The conversion from combustable engines to electric (battery) vehicles isn’t as clean as it appears. University of Manitoba professor and author, Vaclav Smil tackles the efficiency of this conversion in his latest book, Energy and Civilization: A History.
Smil uses a core principal called energy returned or energy invested, EroEi, that measures how efficient you are at creating new energy.
The main challenge, that Smil sees, with the push to electric powered vehicles is that the energy returned does not exceed the energy invested. Smil uses historic examples to illustrate his point that man needs to get a better return on investment in order to succeed.
Provinces like Alberta will not be able to achieve this return because the cost of producing renewable energy like solar and wind is too high and right now, technology hasn’t advanced at the pace required to achieve this goal.
Provinces like Manitoba, that rely on hydro power have a much better balance of their EroEi ratio. To read more about this topic you can source Vaclav Cmil’s book or read this article by MotorMouth:
Motor Mouth: From well to wheel, EVs don’t make sense with solar, wind power