Toyota's dose of reality is a warning

When Toyota speaks, car buyers listen. Hopefully, our elected officials will as well.

It is one of the world’s two largest auto and truck manufacturers – twice the size of GM, our biggest. Toyota warns the world is far from ready to jettison gasoline and diesel engines and require batteries to run our replacements.

For Toyota, it is not just about finding enough critical battery material such as lithium, cobalt and nickel, but it is about having enough electricity in our power grid to recharge them.

Specifically, Toyota not only worries about our grid capacity today but in the future when at l...