The promise and peril of the electric car revolution

We can do better than electrified sprawl, if we try

An electric car.
(Image credit: Illustrated | iStock)

The electric vehicle revolution is nigh. As recently as 2017, electric cars comprised just 1.4 percent of global sales. By 2021, they made up 8.6 percent, roughly a sixfold increase in just four years, with that last figure coming in a year when auto manufacturing was hamstrung by the shortage of computer chips.

Soon electric vehicles (EVs) will displace gas-powered ones, and that will be an improvement over the status quo — but only a modest one if American cities can't take advantage of the broader benefits of electrification. We can do better than e-sprawl, if we try.

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Ryan Cooper

Ryan Cooper is a national correspondent at TheWeek.com. His work has appeared in the Washington Monthly, The New Republic, and the Washington Post.