Would an electric car ever stop you from taking a road trip? That's the claim making the rounds on conspiracy Reddit.
The post, which has racked up hundreds of upvotes on r/conspiracy, suggests that EVs are designed to discourage long-distance travel, making suburban life unsustainable and forcing people into cities.
The user claimed that longer charging times and growing lines at charging stations, especially in places like California, are evidence of a plan to restrict movement. "... There won't be many people going on road trips anymore, nobody is doing joyride [cruising] at night in their tesla either as it has to charge overnight," they wrote.
Sure, charging an EV takes longer than filling up a gas tank, but they're more than capable of long trips. According to a report from the U.S. Department of Energy, a lot of EVs now go 150 to 400 miles on one charge, and fast chargers can get the battery up to 80% in just 20 to 30 minutes. With more fast chargers popping up across the U.S., road trips in an EV aren't as tricky as they used to be.
A report from the International Energy Agency pushes back on the idea that EVs limit mobility. It points out that more people are switching to EVs because they're getting cheaper, easier to use, and there are more places to charge them.
Gas cars mean regular trips to the pump, but with an EV and a home charger, drivers are afforded the convenience of starting each day with a full battery. And with solar panel technology evolving, some EV owners can even power their cars themselves, cutting down on the need for public chargers.
One user said, "An electric car gets about the same mileage as my current vehicle, some models actually get more."
Another commented, "You could argue that there was a conspiracy to make humans (especially America post-WW2) dependent on gasoline-powered cars, rather than the opposite."
A user responded, writing, "Yep, this isn't even a theory — it's facts. There were electric cars in the 20s. Oil companies wanted to sell gas so they muscled their way into the auto industry and made gasoline the standard fuel."
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When you think about owning an EV, what concerns you most about public charging stations?
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Chargers not working 🚫 There's no real evidence that EVs are built to restrict movement. Reports from the U.S. Department of Energy, the IEA, and Tesla all show that EVs are getting more user-friendly and better for travel. As more chargers pop up and battery tech improves, road trips in an EV are eventually going to appeal to the masses.
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