Should Gas-Powered Cars Be Banned by 2035?

• Transportation accounts for approximately 15 percent of global greenhouse gas emissions, and new vehicles sold today will still be on the road in 2045. A 2035 ban on new gas vehicle sales does not remove any existing car; it shapes the fleet that will dominate emissions in the 2040s and 2050s. The climate window for keeping warming below 1.5 degrees Celsius closes during exactly that decade.
• Battery costs have fallen from $1,100 per kilowatt-hour in 2010 to under $100 in 2024, a 90 percent reduction in 14 years. At current trajectories, EVs will be cheaper to purchase and substantially cheaper to operate than gas vehicles by 2030, without any mandate. The ban does not force consumers to buy more expensive cars; it aligns the regulatory endpoint with a market transition that is already underway.
• Norway reached over 90 percent EV market share in 2023 through consistent incentive policy, but that success required 30 years of uninterrupted commitment. The US does not have 30 years. A hard 2035 deadline creates the long-term certainty automakers need to commit capital to transition fully; without it, they maintain internal combustion production lines as a hedge that delays the investment needed to close cost gaps for everyone.

Debater: To be announced

• The average EV price in 2024 remains above $50,000, and the federal tax credit reaches fewer than half of buyers due to income caps and vehicle price limits. Rural Americans drive longer distances, cannot charge at home in rented apartments, and live far from public charging networks. A mandate that functions well for urban professionals is effectively a prohibition on affordable personal transportation for everyone else.
• Mining the lithium, cobalt, and manganese required for EV batteries produces significant environmental harm in Chile, the Democratic Republic of Congo, and Indonesia, including water table destruction, worker exploitation, and community displacement. Replacing tailpipe emissions with mining emissions in other countries does not solve the global problem; it relocates it. The lifecycle emissions of EVs are better than gas vehicles, but the honest accounting is more complex than advocates typically present.
• China controls 75 percent of global battery manufacturing capacity and dominates the processing of critical minerals required for EV batteries. An accelerated US EV mandate that depends on Chinese supply chains transfers American automotive supply chain leadership to a strategic competitor at the worst possible geopolitical moment. Genuine energy independence requires a domestic battery manufacturing capacity that does not yet exist at the scale a 2035 mandate would require.

Debater: To be announced