As a career engineer who spent a lifetime in main street economy, I admire your common sense and knowledge of electrical power transmission issues.
Back in the days of George Putnam’s Talkback show on KIEV (now KRLA) there was a frequent caller who explained that petroleum fuels, with diesel being the at top, has the most energy per pound of fuel of any available. It was during these discussions that I learned about how the power loss in generation and transmission made it more efficient to just burn gasoline in an ICE than burn gas to generate electricity and transmit it to a charging station to run your car.
That being said, if the shortcomings of electric vechicles can be safely resolved and abundant electric power created, perhaps through nuclear power plants, then the gains in air quality, especially where I live, might be a good trade for less overall efficiency. But in the meantime reality must be acknowledged.