The Eurocrats’ fleet of 128 cars was introduced back in 2022 as part of an effort to make operations more environmentally friendly. Electric vehicles now make up 80% of the fleet, which is expected to be entirely zero-emission by 2027.
As the deadline approaches, Brussels officials appear to have orchestrated a “leak” to a sympathetic media outlet, apparently to avert the impending disaster.
An Eco-Friendly Future
It is no surprise that many are taking some pleasure in the commissioners’ frustration. Brussels has pushed through a gradual phase-out of the sale of internal combustion engine cars by 2035, despite warnings from experts that such a move is not feasible.
Neither car manufacturers nor their customers are ready for it. That means us, the consumers. The charging infrastructure certainly is not ready either.
Apparently, it is not even sufficient on the main Strasbourg–Brussels route traveled back and forth by the rulers of Brussels.
Pressure from automakers has paid off, and the de facto ban on conventional cars from 2035 now appears likely to be lifted. Their protests caught the European commissioners off guard.
Before they pushed through the disastrous changes and strapped all of Europe into the straitjacket of semi-functional electric cars, they had no information about the problems this would cause. Or rather, they ignored them. The architect of a bright future never lets reality get in the way, especially when it contradicts his pseudo-religious creed.
However, the commissioners forgot that the same policy would also apply to their own fleet. That is likely why a leak had to be staged through a sympathetic media outlet as a prelude to softening the rules for themselves.
The Politico article includes a cartoon of European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen, patiently waiting with her head in her hand over a croissant and a small espresso at a gas station café, while a charging cable runs from her electric vehicle through the window. In the background, a television news segment carries a teaser on the “energy crisis”.
It was precisely this energy crisis that led European officials to push for electric vehicles, in order to reduce dependence on energy sources from sensitive parts of the world. Since there was no real data to support this idea, things turned out as they always do: exactly the opposite.
It is rather like Germany, which in recent years suddenly had to reactivate its dirtiest coal-fired power plants after phasing out clean nuclear power and switching to “intermittent energy sources”, as renewables might more accurately be called. Since these sources generate power only intermittently, the threat of a grid collapse had to be averted at short notice by bringing coal plants back online.
Nuclear power was no longer available. As a result, Germany has in recent years produced some of its dirtiest electricity in decades.
How to Keep Moving
The European commissioners’ fleet includes large BMWs that are not well suited to long journeys without recharging. The issue of necessary stops and the frustration they cause was reportedly discussed during a meeting of the College of Commissioners earlier this year.
Those who complained were reportedly told to raise the matter with Budget Commissioner Piotr Serafin, who is responsible for administration.
No, clearly this matter is serious enough to be addressed at a higher level.
The Politico article also contains this detail: the alternative to stopping is to drive at a crawl along the motorway to conserve battery power. “But it doesn’t really work”, said one official working for an irritated commissioner, who was granted anonymity to speak frankly.
Such a journey could take up to seven hours. Commissioners often have to drive at night and stop at gas stations at unsafe times.
They reportedly cannot travel by train because they have to handle sensitive phone calls while on the move. So that option is off the table as well.
The search for solutions produced an almost comic result. Hungarian Commissioner Oliver Varhelyi has reportedly found a way around the problem: he leaves his official car during the journey and secretly gets into a conventional one.
Three sources confirmed this to Politico.
There is, however, another way out. The frustrated officials can take inspiration from their boss. Ursula von der Leyen is spared the charging problems of her subordinates.
Under security protocols, she must travel in an armored vehicle. According to her team, no suitable electric armored model is currently available.
The key word is “currently”. Presumably, one will be invented at about the same time as the first electric tank.
A Taste of Their Own Medicine
One cannot help feeling a little sorry for the European officials and their difficult lot. Not because they now have to swallow the medicine they brewed for everyone else, but because of the mindset it reveals.
They imposed pseudo-scientific rules detached from reality across Europe, only to discover their absurdity firsthand. In their campaign against conventional cars, they have woven the noose around their own necks.
That, at least, gives them something in common with the average European, who is being marched backward through history in the name of progress.
It is entirely possible that our European leaders really knew nothing about the problems with electric vehicles. Opponents of their ideas were apparently dismissed as Russian trolls and loudmouths: enemies of the West merely because they objected to the bright futures sketched out in Brussels playbooks.
In that sense, it is fitting that they are now discovering what they have dragged Europe into.
This suggests an interesting model for solving other European problems. In September 2022, in Burgdorf, Lower Saxony, a wolf killed a pony named Dolly on a family farm. Ordinarily, this might not have changed much. Wolf problems in Germany are nowhere near as serious as Slovakia’s problem with overpopulated bears attacking people. But this case was different.
Dolly was Ursula von der Leyen’s favorite pony.
Suddenly, the impossible became possible. The authorities authorized the shooting of the wolf.
At the time, Slovakia, even under strict Brussels regulations, was not allowed to kill bears that had killed people.
Perhaps EU officials are capable of responding to ordinary human concerns after all. They may seem like the cream of some alien civilization, but when they descend from their ivory tower, they apparently still have human instincts.
The principle could be applied more broadly. If EU officials want to force giant wind turbines on unwilling citizens in the name of progress, perhaps they should first be required to install one in their own backyards.
Then they might finally understand the “joy” they seek to impose on others.
