Are electric vehicles the answer to oil shocks?
War in Iran is ratcheting up gasoline prices. What can drivers do?
The U.S. war on Iran has driven up gasoline prices, alarming drivers around the world and spurring renewed interest in electric vehicles. Gasoline prices are rising “and so are searches for EVs,” said InsideEVs.
The Iran crisis has thrown global oil markets “for a loop,” which has increased gasoline costs by 50 cents a gallon over the last month. Online searches for electric vehicles, both hybrids and full EVs, have “jumped over the last week.” Most of that gain came from “full EV searches.” A similar spike in oil prices and EV searches occurred when Russia invaded Ukraine in 2022.
Will the crisis in the Middle East “finally mean that people will want EVs?,” Matt Hardigree said at The Autopian. The end of tax credits for electric cars has produced a drop in EV sales, dropping by half from 12% of all vehicle sales in 2025. Automakers have “largely cut production” of EVs, and the EVs that remain on the market are “super cheap,” as dealers try to unload inventory. A “prolonged period of higher energy prices” could change that dynamic. Come summer, “there might be fewer affordable EVs and higher energy prices.”
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The road to energy independence?
Electric vehicles “are not the answer to oil shocks,” Kevin D. Williamson said at The Dispatch. Look to China, where oil consumption is increasing despite the proliferation of cheap and abundant EVs because “there are many things you can do with oil other than refine it into gasoline and diesel.” Imported oil fuels the country’s growing petrochemical industry, which makes plastics and other products. Back in the U.S., commuters with “relatively short daily drives” might benefit from EVs, but that “would not have the effect of lowering U.S. oil consumption.”
Reduced oil demand “can lead to less conflict and more energy independence,” Jameson Dow said at Electrek. Most oil is used for transportation, and “more than half of that goes into the engines of the approximately 1.5 billion personal vehicles on the road today.” That is a “global overreliance” on a single resource, giving “massive amounts of control and wealth” to the countries that use it.
Fuel price security
American carmakers are bracing for “ripple effects” from the war, said The Detroit Free Press. They will face new challenges “if this stretches out and causes extended disruption to oil supplies,” said Sam Abuelsamid, vice president of market research for Telemetry. General Motors, however, “might be in a good place with its electric vehicle lineup."
“I’m sure glad I bought an EV and solar panels,” Ryan Cooper said at The American Prospect. The stereotype is that electric vehicles are for “environmentally conscious liberals.” But they are also “much cheaper to operate than gas cars.” In a world with roller coaster gas prices, EVs offer “fuel price security,” which is easier on the wallet.
