We should be banning, or more accurately, phasing out combustion engines for all vehicles including government and emergency vehicles. If anything should be EVs these should be it. Also consider that American fire trucks are massively oversized compared to ones in the rest of the world. They don’t need to be that big, and thus more compact European-style ones could easily be replaced with electric equivalents.
Combustion engines will likely have a place for a long time. Large equipment just doesn’t do well on battery power. They can’t get the required runtime. Also, in places where they are used, electrical power is often limited.
Hydrocarbons are an excellent way of storing energy. We will also need to overproduce renewables, to keep grids stable. Synthetic hydrocarbons could be a good solution to both issues. Currently, they are nowhere close to competing with fossil fuels, but that will change in time.
We should be banning, or more accurately, phasing out combustion engines for all vehicles including government and emergency vehicles. If anything should be EVs these should be it. Also consider that American fire trucks are massively oversized compared to ones in the rest of the world. They don’t need to be that big, and thus more compact European-style ones could easily be replaced with electric equivalents.
Combustion engines will likely have a place for a long time. Large equipment just doesn’t do well on battery power. They can’t get the required runtime. Also, in places where they are used, electrical power is often limited.
Hydrocarbons are an excellent way of storing energy. We will also need to overproduce renewables, to keep grids stable. Synthetic hydrocarbons could be a good solution to both issues. Currently, they are nowhere close to competing with fossil fuels, but that will change in time.