Pavel, you are spot on regarding the influence of the Greenies in the EU, but you are in a much better position to know the details on that than I am.... at least for the next few months.  After that the U.S. may catch up with the EU or even surpass it with our change in political power structure.  Bottom line:  there is definite political power behind the effort to move forward with alternative electricity power generation in much of the world today.  The pressure on ICE automobile manufacturing is definitely a real factor in the market now and should result in increased demand for alternative energy sources of all kinds, including lithium batteries.  Some previous reports regarding the rapidity of the shift from ICE to EV have already been revised to reflect a faster conversion than previously thought possible.  Those previous estimates were before many of the auto manufacturers and many of the governments made their announcements of converting their products largely to EVs and their government mandates on the auto industry to emission standards that largely preclude the existence of large numbers of ICE vehicles in their countries after a preselected point in time.  

The scales have tipped!

The solution for the loss of tax revenue from gasoline taxes has already been found, at least here in Nevada.  Cars are re-registered yearly for license plate stickers and have to have annual smog certification testing.  As part of the re-registration process, automobile owners must now report the odometer mileage reading at the time of re-registration.  The plan, as it relates to EV owners, is to do a mileage tax yearly on auto owners.  The government has figured out how to plug the hole in tax revenues so that EV owners are not going to get that tax break they might have hoped for when they bought their EV.  One big question, to me at least, is:  Will the government actually charge more in taxes with this new system that will be applied to EV owners than they would have if they had kept their old gas burning ICE vehicle?

The new system of taxation actually gives the government a chance to take a bigger piece of the pie and I am certain that local, state and federal governments have not left that possibility unnoticed.  You know the saying:  Nothing is sure in life except death and taxes.  How true.