Carlos Ghosn, Electric Vehicles, and China

I friend sent me this interview the auto legend Carlos Ghosn, the CEO of a three-companies alliance: Renault, Nissan, and some Russian company with which I’m unfamiliar.  I think the world of Carlos Ghosn as an executive.  I attended the Los Angeles Auto Show in 2008, at which he spoke at length, and he impressed the heck out me with his commitment to EVs.

I also have great regard for Charlie Rose; in fact, I’m awestruck by his facility with so many disparate topics.  Obviously, he as an incredible team of researchers, writers, coaches, etc., but he still blows me away.

If you have 30 minutes to watch the interview, you’ll see that the topic of the huge Chinese auto market is a key focus.  This is a country with air pollution so severe that it’s causing over a million deaths per year, and, as we look at pictures like the one above, we naturally ask ourselves: how is it possible that air like that could do anything other than kill the people who are forced to breathe it?

We learn in the interview that China requires all entities who sell vehicles there to address the issue of emissions.  It’s hard to know exactly what means.  I would think that the main question at hand would be:  “Where does the energy come to charge them?” The answer, of course, is coal, and that’s exactly what the photo depicts.