Are we facing a zero emissions U-turn?

As I head to the US for the annual NADA Show, the headlines are full of President Trump’s ‘shock and awe’ first 24 hours in office.

I’m certain that I will meet many card-carrying Republican US dealers over the next few days who are highly supportive of what is unfolding in Washington, and I’m not going to comment here on my own thoughts about Trump 2.

Observed from a European or even global perspective however, withdrawing from the Paris Climate Change accord, turning on the oil supply with the stated ambition of halving the oil price and revoking the mandate to get to 50% BEV sales by 2030, freezing all related incentives all strike me as bad news for the planet.

We know that Trump is a climate change denier, but we have just seen days of continuous fires that have burnt large areas of Los Angeles to the ground and many of those travelling to New Orleans for the NADA Show have had their plans disrupted by heavy snowfall there.

This is my third trip to New Orleans for NADA and the second time that the city has been brought to a halt by snow that I was told the first time was a ‘once in a lifetime’ event.  Either I’m on my second life, or life is changing…

There are some who would like to turn the clock back, stop air travel, eradicate cars of any type, source everything locally.  I fundamentally disagree with that point of view, and see it as counter to so many aspects of human development and progress.

The world in my view was a better place for the majority as the result of globalisation, and trying to avoid the consequences of that reminds me of those who argued in favour of Brexit for the UK because they thought they could return to some halcyon days of an era that did not in reality ever exist.

I look forward to seeing how long it takes Apple to produce an iPhone for $1,000 when it is manufactured entirely in the US from components sourced entirely in the US.  (Or, not to be partisan about it, how the UK’s National Health Service performs when it is staffed entirely by people who have been born in the UK, even if catering only for patients with the same pedigree).

I suspect that when Stone Age Man discovered that they could shape stones to make tools, someone discovered pretty quickly that the tools also made pretty good weapons and killed a neighbour.

There would have been voices raised saying that having stone tools was all a bad idea, which was addressed by the appointment of a Stone Age enforcer who was tasked with maintaining law and order, and so we progressed on to use the tools and weapons in a generally positive way.

The same principle applies to the invention of the car in the 19th century or the development of planes in the 20th.  They were initially a pretty risky form of travel for both occupants and those in the vicinity, and environmental performance was lacking to put it mildly.  (Total loss lubrication systems anyone?)

Maybe it’s my education as an engineer, but my view is that whatever problems we create as a race, we also have the ability to solve.  If governments supported and regulated for outcomes without trying to dictate solutions, then we would make more progress.

And if all governments recognised that not all issues (not many issues of any importance in my view) can be solved within a four or five year term, that would also help.  The average term of a car lease in the US is almost the same as two Presidential terms, and in Europe, we have numerous examples of governments that aren’t even lasting the length of our typical three or four year lease.

It’s therefore not surprising that customers are confused.  That leads to weak demand, new or used, for the product that’s been forced on them as the result of political direction, i.e. BEVs.  That in turn means that the whole supply chain – OE suppliers, manufacturers and distribution partners have been squeezed by the need for rapid investment (battery manufacturing through to car chargers), at the same time that revenues are flat and profit margins cut.

All nations are looking for growth, but we end up with what I suspect economists would call stagflation – but at an industry level.

There is an expression that we get the politicians we deserve, and perhaps that is the case.  Would we be in a better position if some of our leading industrialists and retailers (not just from automotive) had gone into politics over the years?

It seems to me that party politics – regardless of country – is not a good basis for consistent policy making, and finding the answers to climate change will need a consistent and fact-based policy more than anything else.  It will be a tragedy if short-termism wins over a balanced and fact-based consensus on the need for change – regardless of how that is actually delivered.  It will not only be our industry that loses out from that.