If you add up all the particulate matter produced by operating a car, some of it comes out of the tailpipe and some of it comes from the brake pads abrading, some of it comes from the tires abrading, some of it comes from the road abrading.
Because an electric car weighs more that a conventional car, the electric car will produce more particulate from the brake pads, tires, and road(90%) than a conventional car(85%).
The particulate from brake pads, tire and the road are course and we worry more about the very fine particulates coming out of the tailpipe because it can get way down into your lungs. It can also get dispersed into the atmosphere and reflect sunlight; which can cause global cooling. The fine particulates can also be transported to the poles and fall on the ice, making the ice absorb more sunlight, causing the ice to melt faster, and flood out all the rich people in Miami Beach.
The particulate from brake pads, tires and the road mix with the crankcase oil on the road and when it showers, its like driving on oily ball bearings, until it rains enough to wash it off the road into the bar ditch, creek, river, and ocean, and the filter feeders like oysters and shrimp eat it.
A statement I took issue with in my initial post, because it lacks reference (at the least - the old 'how long is a piece of string' conundrum). Conversely, electric cars tend to be smaller ('compact') cars and the battery weight is offset by the lack of a heavy combustion engine.
How about a list of the vehicle weights of existing electric cars and standard ICE cars? Then we could make some informed comparisons. (With all the creature comfort and 'safety' additions, all cars these days are bloated pigs, IMO - what comes even close to a 700 kg/1500 pound car of yesteryear these days? - just sayin'!)
Lumping in tire and brake wear with exhaust emissions 'just like that' sounds iffy as well.
How about citing tire life (corrected for cross-section - electric cars seems to have narrower tires) and cubic inches of brake pad material used per 100,000 miles? I don't see it in the article. Etc. etc.
Don't get me wrong, I'm no EV fan, never owned one and likely never will, but the article as I see it reads 'stupid'.
And they live and die, along with tons and tons of dead plankton daily, fall to the ocean floor and turn into the black ooze, smashed down by tons of pressure in the ocean depths, and turn back into petroleum.