Escape from Shalott: New family member!

Leman Family Sustainability Journal (a big entry!)

This afternoon we went down to the ol' car vending machine, dropped the coin in the slot, and got a new-to-us '18 Ford Fusion Enegi plug-in hybrid instead!

Our '01 Camry was going to cost us more to fix so that it could pass emissions than the car was worth. We wanted something electric for around town, but fuel-efficient to get Grandma's house (not too many quick- chargers yet on that stretch of road... hopefully soon!).

This hybrid should be able to get us to Boise on less than half the gas it used to take. Taking fuel savings into account, it costs about as much as the last used car we bought. And we have solar panels, so the electricity we use to charge it won't create as much pollution as it would otherwise. We'll see in a month or two how much more we still need to draw from the power grid. Your guess is a good as mine! I'm just glad it isn't as bad for the air.

(But anyway, coal has to account for more than like 2/3rds of electricity production in any given area for an electric car to be harder on the climate than a gas car. We're below that in Utah, and in my house in particular. And Utah's reliance on coal is decreasing all the time, so electric cars only get cleaner.)

We were looking into the Hyundai Ioniq, wanting to take advantage of tax credits for EVs. But supply chains aren't great right now (as for lots of things). So this Ford on Carvana seemed like the best option we could find that fit our needs. If we get lucky and Congress passes a bill aimed at helping people buy used EVs, maybe we'll get a little kickback.

The Energi plugs right into a regular wall socket and should charge easily there in about six hours. In our level 2 socket (which we had installed with our panels) it should only take two.

One criticism of EVs I hear is that the mining required for batteries is so wasteful and bad for land and the people who have to do it. But we mine oil and gas (also not great humanitarian records) and burn it in our cars every day, putting that waste into our air and bodies. Once an EV battery is recycled (it can be done, it just hasn't been much yet), an EV accounts for 300% less mineral waste than a gas car.

We will miss our old Camry, which is going to the junkyard. But we're excited for this new friend. And isn't the vending machine cool?