By Julie Hargreaves
Thanks for the birthday money, Grandad,
You’re welcome, love. What are you saving up for, anyway?
I’m going to buy an electric vehicle.
We’ve always bought Holdens in this family and proud of it. Stay away from Fords, love. Holdens are better.
They don’t make them anymore Grandad. But, anyway, they aren’t electric.
There’s nothing wrong with the ‘lectrics on Holdens. My old Holden has been going for years, never had a problem with their ‘lectrics.
No Grandad, electric vehicles run on electricity not on petrol. You charge up their battery at home. You don’t need to go to a petrol station for fuel.
Be careful, love. Bert at the bowls club was telling me how their batteries catch fire and burn down your house. It was on the news last week about someone who had one in his apartment and the whole block went up in flames.
I think that was an e-bike Grandad. You wouldn’t get a car up all those stairs.
Well, Bert says them ‘lectric cars are just as dangerous. You mark my words; it’ll go up in flames ‘cos of the battery.
Grandad, there are actually less electric vehicle fires than there are fires in ICE cars.
Don’t tell me they’re running cars on ice now. Whatever next?
No Grandad, ICE, I-C-E. Stands for Internal Combustion Engine. You know, like the old Holdens were?
Holdens never had no ice in ‘em, love. They just ran on petrol.
Well, Grandad, times have changed, and electric vehicles are the future now. They don’t emit greenhouse gases, so they’re better for the planet.
Bert was telling me about those greenhouse gases. Says they make plants grow. Can’t see what’s so bad in that.
But it’s greenhouse gases that’s making the planet hotter Grandad.
I don’t mind it a bit warmer. My old bones feel the cold. That’s why we go to Queensland in the winter. Lovely and warm up there.
But, Grandad, the planet getting warmer is what’s causing all the extreme weather we’re getting. It causes more floods, more droughts, and they’re forecasting worse bushfires to come.
It’s just cycles love, we’ve always had that in Australia. It’s the country of droughts and flooding rains, remember.
But Grandad, the extremes of weather are worse than they’ve ever been before. Each year climate records are being broken because the planet’s getting hotter. We even had to run our air-conditioner all last summer for the first time in the ten years we’ve been here. Tassy’s copping a lot of extreme weather now. And we can’t get insurance any more for our house because we’re in a flood zone as well as being a bushfire risk.
Well, I wouldn’t be buying a ‘lectric vehicle then, love, in case its battery starts a fire.