I don't get why some people don't get ebikes.

I managed to avoid comment on the people shredding up trails using hopped up e-bikes as some kind of motorbike substitute.
Interestingly we were stopped-and-talking-nonsense during a long ride on the Downs and heard a weird zzzzzz-ing noise and three guys shot past on full blown MX bikes - proper armour etc - and electric. If they had been on two-strokes or four-bangers it would had shattered the peace and been a bit upsetting. They were on a remote bridleway not a greenway so they were strictly illegal. But somehow, and a bit illogically, it felt fine. They came, they went. And much better than IC rowdiness. If they had been on e-bikes I would have just sighed and thought ‘get an effing proper bike’
 
Regardless of whether or not there's an agenda in that article, the reality is complex. Obviously, even if riding an ebike has a lower carbon footprint than regular cycling, carbon emissions are only one type of pollutant. The other pollutants in battery manufacture are no less of a concern. Equally, much depends on the type of food consumed by riders and how it's produced; after all, some forms of agriculture are more damaging than others (and again, not solely as a result of carbon emissions). Likewise, the carbon footprint of an ebike depends on how the electricity that's used to charge the battery is generated.

To be fair, the author of the article is clearly aware of these issues and he's very candid about the limitations of the comparison being made, even saying that one part is 'simplistic' and that another is 'UK-centric'. However, what has been shown is no more than that, given certain assumptions, ebikes could have lower carbon footprints than regular cycling. The article doesn't consider overall environmental impacts and how they are affected by varying the assumptions (but doing that would be more like a PhD thesis than an article for mass consumption!). It's food for thought rather than conclusive.
To be fair the author is writing nonsense.
To follow his logic e-bikes have a lower carbon footprint than joggers walkers and hikers as they eat more.
 
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