[Congressional Record Volume 169, Number 122 (Monday, July 17, 2023)]
[House]
[Pages H3616-H3617]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




            HEAT WAVES ADD BURDEN TO ELECTRIC VEHICLE OWNERS

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. The Chair recognizes the gentleman from 
California (Mr. LaMalfa) for 5 minutes.
  Mr. LaMALFA. Madam Speaker, I was looking at a local news source here 
today. The title of the article is: ``Heat Waves Add Burden to Electric 
Vehicle Owners.'' There are challenges, as it turns out, that these 
heavy, expensive batteries in electric vehicles have a tendency to get 
damaged by high temperatures.
  Electric vehicles are extremely complicated, and they are expensive. 
Repairing EV batteries is nearly impossible, and replacing one is very 
costly. A section of the article referenced a really expensive brand of 
pickup that's on the market. It talked about making repairs in a fender 
bender if somebody hit the rear quarter panel on it and it drove the 
body work up into the rest of the forward part of the car. It isn't 
just a matter of repairing that quarter panel. They had to take the 
vehicle almost entirely apart, which made it a $42,000 repair because 
there is so much complexity with the extensive wiring system in the 
electric vehicle technology that drives all the different wheels.
  We are being told as Americans that we should start driving these 
vehicles. We should buy them, replace what we have, and drive these 
vehicles. In my home State of California, they are basically forcing 
the mandate on that, followed closely behind the Biden administration 
wanting to do certain things by an X amount by year 2030. By the way, 
they just make up numbers. They will say 50 percent by 2030 and 75 
percent by 2035. They will do the same thing at the Federal level: X 
amount by 2040 and 2050. They just make this stuff up with fancy round 
numbers.

  Some of the recommendations in the article about how to deal with 
your electric vehicles are actually the absurd part of it. Don't park 
your car in the Sun and charge during cooler times of day are some 
suggestions in the article to EV drivers.
  Now, I got to spend the weekend here in D.C. because my plane was 
canceled going home the other day, so I am not sure how you try and 
figure out when the cool time of day is in D.C. so you can charge your 
car.
  Another suggestion of the article was to use air-conditioning 
sparingly. Sure. In places like this, or even where there is more 
humidity in the South and others, you are going to drive along in this 
car because it is electric and not use your air-conditioner.
  One of the really good ones was that they wanted you to keep the car 
plugged in while you are using the air-conditioner. What does that even 
mean? How do you keep your vehicle plugged in while you are using the 
air-conditioner?
  People made fun of this one. Are you supposed to have an extension 
cord that is 10 miles long so you can keep it charging while you are 
driving around? It becomes really absurd after a while.
  What is the bottom line here? For certain people, electric vehicles 
make sense for them if they have short commutes or they do a lot of in-
town driving, and it will last for a particular amount of time.
  The article goes on to state, though, that most of the time you can 
come home and plug in, and you don't need to use a fast charger, unless 
you are on a long trip. If you are on an extended trip, then you are 
going to have to find a means to do that. You can't just go 200 miles 
and then charge it for 8 hours. However, they also don't want you to 
use a fast charger because it is tough on the battery in hot 
conditions.
  Your mobility is really what is being affected, what is being taken 
away here, and there are those in this place in the regulatory scheme 
we have in my home State of California or here in D.C. that don't 
really care that you have mobility. They don't want you to have 
mobility. They want you to be tied to what they believe are your 
walkable neighborhoods and stay in your 15-minute cities. They don't 
seem to like that.
  This all starts with these mandates, taking away the systems, the 
things

[[Page H3617]]

that you normally use, use at your choice, and forcing you into 
something else.
  Whether it is your vehicles, whether it is your gas stove or other 
appliances, your yard maintenance tools, they want to take that out and 
convert you to a grid that is not actually ready to accept the mass 
amount of charging that is going to be needed to do this again.
  California's grid on many hot days is close to going down. They have 
to start telling people to shut off their manufacturing plants and such 
so they can keep the grid going. They are tearing down hydroelectric 
dams in my district right now because they aren't green enough, even 
though it makes CO2-free power.
  It is absurd what is going on with the regulatory state, and we need 
to stop the Biden administration by doing it just by executive action. 
It needs to run through us so we are held accountable to you.

                          ____________________