When we finally sat in the BZ4X, my wife and I both felt like Goldilocks breaking and entering into the bear’s bungalow. As previous Prius owners, we both thought, “This is just right.” The acceleration threw us back in our seats and all the gauges & clusters felt normal. It was pretty instantaneous for both of us and a big upgrade.

EVs are fun and great for the planet.

I just bought the LAST car I thought I’d buy. And I LOVE it!

We are the proud owners of a barely used Toyota electric vehicle, the oddly named BZ4X. It lived in California for all of its 3,000-mile-life, was marked down about $25,000 from its 2023 new price and is fully loaded with every bell & whistle you could ring or blow.

We even received some local incentives from our electric company, DTE, that knocked a couple grand more off the price. As I wrote to my pal Elli, “It’s wild, almost surreal, that we’d go for an EV with some the crappiest range known to humans.”

Our bright red B-Zed (as most other countries call it) only gets about 220 miles per charge, less in these recent frigid temperatures. And I had to overcome a whole heap of FUD — fear, uncertainty and doubt — a disinformation tactic used by anti-EV fossil fuel folks and politicians to poo-poo pro-environmental policies.

EVs have always faced a range of anxieties from the public, the main driver being, well, range anxiety. Supposedly everyone is worried that they can’t drive as far with an electric car as they can with a gasoline-powered one. They just need to get a long enough extension cord.

We took to the internet to find the best deal nationwide and landed on one way over in California at a Chevy dealer who wanted it off their lot and were willing to negotiate. They put it on a truck and sent ‘er cross country. (My wife ended up sending their business manager a gift card because she was so helpful.)

Kidding aside, no, most electric vehicles don’t travel as far on a single charge as internal combustion engine (ICE) cars do on a single tank of gas. But most all EVs travel at least 200 miles per charge while the average American only drives 30-40 miles per day.

Only two or three times over the past several years have I gone further than a couple hundred miles from home (by car, that is!) For the vast majority of my work, errands, visits or wandering, I’ve stayed within that radius.

Check out this map from withinhours.com These are some places within a couple hundred miles of the Motor City.

 

But that’s just where I can go in my own car. A whole bunch of EVs travel well over 300 miles on a single charge. And hey, I can name four or more that go over 400 miles before needing to plug in for a bit. That’s one loooooong extension cord.

Ask yourself how far you typically drive. If you go two to three hundred miles per day, then maybe you’re not ready to purchase an EV. But maybe you are, considering the price of gas vs. the price of electricity. Imagine starting every single morning with a “full tank of gas” trickled into your battery overnight. Imagine never having to make a Sunoco stop, a Shell swing, an Exxon exit …

If you do want to travel further than your car’s charge can carry you, check out these maps from my ChargePoint app.

 

You can’t even see the United States due to the massive number of fast charging stations. Zoom into Michigan and, sure, you’ll see a few charging deserts. But, like traveling through Death Valley,  you’ll just need to top up before leaving Lewiston if you wanna make it to Mio.

Don’t get me wrong; I was concerned about range too, until I asked my nephew Kyle — way back in 2018 — how I’d get to Key West in his EV. He pulled out his phone and showed me where I’d charge, who’s charging their cars there now, where else I’d need to stop and for how long. It was a revelation; oh, I could get all the way there with ease! There are tens of thousands more car chargers now, thanks to Biden’s Infrastructure successes.

EVs just had their best sales year EVer, despite all the FUD. 1.3 million EVs were sold here in the U.S. in 2024. China sold that many in their own country in just December alone. Global sales of EVs and plug-in hybrids jumped 25% to 17,000,000 cars in 2024.

Other countries are overcoming FUD quite well, thank you very much. They realize EVs are cleaner & greener; and burning gasoline is simply bad for the environment.

I could go on. And since this is my story, I think I will. With no gas or oil needed in electric vehicles, there’s not a lot of maintenance required. Even brakes can last 100,000 miles because EVs use regenerative braking, relying on their motors to slow the car down, all the while adding energy back into the battery. And no, you don’t have to worry about changing worn out batteries. You guessed it; that was part of the FUD also.

Want another FUD buster? 82% of U.S. buyers are highly satisfied with their EVs according to Cox Automotive. And hey, gasoline cars waste about 80% of the energy pumped into their tanks. Electric cars waste only about 10% of the electricity poured into their batteries. Toyota’s EV is one of the most efficient cars on the market, too.

The new administration has been sewing so many lies about EVs that they practically have their own Department of only FUD U.S. (DOOFUS, for short). Republicans complain about EV incentives. It’s highly likely that all the incentives for these cars will go away, even though we still give $20 billion in oil subsidies to already wealthy companies.

Rest assured, California — now the fourth largest economy in the world — will keep pushing for cleaner air, cleaner vehicles and renewables. If/when the GOP ends subsidies, California will start ‘em back up again. With China, Europe and a large portion of the world also pushing full-steam ahead with electric vehicles, no matter how much the administration wants to squawk, EVs are the future.

Fun fact: Norway is the global leader in EV adoption. In 2024, almost 90% of new cars sold in Norway were fully electric. And Norway is consistently named one of the happiest countries on the planet, so …

I have driven a whole bunch of EVs over the past several years, too numerous to count. Every time I sit in one with a fresh face who has never gotten behind the wheel, their response is always the same, “Whoa!” EVs are fun and they accelerate much quicker than most every gas guzzler out there. They’re quiet, comfortable and never needing your oil changed or emissions checked is just as appealing as never having to pump gas again.

If you live nearby, hit me up and we can take a spin. Baby you can drive my car. I guarantee you’ll like it.

No fuddy duddies, please and thank you.

 

Here are a few YouTubers I follow who do great work explaining and reviewing EVs:

Adam’s Everything EV from West Virginia

Transport Evolved from Oregon

Electrifying out of the UK

Electroheads also out of the UK

Fully Charged yep, from the UK too, ‘kay?

The Electric Viking down unduh in Australia

 

Rodney Curtis is a recovering journalist and author of four books.

Check out Rodney’s books here.