nytimes.com
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Chinese technology companies are paving the way for a world that will be powered by electric motors rather than gas-guzzling engines. It is a decisively 21st-century approach not just to solve its own energy problems, but also to sell batteries and other electric products to everyone else. Canada is its newest buyer of EVs; in a rebuke of Mr. Trump, its prime minister, Mark Carney, lowered tariffs on the cars as part of a new trade deal.

Though Americans have been slow to embrace electric vehicles, Chinese households have learned to love them. In 2025, 54 percent of new cars sold in China were either battery-powered or plug-in hybrids. That is a big reason that the country’s oil consumption is on track to peak in 2027, according to forecasts from the International Energy Agency. And Chinese E.V makers are setting records — whether it’s BYD’s sales (besting Tesla by battery-powered vehicles sold for the first time last year) or Xiaomi’s speed (its cars are setting records at major racetracks like Nürburgring in Germany).

  • redditmademedoit@piefed.zipEnglish
    3·
    6 hours ago

    I think we should also focus on using less energy overall – e.g. replace short to medium persinal car trips with walking, bicycles and public transport, medium to long travel with trains, eliminating unnecessary travel that can’t be accommodated by those modes of transport. Environmental solutions like replacing fossil fuel powered cars with emissions free, but equally dangerous and still inefficient EVs for personal use will keep us burning oil even longer by tying up investments in highways and hostile, car based infrastructure.

    Things like rethinking infrastructure, labor, economy and housing would have been more achievable and, for most, felt more like progressing towards a better future than straighup sci-fi level efforts to continue the status quo without as much oil. But it’s the latter we get, they’re putting carbon capture machines on Norwegian oil rigs as we speak.

    • AA5B@lemmy.worldEnglish
      2·
      5 hours ago

      For sure we should reduce overall travel.

      • To the extent people still work from home: we do. On days when I work from home I generally don’t use a motor vehicle for anything
      • to the extent we order online, we do. I rarely goto stores besides the grocery. Sorry retailers and local shopping advocates but a dedicated delivery vehicle is more efficient that you taking yours
      • I’ve seen gradual progress in train buildout from the 2022 infrastructure bill. It’s very slow, piecemeal, not dramatic but there are more transit options