We Can’t Let Governments Regulate E-Bikes To Death – CleanTechnica

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E-bikes are essential to efforts to address not only climate change, but urban pollution, congestion, and many other problems. But, like any good thing, there’s always a temptation to give into fear and try to control new technologies with an iron fist. In this article, I’m going to discuss why this is such a problem and what we should be doing instead.

The Importance of E-Bikes

Let’s start with the obvious: e-bikes are a pivotal technology for addressing climate change, primarily due to their significant reduction in carbon emissions compared to traditional transport methods. Their light weight compared not only to cars, but even to a passenger’s share of a bus or train puts them among the cleanest and most efficient methods of travel. Nothing beats them but walking or a non-electric bike, regardless of whether it’s a slow e-bike or a faster electric motorcycle.

The manufacturing and lifecycle emissions of e-bikes are also considerably lower than those of electric cars and trucks, positioning e-bikes as a more immediate and impactful solution to battery shortages and the need to reduce overall emissions.

Cities further benefit because the adoption of e-bikes leads to a direct reduction in car usage, with studies indicating a decrease in a household that buys one of up to 19%. This shift not only cuts down on emissions but also alleviates traffic congestion and reduces the demand for parking spaces, contributing indirectly to lower urban heat island effects and improved air quality. Everyone, even people staying in cars, benefits from less congestion.

The benefits of e-bikes extend beyond immediate emission reductions. They make physical activity more fun, which decreases healthcare costs. E-bikes also democratize cycling by making it accessible to a broader demographic, including those for whom traditional biking might be too strenuous, or for people who can’t show up sweaty to work (but could get some exercise in on the way home). This means their ability to replace car miles is naturally greater than non-electric bikes.

In other words, there’s just no substitute for them. We need all of them we can get, even if they’re imperfect.

“Won’t Somebody Please Think Of The Children?!”

Sadly, there’s a segment of the population (the majority in some less sane countries) who fear all new things. To some people, computers were frightening. Smartphones? Terrifying. Look at all of these zombies reading their phone screens instead of socializing!!!

Fear of new things can be compounded by actual problems, even when the problems are pretty rare. Some people really do get addicted to video games, leading ignorant people to suggest government regulation of video games. There’s no freedom too important for fearful people to not wander their way into a desire for tyranny, just so long as the tyrants protect them from their imagined or exaggerated fears.

Sadly, we’re seeing this play out against e-bikes in the UK:

Another 9 illegal bikes off our roads to be crushed! Keeping our most vulnerable road users safe. PS Ford #RoadSafety 🚲 🚶🏻‍♂️🧍‍♀️ pic.twitter.com/ubA1eWWCCT

— City Police Officers (@CityPoliceCops) September 5, 2024

These e-bikes look like something you’d see in the United States. Sure, there are some jerk-offs who do stupid things with their e-bikes, injuring themselves and others, but the vast majority of people who buy an e-bike use it for transportation, recreation, and sometimes even work. Whether they buy the bike from a local bike shop or buy something from one of the many companies who will ship you one cheap, this is the case.

But, unlike the United States, UK voters are more comfortable with being told what to do. Limits on motor power, bike features, and other things are not only tolerated, but celebrated. Fear of things like a throttle that doesn’t require you to pedal has led to very strict regulations on the vehicles. Instead of waiting for someone to ride recklessly, they proactively look for bikes that violate these obscenely strict laws and confiscate them, depriving people of their transportation.

Instead of suggesting that the government leave e-bike owners alone, there are even subjects (note that I don’t use the term “citizen” when referring to people with this mentality) who suggest a licensing scheme that includes insurance for these “motorcycles”. Others suggest that these bikes are some sort of stealth weapon thieves use to steal people’s phones.

But, to some commenters’ credit, there were people who took the police to task for not seeing that cars hurt vulnerable road users a lot more often and in worse ways than the less responsible e-bike owners. Sadly, they’re outnumbered by voters who subscribe to the Helen Lovejoy philosophy:

Trading Liberty For Safety Isn’t The Answer

This is one of those times where I’m glad that the first Sensiba in the United States turned on his masters and escaped slavery. Sadly, he was born into serfdom in present-day Germany and was pressed into service as a mercenary. The British used slave mercenaries during the Revolutionary War when they were short on Redcoats, paying the Hessians for their slaves’ services. But, some of them saw the opportunity at a better life and ran away to join the Continental Army.

The escaped Hessian mercenaries obviously weren’t the first people to turn on the British. For a variety of reasons that ranged from taxation to speech restrictions to massacres, American colonists got sick of being told what to do by people thousands of miles away. They started by doing things like tarring and feathering politicians and dumping tea in the harbor to provoke an overreaction, kind of like Agent K in Men in Black.

Like the giant alien cockroach, responding with force to the colonists’ relatively minor provocations didn’t go well. The best example of this was probably the Boston Massacre, in which the Redcoats became the bad guy of the story in an irreversible way. The rest is history.

While there are definitely downsides to the American culture of ungovernability (readers no doubt have a number of examples they’d like to talk about in the comments), it’s possible to be too obedient and too accustomed to government power. When a culture and a society gets like that, you get to the point where too much law and order starts to hinder a society’s ability to adopt new technologies, like e-bikes.

We have to keep in mind what happens to the owners of these nine e-bikes (along with the thousands of others that have likely been seized). When the Bobbies threw all of the money it took to buy the bike in the toilet and flushed it, at least some of the owners won’t be able to replace the bike anytime soon. Some will go to transit, which isn’t a downright terrible outcome in the UK, but others are going to start spending more time behind the wheel, increasing carbon emissions.

At then end of the day, London’s least fine are proving Benjamin Franklin right when he said, “Those who would give up essential liberty to purchase a little temporary safety, deserve neither liberty nor safety.”

To get a feeling of safety, people allowed their government to strictly regulate e-bikes, but their long-term safety from climate change ended up being compromised in the bargain.

Featured image by Jennifer Sensiba.