Toyota cites new facts and figures to back up its claim that a multipronged approach of blending EVs with hybrids and other green technologies will do more good in the global battle to cap carbon dioxide emissions.
TOKYO – Toyota Motor Corp. has come under fire for what critics call foot-dragging on pure electric vehicles. Now the world's biggest automaker is fighting back with its most robust retort.
The question matters as more automakers plan to ditch internal combustion and go 100 percent EV as their path to carbon neutrality. Honda, including Acura, has joined Cadillac, Ford of Europe, Jaguar, Mini and Volvo in declaring intentions to sell only electric vehicles. Others, including Volkswagen, Ford and General Motors are diving aggressively into EVs.
Pratt, a lanky MIT-educated robotics and artificial intelligence whiz, is also the CEO of the Toyota Research Institute, the carmaker's U.S.-based skunkworks for futuristic technologies. Crunching the numbers on various paths to carbon neutrality was one of his latest brain teasers. Pratt likened today's enthusiasm for EVs to yesterday's confidence in autonomous driving: It's overly optimistic, he said, citing Amara's Law, a maxim claiming humans"overestimate the effect of a technology in the short run and underestimate the effect in the long run."
Pratt's model starts by hypothesizing a fleet of 100 traditional internal combustion vehicles, with average emissions of 250 grams of carbon dioxide per kilometer traveled.If that lithium were used for a single 100 kwh battery, it could support one pure electric on the order of a top-grade Tesla. In that case, the fleet of 100 would have one EV and 99 traditional gasoline-burning vehicles, and its average fleet emissions would drop to 248.5 g/km.
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