U.S. Electric Vehicles Saved 700 Million Gallons of Gasoline in 2021

Photo: Argonne National Laboratory (via Nat Bullard)

Electric vehicles (EVs) comprised the displacement of about 700 million gallons of gasoline in 2021, accounting for roughly 1.9 billion miles driven during the year, according to data shared by the Argonne National Laboratory (via @Nat Bullard from BloombergNEF).

Additionally, the data states that $1.3 billion was allocated away from gasoline purchases, representing a 0.54-percent reduction in U.S. gasoline consumption in 2021. The data also shows that 6.1 terawatt-hours were consumed in the same year by EVs.

The data comes from Argonne’s Assessment of Light-Duty Plug-in Electric Vehicles in the United States, analyzing EV data ranging from 2010-2021, and coming from the firm’s U.S. Department of Energy-managed laboratory outside of Chicago.

In 2020, EV drivers drove about 13 billion miles with a gasoline reduction of about 480 million gallons, marking a significant increase already from 2011’s 0.1 billion miles and just three million gallons of gasoline saved.

The news comes as Tesla remains the best-positioned in the shift to EVs, while other automakers continue to ramp up production efforts — both increasing competition and growing the number of EV options available to prospective buyers.

In California alone, Tesla has about 61 percent of the state’s market share even as other automakers have started bringing their first EV models to market, according to a report last month.