cars go the way of the horse and buggy, and EVs are the only legal option, I think that dooms millions of Americans to our decrepit, dangerous and often nonexistent public transportation system.
Maybe battery tech will have some major breakthroughs in the coming years. And as an electrical engineer I’m totally sold on electric motors. My problem is with the batteries, and how they don’t seem economical to maintain, refurbish or replace. If we’re setting up a world where, if you want to drive, you have to buy a new $40k vehicle every ten years, after tossing the old one in a landfill, that is not an improvement, either environmentally, economically, or in any sense at all.
That certainly seems to be where things are headed, but I think we might be viewing the future with rose colored glasses. I’m not counting on the death of OPEC, or oil in general, yet. It ain’t over until the fat lady sings.
A very important thing to remember concerning climate change, OPEC etc is that the substantial majority of us at Straight Dope have a good idea what is happening in the US, some idea of what is happening in Canada, Western Europe and other western democracies and little idea of what is happening in the third world/Global South (or whatever the current politically correct term is). Thus we are constantly reading articles about the growth of renewables–yet it turns out that every year (except for major recessions) more carbon is being dumped into the atmosphere than the previous year. So I agree the OP’s article is probably overoptimistic.
Your experience with phones and laptops is not applicable. Those devices are designed to have limited lifespan, and charge the battery to the point where they degrade only just slowly enough to last a few years. Further, they have essentially no environmental controls like heating/cooling systems.
EV batteries have much tighter controls, and have lower peak charge settings, which reduces the rate of degradation. Users can extend this even further by limiting the charge under most conditions.
Tesla batteries typically have ~90% capacity remaining after 200k miles. And the rate of degradation decreases after that, so it’ll probably have >80% capacity at 500k miles. That’s still a very drivable car (assuming the rest of it hasn’t broken down by then).
The used car market will be fine. It’s just that used EVs are expensive since there aren’t any super old ones. Once a lot more of them enter the pipeline, there will be plenty of used ones available and prices will drop.
Gasoline is roughly 45% of the output. Add other fuels that there’s also a push to get away from (40%), and the remainder (15%) is asphalt and chemical feedstocks. Refinery output is not infinitely configurable.
The number of products is high; that’s not disputed. It’s just not all that important because the percentage of oil used for them is low. And there are alternative feedstocks for them, albeit with their own impact tradeoffs.