One of the arguments that critics of electric vehicles always raise is that most electricity in the U.S. is generated by burning coal..... which is a very high air pollutant and threat to our ozone layer. Let's discuss this head on.
In my book, I provide one argument that critics can't get around...that is that electric vehicles are far superior in efficiency to gas powered vehicles. This point alone is a reason to accelerate electric vehicle usage; i.e. at minimum we slow the use of needed energy to power our world.
The second point is that instead of trying to re-invigorate an industry that's not going to come back, we should be investing in technologies that accelerate us to the front of the energy usage for the future. Here's a good example. There are many potential ways to generate electricity as shown in this video from the Facebook SciencNaturePage by Hashem Al-Ghaili. Watch the video and you tell me whether this is the type of investment the U.S. government should be exploring instead of resurrecting the mining industry for electricity?
https://www.facebook.com/ScienceNaturePage/videos/1214829505315972
For me... we should move toward future opportunities instead of holding on to past success.