It's from this TED talk
I've been arguing this point in the Chevy Bolt forum.
The information Graham presents isn't entirely accurate, for instance he understates the CO2 released from burning gasoline in a standard ICE by about half. The main thing is that his progressive stance questions conventional wisdom that EVs are the only and best way forward.
The fact is that we are battery constrained, and in light of this fact, it makes no sense to subsidize auto manufacturers to make them. That is essentially what the federal tax subsidy is; an incentive to raise EV prices to capture most of the tax credit. I'll leave aside the fact that it's a regressive tax and it mostly benefits foreign auto manufacturers (because most are foreign).
Plug-in Hybrid Electric Vehicles (PHEV) should have been way more popular. Then minimize the expensive and sucky part of battery vehicles (the battery), and maximize the utility of it. They leverage the strengths of both ICE and electric to minimize fossil fuel consumption, improve performance, and eliminate range anxiety.
Here's my analysis and comments I made on the other forum;
4 PHEV batteries can be made from an equivalently sized EV battery. Even given very pessimistic assumptions about PHEVs in real world use, we can do some simple math.
Assume 12,000 miles driven per year
Assume 50% of PHEV miles are driven in EV mode
4 x 12,000 x 50% = 24,000 EV miles
1 x 12,000 x 100% = 12,000 EV miles
In a worst case scenario, given limited battery resources, getting 4 people to drive a PHEV will result in at least twice as many EV miles as 1 person driving all EV miles.