Image: Tanya Shukla
Walking around the halls of Everything Electric and seeing the excellent products on display, the people queuing for test drives and clambering all over the vehicles, it is hard to believe that every driver isn’t either driving an EV or queuing up to buy one.
Unfortunately they aren’t, and this seems like a good moment to examine why.
Not only is this a good week because of all the fun of Everything Electric, this is also the week in which the Senate committee on Information Integrity on Climate Change and Energy met.
This week the CEO of the Electric Vehicle Council, Julie Delvecchio, and EVC Head of Policy, Aman Gaur, appeared before the enquiry in Melbourne to highlight the misinformation themes that are shared widely across both social networks and by media personalities and outlets across the world.
The commonly seen falsehoods and their refutations I have taken directly from the EVC’s submission to the inquiry:
I can be fairly confident that every single reader of this article has heard or seen one of these nuggets of anti-EV propaganda on the TV, in print, online, or spouted by some bore holding a tinny at a party, and probably had to dispute them at a barbecue, in the pub, or in the comments sections of articles across the web.
However, this misinformation and disinformation problem is compounded by an automotive industry that is far from committed to selling EVs. In FY24 the automotive industry spent $690 million on advertising, and this is not even the whole scope of the automotive marketing and PR spend.
The industry spends another sizeable portion on putting cars in the hands of journalists and key customers, drive and demo days, dealer promotions, sponsorships of sports teams and local events. The automotive marketing machine is huge.
Toyota, the biggest vehicle OEM in Australia by far, was the 8th biggest spender on advertising overall in FY2024. The top ten in FY24 rounds out with 2. Hyundai, 3. Mitsubishi, 4. Kia, 5. Nissan, 6. Volkswagen, 7. BMW, 8. Mazda, 9. American Special Vehicles, 10. Isuzu UTE. Looking down that list of brands, only a few of them had EVs to sell in that period.
Nielsen also breaks out spend on EV advertising—$66.5 million, 9.6% of the total in FY24 and up a massive 711% since FY21. Good news? In June of 2024, EV sales set a record 8% of the total with Tesla, BYD, BMW, and Volvo racking up the big numbers. Only one of those brands is represented in the top 10 spenders on automotive advertising.
So how does this link back to misinformation and disinformation? Most of the biggest spenders on advertising do not have BEVs to sell or only have a small token effort. My most recent EV drive was in the somewhat half-baked Toyota bZ4X, launched in February 2024.
The other side of the automotive marketing and PR coin is the automotive press. There is no doubt that many Australians love their cars and love to consume automotive content—read about cars, watch videos about cars, listen to podcasts about cars. Australian media is there to meet that demand.
All of the major media companies feature automotive coverage: 9 has Drive, 7West has Car Expert, and News Corp features automotive coverage across its mastheads. There are independent titles like Which Car, owned by Motoring News Network.
What is notable is that many of these titles sit outside the paywalls of their associated news sites. You can read them for free when you have to pay for the news content.
When something is free, you always have to ask who is paying for it — or another way of putting it is when you read something free, you, the reader, are the product, packaged and sold to those who want to sell you something. (Noting, of course, that you aren’t paying to read this article and you are seeing adverts around and through my words).
The automotive media is there to sell cars, to capture automotive advertising, marketing, and PR spends. It is part of what funds commercial media and the programmes we watch on TV, the news we read, the radio we listen to. There’s nothing wrong with this—this is just simply how our economy works.
However, if the brands spending the most money on advertising don’t have much to sell by way of EVs, does this have an influence on the way automotive journalists cover them?
Does it influence the talking points they choose to focus on in print and on breakfast TV? What is clear, though, is that in today’s media climate, controversy and sensationalism generate clicks and eyeballs, and these feed through into advertising revenue.
So there’s a simple prescription for the EV industry: if you want to sell more EVs, if you want to change the conversation, if you want to get some of the loud mouths in the automotive press to turn off the insidious drip drip of misinformation and disinformation on breakfast TV — spend and spend more on advertising, marketing, and PR.
Spend your money on new media voices like Everything Electric, The New Joneses, and The Driven (we have to eat as well). Spend your money on traditional media. Don’t forget that Australia is one of the most pay-for-play media markets on the planet. Take control of the coverage, take control of the narrative.
There is one more piece of advice. Now is not the time to be focussing on products and brands. A walk round Everything Electric today will show you that there are some truly amazing EVs to buy at every price point, many of which are now cheaper than their petrol equivalents.
Right now the industry needs to be spending collectively to sell the idea of electric motoring. Most Australians are completely oblivious to the fact that driving an EV is a safe, practical, and simple choice you can make today. Most Australians are unaware that driving an EV is awesome.
Ed will be speaking at Everything Electric, part of a panel discussing ‘Next-Gen EVs: What’s Coming Down Under?‘ at 10:30 on Sunday 16th November, hosted by Simone Annan.
Use code THEDRIVEN for 30% off tickets to Everything Electric Melbourne.
Ed Lynch-Bell is Principal at Second Mouse, dedicated to building more sustainable energy tech and mobility products, services and businesses. Ed is also a co-host of the Melbourne and Sydney EV Meet-ups, bringing the e-mobility industry together.
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Can't see the editorial bias of mainstream car media changing while they represent Toyota et al, brands that have a strangle hold on the car market. Toyotas next EV will be in 2027 and even then its unlikely to be a volume seller. Expect years more of the same from the publications and the usual suspects in the comments section.
What we really need to do is engage specialists in the area of change management - this is something that is well recognised in the area of project management.
Time to call and use the relevant professionals to assist.
Conspiracy mentality drives misinformation about EVs - News - The University of Queensland
You're zeroing in on the real obstacles to uptake of EV's with this and your previous articles Ed.
The Auto/media alliance is conflicted about EV's and still are pretending it's not happening and if they're lucky will go away.
The Government need to step in right now. They are exposing the truth about misinformation in the Senate Committee. The response to that is to step in with our tax payer dollars and tell Aussies why it's not only ok to get an EV but they are bloody ripper true blue vehicles. Show 'Aussies' camping and powering their houses with V2L. Tell Aussies how much $ leave the Country to pay for fuel. Tell em it's good for our national security. Tell em they don't spew out toxic fumes giving kids asthma. Show em dragging off a V8 Commodore while towing a trailer. Show the family with lots of room in the back seat waving at a servo as they pass it with the sun shining brightly behind them.
It's a bloody information war so lets fight it!
And including misinformation on purpose gets more attention and more revenue with little or any consequence for integrity and honesty. That is the problem.
The solution is quite simple. Fight disinformation with disinformation. Just spread the rumour that petrol fumes lead to autism, maybe even cancer. Hey, it worked for the anti-vaxers! It might even be true...
Nah, just spread the rumour that fossil fuel cars regularly catch on fire and so are really dangerous, maybe say that there are around 10,000 fossil fuel vehicle fires in Australia every year or around 25 each and every day.
Oh, wait, those things are actually true…
Understand that the old media, dealerships and oil industry have a common enemy in clean efficient and cheap mobility they need to disrupt, deny and delay for as long as possible....... for THEIR survival sake.
I very rarely see any signs on the roads showing where EV charging stations are.
I think that would be a simple way of raising awareness of EVs to the folk whom are oblivious of their existence.
Totally agree and have pointed this out repeatedly.
Let's not forget that the FF industry and FF-fed vehicle population is also joined by ICE vehicle-makers' massive investment in ICE vehicle factories, and they would rather not pick a date when they will kiss goodbye to those infrastructures - the presses, engine casting, transmission assemblies, the whole she-bang of components that are no longer needed for BEV manufacture. Based on past experience, they will hold out until ICE cars are actually illegal and then put their hand out for final government payouts to sweeten their abolition.
Government needs to start a campaign highlighting the pollution impacts of different types of vehicles. Big SUVs and 4wd utes cause more deaths through toxic pollution and CO2 emissions than cigarette smoking. EVs pollution deaths (from embodied emissions) are a small fraction of IC pollution deaths
https://www.rees-journal.org/articles/rees/full_html/2023/01/rees230036/rees230036.html
I wonder when they will realize this and do an anti-smoking type campaign and also ban advertising of these pollution machines. I think its not a matter of if but when they will have to start using sticks such as much higher 3rd party insurance and fuel taxes to push IC vehicles off the road.
You can't just blame the medi, your other article ED LYNCH-BELL AGL’s kerbside chargers join Chargefox – but why only one way? tells why people are so hestant to adopt EVs:
'We're still asking EV drivers to manage too many apps. Some offer RFID cards, some don't. Some participate in roaming, some don't. It's a mess that hinders adoption.'
It's all confusing the many stories I've read on charging failures and extended times to go somewhere are the real story. Until it's seamless, simple and quick to charge, I'm talking under 15 minutes, you won't swing the masses.
The misinformation and disinformation about the CEO of Tesla is incredible.
The misinformation and disinformation by the CEO of Tesla is incredible.
There, FTFY.
Perhaps we need to appeal to folks desire to do the right thing and their hip pocket nerve. We know that more people die as a direct result of vehicle exhaust emission than in road accidents (and many times more suffer medical complications). And whilst assisting clean up the air in our cities and suburbs, EV drivers can benefit from much lower running and maintenance costs. With EV prices now approaching ICE levels, there really is no excuse to not doing-the-right-thing by fellow citizens and ones bank balance.
I'm pretty sure that the mentioned bullet points against EVs are irrelevant to most potential buyers today. Relevant is range anxiety. Sure, many can charge at home for the daily drive, but "killing the weekend" - to cite this infamous argument - is something that many are getting headaches about.
Take any popular weekend destination - e.g. Port Stephens for Sydneysiders - and then imagine thousands of EVs that eventually have to recharge without the required infrastructure in place.
Just look at the available chargers up and down the coast - there are a few - but most aren't fast chargers, thus impractical, really. Stating that this is sufficient for a broader EV adoption is hilarious. If you want to have more EVs on the roads, put some serious effort into the fast charging infrastructure.
There are about 22 fast chargers in Port Stephens council area but nothing greater than 50kW at Nelson Bay. I see plenty of AC charging available. Some EVs can go there and back from Sydney without a charge.
Are you back again ? Pushing the FUD button about charging.
New chargers are going in all the time. I've never had an inconvenience with charging in 60k Km of driving. Still smiling all the way with virtually free motoring.
You really like your echo chamber.
As Cam above also confirmed - there is no charger with more than 50kW available in the Nelson Bay example. Sure, some may be able to do the Sydney-NB round trip without charging. But others don't want to wait for 1-2 hours while charging at such slow speeds at a limited number of charging stations. If you don't understand this, I can't help you really.
Again - once the infrastructure is in place, I (with no home charging option) will be more than happy to shift to an EV. So it's not as if I'm not on your side here, really (although you refuse to accept that, I reckon).
How many people would drive from Sydney to Nelson Bay, and then turn around and drive back the same day?
Stay at accommodation with a charger, and charge overnight.
And plenty of chargers between Sydney and Nelson Bay too.
You’re trying to turn a molehill into a mountain.
How many people stay on the campground in Nelson Bay? And then what?
You only have a richy-rich argument - like so many others here.
Assuming that all tourists can afford to rent a home - and on top of this that these homes even allow charging at all - is downright bizarre. I really don't know in which world you are living there.
You are the one who needs to acquaint yourself with reality. I made no mention of renting a home. Plugshare shows 5 hotels/motels in Nelson Bay that have AC charging:
I suspect most people who have EVs can also afford to book a motel for the night. After all, we are repeatedly told that EVs are only for the rich, so… 🙄
Alternatively, people coming from Sydney can charge at any of these DC fast chargers on the way or coming back, and not need to charge in Nelson Bay at all:
Most of the chargers are 22kW - thus suitable for overnight charging. That's good enough for how many EVs? Right.
Your argument that people can go back to the city at the initial charge is silly. Possible of course. But why are there 10 petrol stations on the peninsula then? You don't need 10 petrol stations for the handful of residents there. Just take the myriads of off-roaders in Nelson Bay - even if they wanted an EV, they couldn't come back to Sydney with the initial charge.
You can't argue with ideal scenarios and the assumption that people are willing to spend heaps of time for charging. That's the thing - unless the charging experience is close to refueling an ICE, EVs will not be mainstream.
I'm sure that we'll get there with fast chargers and solid-state batteries, but until then I don't see that most people will abandon their fossil fuel guzzlers. If this weren't the case, we'd see a massive uplift of EVs already - because EVs are cheaper to operate, and the pricing has almost reached parity now. But even with the crystal-clear advantages and heaps of models to choose from, the sales numbers are moderate at best.
Until the infrastructure issue has been resolved, it'll be hybrids or PHEVs for most. Well, in a couple of years anyway. The sad reality is that 70% of the sales aren't even hybrids, let alone EVs and PHEVs.
“That’s good enough for how many EVs?”
All of them.
Thanks for playing.