[ustolemyname]

Only 19% of electricity generated today in the US is from coal, trending toward 0. Then consider larger fossil fuel power plants are far more efficient than the tiny engines in vehicles.

"Coal is used to power electric vehicles," is an argument that is more noise than signal.

[justinator]

This is regional dependent. The last time I looked in Colorado, and electric vehicle is actually spews more pollution when running than a gas car b/c of the amount of coal power plants that we run - much to the chagrine of all the Boulderites in their Teslas.

[ZeroGravitas]

This site suggests a Tesla 3 in Boulder gets 66 mpg-equivalent (more if they have solar):

https://evtool.ucsusa.org/

[seanmcdirmid]

Colorado is 30% NG and 30% coal, probably because a lot of coal is mined in adjacent Wyoming and MT. The rest are renewables. The coal number keeps dropping, so EV use will improve over time without upgrading the vehicle.