Elon Musk Says EVs Will Double World's Need for Electricity

While electric automobiles have numerous advantages over internal combustion vehicles, we’ve often wondered when their disadvantages would be offset to a point that would make sense to have them become the dominant mode of transportation. While there are multiple issues that have to be addressed, one of the largest involves finding a way to source the kind of energy needed for the world to recharge them on a regular basis.

An EV-dominated society likely means elevated energy prices and peak demand hours that could easily overtax national energy grids. Renewable energy sources may also prove insufficient in providing the kind of power necessary — potentially requiring countries to double down on plants reliant on coal, oil, and natural gas if nuclear facilities are not approved. Counter-productive takes like that are often downplayed, however, so industrial giants can continue proclaiming the technology as largely trouble-free.

But what happens when EV royalty starts making similar claims about our collective energy needs?

On Tuesday, Tesla CEO Elon Musk stated that the world’s electricity consumption would likely double as EVs become the norm. While this doesn’t account for the additional energy needs created by our increased reliance on digital devices (something that’s already hard to calculate as electronics become more efficient), he believes it will create massive demand for nuclear, solar, wind, and geothermal energy solutions if sustainability is to be entertained.

In an interview with Berlin-based publisher Axel Springer, hosted by Germany’s Bild am Sonntag, Musk said sourcing the energy necessary to power EVs would become the biggest obstacle over the next two decades. It’s actually something experts have been considering for a while and Germany, in particular, has had to confront as its own massive push toward sustainable energy turned out to be, well, largely unsustainable.

Despite advancing one of the most ambitious excursions into wind and solar shortly after the 21st century began as part of its Energiewende program, Germany’s emissions stagnated in 2009. By 2018, the nation was actually increasing its utilization of coal-fired plants to meet its growing energy needs and public opinion of renewables declined immensely. While part of this was blamed on the country shunning nuclear power, there’s a growing skepticism that the nation can actually maintain its current energy usage on the promise that wind and solar will become more efficient and cheaper in the coming years. Though even dissenters aren’t thrilled at the prospect of becoming increasingly dependent upon limited resources like coal or entertaining new concepts like national energy rationing.

Either way, the issue will be exacerbated by an influx of electric vehicles.

“It will take another 20 years for cars to be fully electric. It is like with phones, you cannot replace them all at once,” Musk said during a discussion held on the Bild website.

“We need sustainable energy,” he continued. “If something goes wrong we don’t stop producing CO2 and still need to transition ourselves toward sustainable energy production.”

But Elon cautioned that sometimes the wind doesn’t blow and the sun won’t shine on the vast solar arrays needed to harvest and store the necessary energy. He envisioned a future where most people had solar cells on their homes and businesses. Buildings would also utilize batteries connected to improved energy grids to help offset peak draw hours and reduce the presumably higher cost of electricity.

Musk also noted to his German audience that he did not oppose nuclear energy and went so far as to suggest it might even be necessary if we’re to meet tomorrow’s need for electricity — which he said would double by 2040.