Automation in electric vehicle futures

Abstract

In this article we consider how people will live with the automated features of electric vehicles (EVs) in possible futures. We complicate dominant industry and government narratives which: envisage EVs as part of future fully automated systems - involving remote or wireless EV charging, vehicle-to-grid and vehicle-to-home electricity systems; and see these moves as driving a transition to decarbonisation, renewable energy and environmental sustainability and planetary health. We argue instead that the roles of automation in people’s everyday lives with EVs in the present and possible futures are shaped by the particularities of life itself, and the places and localities in which it is experienced. Our research shows that how people live with automation is likely to pivot on everyday values of care and safety, and implies a future life where people remain in control of automated features, rather than signing up for fully automated systems. To understand the future of EV automation therefore, we must look to how people navigate such values and how they apply everyday creativity and innovation in possible, future contingent circumstances. To develop this we draw on our analysis of industry materials, online ethnography, documentary filmmaking and futures workshops.