The worst and most stupid bit is this:
Speaking to crowds on Wednesday, vice president JD Vance said US allies are “suffering from this, frankly, more than we are.”
He claimed this was because they had “focused on a lot of green energy scams and they’re hurting a lot more than we are.”
Vance continued:"As much as we’ve got to focus on getting these gas prices down, the reality is overseas they’re feeling it far worse than we did because we’ve taken the steps to protect our energy economy.
Apparently an average fuel tank can hold somewhere between 40 and 80 litres. So, that’s up to (0.75 * 80 = 60) 60 kg of fuel, which can supply 2.74 GJ of energy. If you wanted 2.74 GJ of batteries in your car, it would weigh about 4000 kg. That’s double the weight of an F150, or basically the weight of a F350, engine, fuel tank, wheels, etc. included.
Now, of course, nobody puts that much battery capacity into a car or truck.
The point is, it’s not an apples to oranges comparison when you talk about the energy efficiency of an EV vs. a ICE car. ICE cars are inefficient, but carry around a very energy dense fuel source and can go hundreds, sometimes thousands of km without needing to stop. EVs have much more efficient engines, but have to drag around really heavy batteries that aren’t very energy dense. Their range is very constrained because if you wanted to match the range of an ICE car you’d have to almost double the weight of the car in batteries alone.
Personally, I like mass transit and bikes. But, if I had to own a car I’d get an electric one. Still, I know that the major drawback to electric cars is that battery energy density sucks compared to gasoline.
Energy efficiency does matter because even if you are burning diesel to generate electricity, you can make power stations a lot more efficient than car engines. So shifting from ICE cars to EVs would reduce fuel use even in the absence of green electricity.
This is true, but like I said, the difference isn’t huge. An ICE car’s fuel + engine would be in the 100 - 400kg range, while an EV’s batteries + motor would be in the 200 - 500kg range. An additional 10% or so of weight is bad, but is outweighed by the at least fourfold increase in efficiency.
‘Contain’, not ‘can supply’ 2.74 GJ of energy. At 20% efficiency, you’d need a 800kg battery to match.