Personally, any car that replaces an ICE is beautiful to me. Even the Nissan Leaf and the BMW i3.
. . . some just are more beautiful than others.
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Car & Driver: The Mach E is simply better than the Model Y
- Thread starter FordMME
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. . . some just are more beautiful than others.
Bring on the cleaner air. I'm fine with ICE sports cars and such sticking around as low mileage toys, but it's well time for regular daily driving to become emissions free in all cities and urban areas.
In wishful thinking, yes (my wish was for that to happen in the 1990's actually. That was after the EV1 showed it was possible). However, sadly, in the actual world, it is still not yet that time.
Tesla can't grow capacity fast enough, the legacy ICE industry is still resisting the conversion to EV and haven't died yet, and the current administration is screwing things up by incompetent meddling. That meddling is just going to prolong the death of the legacy ICEmakers without sufficiently increasing EV manufacturing capacity seriously. It will also hold non-Tesla charging infrastructure back for another 5 years of so by encouraging too many clowns to continue to sell garbage charging equipment in order to get the subsidies just as Blink, Chargepoing, EVgo, and EA have done before.
Luckily, despite 1 step backward for every 2 steps forward, there is still overall forward motion, just not as fast as we'd like.
Undecided_2
Member
What we need is more chargers - estimated at 38k a year - that are cheap or subsidised by the government as so many people live in homes that won’t support a home charger. The U.K. is way behind.
Instead of just relying on EV cars the government should be laying out plans for mass ground transportation to become super cheap. It should not be cheaper for me to fly from Scotland to London than taking a train considering how polluting the aviation industry is.
EVer Hopeful
Active Member
ok, I'll bite. What specifically is the "incompetent meddling" this administration is doing and what would you prefer to see them do?
EVer Hopeful
Active Member
It might be cheaper to fly but it's waaaaaaay nicer to go by train, and ironically it probably takes about the same amount of time (well when the trains are running that it)
Focus on the entire electrical energy infrastructure required, rather than just pushing for more BEV’s. Need a more overarching plan.
Not sure where you are getting your information, but:
How energy and utilities can access infrastructure spending for clean energy and modernization efforts
How clean energy and modernization efforts can support the development, demonstration and deployment of cutting-edge clean energy technologies.
www.pwc.com
Fair question but I believe I gave a couple of examples:
1) perhaps this is too subtle:
The legacy ICE manufacturers will, again, count the subsidy as profit, put out a few more compliance vehicles but not put any effort into reducing manufacturing costs to give us sustainable low-cost manufacturing capability. Not everyone is as altruistic as Tesla and ploughing margins back into cost reductions. Instead, with the upgrades, they upgrade their Bloomfield hills homes and pay larger dividends and bonuses with the margins. As we've seen, unless very carefully handled, handouts create dependencies.
2) I think I was clear on this one:
and one I missed:
3) as with all government money. Most of it will be squandered on the undeserving, non-contributing special interests that lobby to get a piece of the pie.
I have to disagree here. The power companies will make more money from selling more electricity for EVs. This can pay off bonds. No grants or subsidies needed if a simple, sustainable plan is made and executed.
That's how the great infrastructure from the early 20th century was built. The payoff from doing so was so great that it got out of hand (stock market crash of '29 and great depression) but it did get us the modern infrastructure we have today.
Merrill
Merrill
I'm not sure what Public Safety Power Shutoff (PSPS) have to do with EVs.
EVs with V2H are actually a partial solution to these.
More correctly, PSPSs are because:
- sustainable business has been squelched by government meddling (CPUC) so the only way a for-profit utility can make money for their shareholders and executives is by scrimping on maintaining and improving infrastructure. The top price, while guaranteed, is set so the only way to advance is to cut service.
- the American Public has lost appreciation for infrastructure and become a bunch of whiny self-absorbed, self-entitled scum blaming everything on the deepest pockets they can get a court to extort money from where most goes to lawyers but a little trickles down to them.
- naive urbanites are moving to the rural areas with enticing name like "Paradise" where they are as completely unprepared as fish out of water.
Merrill
Merrill
How ever you want to say it is fine with me but the reality is that the utilities in California are making billions so the fact they did not take care of their infrastructure is why in this state in 2017 we had massive fires do to the above. Monopolies out of control with no oversite.
The American Public is more divided than I’ve seen >60yrs
I don’t reside in Cal, you get more than your share of wildfires from nature, your grid should not add to the problem!
The electrical energy infrastructure is being pushed to wind and solar energy production for decades at both federal and state levels. Here, in Oklahoma (!), wind production soon will be about half of all state energy production. If we see that half of all vehicles in OK are EVs, you may have your point.
Complaining about fires in California is like complaining about rain in Seattle or snow in Buffalo. Its 100% natural. Californians also build houses in alluvial fans and complain when water runs through their house when it does rain.
The problems are that:
a) people are in denial that fire is natural and have been fighting the fires.
b) people have been fighting fires allowing underbrush and branches to grow wildly enabling much greater fires.
- they also whine and wail (and sue the deepest pocket they can find that they can blame) when a fire is allowed to burn on or if a controlled burn gets out of control (which has to happen on occasion)
2) They won't have forests much longer in the state either given their historical and present practices.
c) You should hear all the bickering and wailing when the power companies try to either:
- cut trees away from the power lines.
- charge more to bury them under the ground. Of course, the utilities would probably pocket any extra money than actually spend it as promised. It's kind of a sad situation so many years of poor management has caused.
d) people keep building their quaint houses nestled in the forest without being ready to deal with the consequences (except, of course, by either dying because they don't know how to open their garage door when the power is out or suing the deepest pocket they can find if they manage to survive)
I'm not sure what California will do but they're headed toward a terrible train wreck and just keep going.
Undecided_2
Member
Unfortunately, my company policy is cheapest mode and yes, the times that I could have got on a train and arrived at the same or earlier time than my plane has been depressing. Without getting packed, dressed and then undressed and unpacked to then get dressed and packed again when flying.
Representative Thomas Massie (who is also an MIT EE grad) says we are relying on political science rather the engineering regarding our current green energy goals. Were his comments off base during this interview 9 months ago:
How energy and utilities can access infrastructure spending for clean energy and modernization efforts
How clean energy and modernization efforts can support the development, demonstration and deployment of cutting-edge clean energy technologies.
I guess this is what I would consider FUD. Is that what you came for?
Is the grid ready for a 100% overnight transition? No. Is that what is planned? No. New cars electric, yes, but most people buy used. So ICE isn't going away overnight.
He harps on the increased electric bills for some people but ignores the savings from not buying gas.
My electrical use has increased by about 25% for local driving (I have an electric home with wood heat backup). It's a ding for sure but nothing compared to the gas savings.
He harps on the fact that some electricity isn't clean, as if that's a reason not to transition to 0 tailpipe emissions. Just plain stupid reasoning. Future increased needs for electricity will largely be clean because its the cheapest way to go right now.
The electric vehicle transition is well on its way in California. Far more along than the rest of the country. It hasn't wiped out the infrastructure there.
The grid does need upgrading. There is money to do that, and it will take a while. In the meantime, you can help by supporting the transition, or you can stand in the way. It is clear what Rep Massie has chosen.
Merrill
Merrill
I agree with you on this, I don’t own a gas vehicle for several reasons. I want to help the environment and not support the fossil fuel industry for me it’s not all about saving money.
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