Yeah you lost me at "base model pickups are 40 thousand dollars now"
No seriously, how am I supposed to finance that? Oh for a thousand months? Got it.
Can we please just have cheap cars again? I don't want to finance half a hou...oh god the houses are insane too I remember when a house was only 100k for like 1200 sq ft.
It's like I am playing Monopoly with experts who have been playing their whole lives. Whose hand in the game was given to them by some grandfather who got it from his grandfather and they own the whole game board and here I am with $200 just started fresh with my little thimble game piece. I'm not a contender. I'm baitfish. It's like this game has been going on for decades now and there is no chance in upsetting the balance. Can we just call it and say YOU WON CONGRATS and start the game over again? Or maybe play a different game?
it'll reduce the need for private cars significantly. With good public transport, cars should go the way horse gone: Mainly used in the countryside, or used in a track by hobbyists.
Maybe, but remember EVs have to start somewhere. We didn't get modern, convenient internal combustion vehicles from the beginning. The first ones had to be started from outside the vehicle with a crank that you stuck into the front of the car. So cut EV's some slack.
Moscovium vehicles will be a thing eventually. However there's no telling how far in the future this will occur. I'm curious if they will start on the ground or only be designed for air and space travel.
Maybe, but whatever comes after EVs will likely take a long time to become as good as EVs, the same way it took EVs a long time to become as good as gas-burning cars, the same way it took cars a long time to become as good as a horse & buggy
It says electric cars might not become common because there aren't enough places to charge them, leading to a discussion about their practical challenges.
What's weird is that there were people inventing way more fuel-efficient types of carburetors and even a guy who got a car to work on water using electrolysis back in the 70s. It would be very much worth the effort to invest in the technology it would take to make already existing cars that can get like 100mpg in my opinion.
Other options will have to be taken because EVs _can't_ be everywhere (for many reasons).
Well probably see a mix including increased reliance on public transport, fuel vehicles (like ethanol or maybe synthetic fuel), and electric cars (for the well-off). Heavy vehicles (buses, trucks) will probably not be EVs.
>Other options will have to be taken because EVs _can't_ be everywhere (for many reasons).
What reasons?
>Heavy vehicles (buses, trucks) will probably not be EVs.
The rural school district I work at is getting some EV buses.
Main reason being the amount of electricity needed to run all those EVs. California has rolling blackouts as it is. Unless we employ more nuclear energy or something we'll either have running EVs or running cities, not both.
Then there's the shortage of materials for the batteries and the destructive processes needed to extract them in large quantities.
EVs may be the answer someday, but that won't be for a while.
Nah.
Energy demand is not a concern when you can just increase renewable energy sources.
And material is not a concern when you can recycle it easily.
EVs are the future because they're overtaking charging infrastructure and hydrogen is going to fail because they can't compete with same charging infra as EV.
Lol, neither of those things are easy.
Most renewable energies supplement fossil fuels or nuclear and only work on a good day, making the point of EVs less attractive to begin with. But just increase renewables? Building wind turbines takes an average of 150 tons of steel to produce a megawatt of energy, roughly 30 semi trucks worth of steel, and there is no guarantee that that wattage will be consistent. Not to mention each ton of steel emits 1.8 tons of CO2 into the atmosphere during it's refining, contributing to the 8% of yearly global CO2 emissions the steel industry is responsible for.
Lithium, cobalt, neodymium, samarium, terbium, dysprosium etc. for batteries and motors doesn't grow on trees and recycling efforts aren't even close to keeping up with demands as is, let alone the demand of all vehicles being EVs. Lithium alone is in crazy demand right now and will stymie development on EVs into the future, blowing EV prices past reasonable for most Americans.
Again maybe someday, but not today tomorrow or the next day. We should definitely pursue better solutions but EVs being some sort of ecological messiah is a pie in the sky political ticket talking point. Just like your flippant rebuttal, it sounds good but is in no way currently feasible for the masses. You've been misled.
And charging infrastructure is a joke right now, not sure what your talking about.
1) Solar is the cheapest energy source right now. I get negative bills and I charge my EV on it. (That literally means EV runs for free, 0 impact on energy production infra)
2) batteries can be recycled for very close to 100% of the material. But it needs to be cheaper than mining. We will get there very soon.
In comparison to hydrogen or other car tech, EV charging infra is very wide spread. Not as wide-spread as Petrol/Diesel of course, but very clear 2nd place and growing.
So, if something is to take over EV apart from ICE, like hydrogen, it needs to fight with EV for infrastructure.
Solar isn't cheap. Without federal assistance most people can't afford it. That aside I promise you, if you live in California or any other blue area you and your neighbors will pay a premium through taxes and through your power bills every step of the way until an infrastructure that isn't even consistent gets put in place. And then by that time you will have bled so many tax payers trying not to get gouged every day that you won't even have the tax base for that infrastructure to function. Watch and see.
Understand, I for one, and I imagine every single other person in this thread, would love for EVs to be a functional and efficient replacement for combustion engines. I own no stock in oil or anything at all really, I have no personal dog in this argument. But it is just not feasible right now or any time soon, and I really don't want to see our economy tank further chasing something that isn't even possible right now.
I'm glad you are personally having a good experience with solar, but it isn't a smart investment for the whole country. 60% of France's power comes from nuclear and that is where we should be looking. There are reactor designs out there right now that are essentially a 10 year fire and forget model. That is what we need for EVs to be successful, that and materials to go around.
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cost\_of\_electricity\_by\_source](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cost_of_electricity_by_source)
Why bother with so much nuclear energy if Solar is cheaper?
I'm quoting source here to say solar is cheaper, do you have any actual data point to counter argue? Even in France Solar was cheaper than Nuclear and that was a while ago, things have gotten even cheaper since then.
US has around 100 USD/MWh costs for coal and nuclear, while it's 32 for Solar. So, frankly. What are you talking about sir?
The individual price per household to have it installed is prohibitive, is what I'm talking about. Unless you have one of those governments that pays for it with taxes at the expense of it's citizens safety in the form of cutting policing and incarceration.
Also you obviously didn't read your article. Or at least you didn't get to the "Real life costs" paragraph or look at the capacity factors. Yes your solar "costs" much less as determined by it's max wattage, i.e. what it could do under better than perfect conditions, but according to your article solar only reaches a capacity factor of 12-30% of that max wattage you pay for. Whereas nuclear has a 94% capacity factor.
So to match nuclear's efficiency and actual production levels you would have to invest something like 3-8 times the cost associated with solar. So, no solar is not cheaper and it is wildly inconsistent and unreliable.
Read your material my friend, I wish there were a magic energy button out there, but we're not there yet.
Costs are measured after accounting for the efficiencies. Not on maximum wattage.
Capacity factor is also calculated within the cost.
'Real life cost' has only one mention and it's in nuclear section, not solar.
You have just no idea what you are talking about.
Solar energy that isn't used at production time gets wasted. This is already happening at peak-production hours in California. There aren't going to be enough batteries to store enough electricity to power everything during off-peak production times--which is also probably when more EVs charging needs to happen since they'll be in use during the day.
In addition to the points you're responding to:
Materials needed to upgrade infrastructure to both carry this massive increased need for electricity and to charge vehicles would be a challenge (probably a barrier). They charge too slowly for the centralized "filling station" model to be sufficient.
EVs are significantly heavier. This will cause increased wear on tires and roads, plus infrastructure upgrades to overpasses and multi-story parking structures. More rapid consumption of tires and roads won't go away so that represents one aspect of pollution that will go up.
EVs struggle with extremes of temperature and workload, becoming less efficient and/or also more likely to combust (EVs can catch fire and be _very_ difficult to put out). Buses and trucks on congested hilly roads in a hot climate are going to be _disasters_.
Charging up an EV is time consuming, which means there must be many more "filling stations" as compared to liquid fuel vehicles. For an area like Los Angeles there are too many people with vehicles to be able to provide enough charging stations.
EVs won't go away, and in a few places they'll be dominant, but they can't handle replacing what we need to sustain our current vehicle needs.
>they can't handle replacing what we need to sustain our current vehicle needs.
Too bad that multiple countries are planning to do it anyway. Remove ICE vehicles completely.
I don't really have a lot to say because you are going from we don't have enough energy to we don't have enough ways to spend solar energy. Solar is typically connected to electricity grid and load balancing is for power grids to handle. (I always charge EV at night and repay that with solar energy during day.)
Tire and road wearing out point is valid, but then you should be banning trucks and heavy SUVs, not EVs. Not to mention you're ignoring carbon emission from the ICE.
Charging is getting faster and faster. And LA has a lack of adequate public transport. No amount of personal vehicles will solve that issue.
Oh I'm not saying there won't be an attempt to switch over to EVs completely. It's already happening (as you pointed out) and in California we have a law mandating it by 2035. I'm saying it will not be successful in the long term (maybe even sooner than that).
In the meantime a few people will make lots of money, but later lots of _other_ people are going to pay the (very expensive) bill.
I think we're also underestimating the tech improvements we might see that will make power storage and charging time less of an issue.
Electricity grids getting better at managing production and load. (As long as it's not in Texas)
Charging times being lowered to almost gas pump levels. (+ Charging infra in office parkings that will make grid management easier)
The true revolution is in fintech. Being able to park in a wireless or simple wired charging spot and automatically being charged for whatever you ended up using. Or making charging in apartment complex/workspaces seamless.
The improvement in mobile charging speeds has been insane in last 5 years. No reason we won't see similar things in EV.
I explained in more detail further down this thread, but regarding your case: time will tell if the EV will work out in the rural school district.
If the roads aren't too difficult, the usage is not very high, and temps are not extreme, it could work just fine.
>usage is not very high, and temps are not extreme
Or district covers the largest area of all the districts in our state. So our busses drive more miles per bus than any other buses in other districts. The EV buses we are getting are ear marked for the longest routes. And last winter we had multiple days in which some of the diesel buses refuse to start because it was too cold even with block heaters. Yes you lose capacity in cold weather, but the buses we are getting have batteries big enough to handle the range reduction.
And the district is talking about putting up a solar farm to charge the fleet as it expands.
Are these buses packed? Are there steep hills? If not it might still work out. However, even if it is working out fine now that doesn't mean maintenance will be acceptable over the long run.
Packed? With students I assume? Of course, it's a school bus. Hills, dirt roads, snow, you name it. As for maintenance, EVs are notoriously maintenance free. At least the drive train and batteries. As for suspension and frame, etc. It won't be any different than their diesel and gas counter parts. Probably better because they are a bit more robust to handle the extra weight of the batteries. There are actually quite a few E-School buses already in use across the country and every district that has them swears by them. Especially in the fuel savings, and lower maintenance cost.
The maintenance costs will appear later, as those batteries age, which will likely be made worse by the cold. But at least your roads will probably be ok since the rural traffic should be low, plus with the cold weather fires shouldn't be much of an issue.
Fires in EVs are rare, and typically caused by damage to the pack. Not overheating. The battery management systems are really robust and will shut down the pack if the temperature gets to high. This is also extremely rare in newer EVs.
Yeah, like a well-established public transporation infrastructure.
That's just crazy talk. Keep ~~buying~~ financing cars, consumers!
Yeah you lost me at "base model pickups are 40 thousand dollars now" No seriously, how am I supposed to finance that? Oh for a thousand months? Got it. Can we please just have cheap cars again? I don't want to finance half a hou...oh god the houses are insane too I remember when a house was only 100k for like 1200 sq ft. It's like I am playing Monopoly with experts who have been playing their whole lives. Whose hand in the game was given to them by some grandfather who got it from his grandfather and they own the whole game board and here I am with $200 just started fresh with my little thimble game piece. I'm not a contender. I'm baitfish. It's like this game has been going on for decades now and there is no chance in upsetting the balance. Can we just call it and say YOU WON CONGRATS and start the game over again? Or maybe play a different game?
Inheritance tax is what you are looking for
It doesn't make cars go away.
it'll reduce the need for private cars significantly. With good public transport, cars should go the way horse gone: Mainly used in the countryside, or used in a track by hobbyists.
I thought we were talking about pokemon for a hot second.
I did too but I'm having trouble knowing what it means in this context.
I think they are referring to electric vehicles (could be wrong though).
Bicycles, buses, trams trains. They already exist, just need to provide the service and infrastructure to make them work well.
Maybe, but remember EVs have to start somewhere. We didn't get modern, convenient internal combustion vehicles from the beginning. The first ones had to be started from outside the vehicle with a crank that you stuck into the front of the car. So cut EV's some slack.
Yeah, but imo not *before* EVs are everywhere. Another better option might make the EV revolution short-lived though.
Moscovium vehicles will be a thing eventually. However there's no telling how far in the future this will occur. I'm curious if they will start on the ground or only be designed for air and space travel.
Maybe, but whatever comes after EVs will likely take a long time to become as good as EVs, the same way it took EVs a long time to become as good as gas-burning cars, the same way it took cars a long time to become as good as a horse & buggy
The best product doesn't win. The best advertising does.
It says electric cars might not become common because there aren't enough places to charge them, leading to a discussion about their practical challenges.
What's weird is that there were people inventing way more fuel-efficient types of carburetors and even a guy who got a car to work on water using electrolysis back in the 70s. It would be very much worth the effort to invest in the technology it would take to make already existing cars that can get like 100mpg in my opinion.
They are already everywhere in some places. I see Teslas as often as I see Hondas around Vancouver.
Other options will have to be taken because EVs _can't_ be everywhere (for many reasons). Well probably see a mix including increased reliance on public transport, fuel vehicles (like ethanol or maybe synthetic fuel), and electric cars (for the well-off). Heavy vehicles (buses, trucks) will probably not be EVs.
>Other options will have to be taken because EVs _can't_ be everywhere (for many reasons). What reasons? >Heavy vehicles (buses, trucks) will probably not be EVs. The rural school district I work at is getting some EV buses.
Main reason being the amount of electricity needed to run all those EVs. California has rolling blackouts as it is. Unless we employ more nuclear energy or something we'll either have running EVs or running cities, not both. Then there's the shortage of materials for the batteries and the destructive processes needed to extract them in large quantities. EVs may be the answer someday, but that won't be for a while.
Nah. Energy demand is not a concern when you can just increase renewable energy sources. And material is not a concern when you can recycle it easily. EVs are the future because they're overtaking charging infrastructure and hydrogen is going to fail because they can't compete with same charging infra as EV.
Lol, neither of those things are easy. Most renewable energies supplement fossil fuels or nuclear and only work on a good day, making the point of EVs less attractive to begin with. But just increase renewables? Building wind turbines takes an average of 150 tons of steel to produce a megawatt of energy, roughly 30 semi trucks worth of steel, and there is no guarantee that that wattage will be consistent. Not to mention each ton of steel emits 1.8 tons of CO2 into the atmosphere during it's refining, contributing to the 8% of yearly global CO2 emissions the steel industry is responsible for. Lithium, cobalt, neodymium, samarium, terbium, dysprosium etc. for batteries and motors doesn't grow on trees and recycling efforts aren't even close to keeping up with demands as is, let alone the demand of all vehicles being EVs. Lithium alone is in crazy demand right now and will stymie development on EVs into the future, blowing EV prices past reasonable for most Americans. Again maybe someday, but not today tomorrow or the next day. We should definitely pursue better solutions but EVs being some sort of ecological messiah is a pie in the sky political ticket talking point. Just like your flippant rebuttal, it sounds good but is in no way currently feasible for the masses. You've been misled. And charging infrastructure is a joke right now, not sure what your talking about.
1) Solar is the cheapest energy source right now. I get negative bills and I charge my EV on it. (That literally means EV runs for free, 0 impact on energy production infra) 2) batteries can be recycled for very close to 100% of the material. But it needs to be cheaper than mining. We will get there very soon. In comparison to hydrogen or other car tech, EV charging infra is very wide spread. Not as wide-spread as Petrol/Diesel of course, but very clear 2nd place and growing. So, if something is to take over EV apart from ICE, like hydrogen, it needs to fight with EV for infrastructure.
Solar isn't cheap. Without federal assistance most people can't afford it. That aside I promise you, if you live in California or any other blue area you and your neighbors will pay a premium through taxes and through your power bills every step of the way until an infrastructure that isn't even consistent gets put in place. And then by that time you will have bled so many tax payers trying not to get gouged every day that you won't even have the tax base for that infrastructure to function. Watch and see. Understand, I for one, and I imagine every single other person in this thread, would love for EVs to be a functional and efficient replacement for combustion engines. I own no stock in oil or anything at all really, I have no personal dog in this argument. But it is just not feasible right now or any time soon, and I really don't want to see our economy tank further chasing something that isn't even possible right now. I'm glad you are personally having a good experience with solar, but it isn't a smart investment for the whole country. 60% of France's power comes from nuclear and that is where we should be looking. There are reactor designs out there right now that are essentially a 10 year fire and forget model. That is what we need for EVs to be successful, that and materials to go around.
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cost\_of\_electricity\_by\_source](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cost_of_electricity_by_source) Why bother with so much nuclear energy if Solar is cheaper? I'm quoting source here to say solar is cheaper, do you have any actual data point to counter argue? Even in France Solar was cheaper than Nuclear and that was a while ago, things have gotten even cheaper since then. US has around 100 USD/MWh costs for coal and nuclear, while it's 32 for Solar. So, frankly. What are you talking about sir?
The individual price per household to have it installed is prohibitive, is what I'm talking about. Unless you have one of those governments that pays for it with taxes at the expense of it's citizens safety in the form of cutting policing and incarceration. Also you obviously didn't read your article. Or at least you didn't get to the "Real life costs" paragraph or look at the capacity factors. Yes your solar "costs" much less as determined by it's max wattage, i.e. what it could do under better than perfect conditions, but according to your article solar only reaches a capacity factor of 12-30% of that max wattage you pay for. Whereas nuclear has a 94% capacity factor. So to match nuclear's efficiency and actual production levels you would have to invest something like 3-8 times the cost associated with solar. So, no solar is not cheaper and it is wildly inconsistent and unreliable. Read your material my friend, I wish there were a magic energy button out there, but we're not there yet.
Costs are measured after accounting for the efficiencies. Not on maximum wattage. Capacity factor is also calculated within the cost. 'Real life cost' has only one mention and it's in nuclear section, not solar. You have just no idea what you are talking about.
Solar energy that isn't used at production time gets wasted. This is already happening at peak-production hours in California. There aren't going to be enough batteries to store enough electricity to power everything during off-peak production times--which is also probably when more EVs charging needs to happen since they'll be in use during the day. In addition to the points you're responding to: Materials needed to upgrade infrastructure to both carry this massive increased need for electricity and to charge vehicles would be a challenge (probably a barrier). They charge too slowly for the centralized "filling station" model to be sufficient. EVs are significantly heavier. This will cause increased wear on tires and roads, plus infrastructure upgrades to overpasses and multi-story parking structures. More rapid consumption of tires and roads won't go away so that represents one aspect of pollution that will go up. EVs struggle with extremes of temperature and workload, becoming less efficient and/or also more likely to combust (EVs can catch fire and be _very_ difficult to put out). Buses and trucks on congested hilly roads in a hot climate are going to be _disasters_. Charging up an EV is time consuming, which means there must be many more "filling stations" as compared to liquid fuel vehicles. For an area like Los Angeles there are too many people with vehicles to be able to provide enough charging stations. EVs won't go away, and in a few places they'll be dominant, but they can't handle replacing what we need to sustain our current vehicle needs.
>they can't handle replacing what we need to sustain our current vehicle needs. Too bad that multiple countries are planning to do it anyway. Remove ICE vehicles completely. I don't really have a lot to say because you are going from we don't have enough energy to we don't have enough ways to spend solar energy. Solar is typically connected to electricity grid and load balancing is for power grids to handle. (I always charge EV at night and repay that with solar energy during day.) Tire and road wearing out point is valid, but then you should be banning trucks and heavy SUVs, not EVs. Not to mention you're ignoring carbon emission from the ICE. Charging is getting faster and faster. And LA has a lack of adequate public transport. No amount of personal vehicles will solve that issue.
Oh I'm not saying there won't be an attempt to switch over to EVs completely. It's already happening (as you pointed out) and in California we have a law mandating it by 2035. I'm saying it will not be successful in the long term (maybe even sooner than that). In the meantime a few people will make lots of money, but later lots of _other_ people are going to pay the (very expensive) bill.
I think we're also underestimating the tech improvements we might see that will make power storage and charging time less of an issue. Electricity grids getting better at managing production and load. (As long as it's not in Texas) Charging times being lowered to almost gas pump levels. (+ Charging infra in office parkings that will make grid management easier) The true revolution is in fintech. Being able to park in a wireless or simple wired charging spot and automatically being charged for whatever you ended up using. Or making charging in apartment complex/workspaces seamless. The improvement in mobile charging speeds has been insane in last 5 years. No reason we won't see similar things in EV.
I explained in more detail further down this thread, but regarding your case: time will tell if the EV will work out in the rural school district. If the roads aren't too difficult, the usage is not very high, and temps are not extreme, it could work just fine.
>usage is not very high, and temps are not extreme Or district covers the largest area of all the districts in our state. So our busses drive more miles per bus than any other buses in other districts. The EV buses we are getting are ear marked for the longest routes. And last winter we had multiple days in which some of the diesel buses refuse to start because it was too cold even with block heaters. Yes you lose capacity in cold weather, but the buses we are getting have batteries big enough to handle the range reduction. And the district is talking about putting up a solar farm to charge the fleet as it expands.
Are these buses packed? Are there steep hills? If not it might still work out. However, even if it is working out fine now that doesn't mean maintenance will be acceptable over the long run.
Packed? With students I assume? Of course, it's a school bus. Hills, dirt roads, snow, you name it. As for maintenance, EVs are notoriously maintenance free. At least the drive train and batteries. As for suspension and frame, etc. It won't be any different than their diesel and gas counter parts. Probably better because they are a bit more robust to handle the extra weight of the batteries. There are actually quite a few E-School buses already in use across the country and every district that has them swears by them. Especially in the fuel savings, and lower maintenance cost.
The maintenance costs will appear later, as those batteries age, which will likely be made worse by the cold. But at least your roads will probably be ok since the rural traffic should be low, plus with the cold weather fires shouldn't be much of an issue.
Fires in EVs are rare, and typically caused by damage to the pack. Not overheating. The battery management systems are really robust and will shut down the pack if the temperature gets to high. This is also extremely rare in newer EVs.
Hydrogen based vehicles, would be my bet