When President Joe Biden took Ford’s electric F-150 Lightning pickup for a test drive in Dearborn, Michigan, in May 2021, the event was more than a White House photo op. It marked a new phase in an accelerating shift from gas-powered cars and trucks to electric vehicles, or EVs.

In recent months, global auto manufacturers have released plans to electrify their vehicle fleets by 2030 or 2035, setting up a race to see who can most quickly shift entirely away from producing vehicles powered by gasoline.

Like Biden, former President Donald Trump promised to create jobs in the auto industry. But Trump sought to do it by perpetuating a fossil-fueled system that is the largest source of U.S. greenhouse gas emissions. Automakers benefited from some Trump policies in the short term, including the rollback of fuel economy standards. Now, however, they seem to be embracing the challenge of competing globally in a climate-constrained future.

As an environmental historian, I see this moment as pivotal because unlike EVs from manufacturers like Toyota or Tesla, the electric F-150 does not entirely rely on green consumer choice. It places the electric vehicle transition squarely in the hands of mass-market consumers who don’t choose cars based on environmental considerations, and who are buying far more light trucks – pickups, sport utility vehicles and minivans – than cars today.

The century of gasoline

America’s 20th-century affair with gas-powered cars was not inevitable. From 1890 through about 1915, vehicles powered by horses, coal, electric batteries and gasoline jockeyed for position on U.S. streets. And electric-powered vehicles had some clear advantages. Many consumers feared that gas-powered cars were prone to explode, and there was no nationwide fueling infrastructure.

But World War I combined with a moment of technological convergence that favored the internal combustion engine. Massive new petroleum discoveries in Texas, and later in the Middle East, produced a glut of oil, just as electric lighting replaced kerosene lamps.

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https://theconversation.com/with-fords-electric-f-150-pickup-the-ev-transition-shifts-into-high-gear-161731