Elaine Buckberg, PhD, talks to members of the Economic Roundtable of the Ohio Valley about what electric vehicles mean for the United States economy on Tuesday during an ERT Speaker series event in Vienna. (Photo by Michellle Dillon)

VIENNA — Community members learned about electric vehicles (EVs) and their effect on the nation’s economy Tuesday in Vienna.

Elaine Buckberg, PhD, talked about EVs and the economy in a talk titled “What Do EVs Mean for the U.S. Economy?” as part of the Economic Roundtable of the Ohio Valley (ERT) Speakers Series Tuesday at the Parkersburg Country Club in Vienna.

The Economic Roundtable of the Ohio Valley (ERT) is a non-partisan, non-political educational organization that encourages business professionals to engage in meaningful conversation, networking and learning through its Speakers Series which helps inform the local community on important governmental, economic and social issues, according to their website.

Buckberg has a PhD in Economics from MIT and a bachelor’s degree in Economics and English from Yale, according to her LinkedIn account.

Buckberg used to be the Chief Economist at General Motors, the Deputy Assistant Secretary for Policy Coordination at the U.S. Department of Treasury and an Economist at the International Monetary Fund, among other things, according to ERT’s website.

Currently she is a senior fellow at the Salata Institute for Climate and Sustainability at Harvard University. The Institute’s mission is to develop and promote durable, effective and equitable solutions to the climate change challenges confronting humanity. Buckberg’s research interests include decarbonizing transportation and electric vehicles, according to Harvard’s website.

During her talk Buckberg spoke about EV sales trends in the U.S. and abroad. According to Buckberg, EV sales have continued to rise in the United States in 2023. Prior to 2022 electric vehicles accounted for 5.8% of vehicle sales. In Quarter 4 of 2023 they accounted for 8.1% of vehicle sales.

Buckberg also talked about how EV ownership has evolved unevenly in states. In California EVs accounted for 24% of vehicles, while in Ohio and West Virginia EVs accounted for less than 5% of vehicle sales, she said.

As if to prove her point, Buckberg asked the audience how many people owned electric vehicles. Zero people raised their hands.

She also discussed EV ownership trends for the future. She said that the U.S. is forecasted to have 50% of vehicle sales be for EVs by 2030.

Buckberg emphasized that all of the vehicle sales information she was sharing during her talk were for passenger vehicles and not commercial vehicles. .

Buckberg spoke about the impact of the Inflation Reduction Act that was passed in 2022 and its impact on EVs. She said the IRA has three EV related goals: the promotion of EV adoption for reducing greenhouse gas emissions and climate benefits; a domestic EV industry; and the prevention of U.S. EV manufacturing being vulnerable to foreign control of the supply chain.

Buckberg ended her talk with a discussion about whether EVs really lower carbon emissions. She talked about a survey conducted by Argonne National Laboratory about what different vehicles look like from mining the materials that go into making it to scrapping the vehicle and what is the relative energy use of this process.

Buckberg said gas powered cars had the highest amount of carbon emissions, with 400 grams of carbon dioxide per mile. Hybrid vehicles had 300 grams of carbon dioxide per mile and EVs with a 200 mile driving range had 200 grams of carbon dioxide per mile. She also said that EVs with a bigger battery, and therefore a longer range, had 254 grams of carbon dioxide per mile.

Buckberg said “EVs remain the lowest emission solution.”

When asked what obstacles there are to increasing electric vehicle ownership in West Virginia, Ohio and Appalachia, Buckberg said, “Number one, I think is when people are unfamiliar with them it’s hard to get it moving. Number two, public fast charging on your highways so people feel like they can charge at home, they can do that road trip.”

According to the U.S. Department of Energy Alternative Fuels Data Center website, West Virginia had approximately 1,870 electric vehicle registrations and Ohio had approximately 34,060. The information was last updated in July 2023.

Buckberg also spoke about these issues at Marietta College at 7 p.m. Monday at the Alma McDonough Auditorium as the speaker for the 40th annual Milton Friedman Lecture. according to a media release about the event.

To learn more about the ERT and its Speakers Series visit .https://www.economicroundtable.org/