[OutbackJon]

@bigbird1 - You also have only 1.4M people in your entire province. Of our 50 states and 6 'other' areas, 43 of them have larger populations, and except for Alaska, they're all far smaller than Manitoba.

Any added hydro has pretty much been taken off the table by environmentalists here. Wind and solar get opposed by NIMBYs. (Not In My Back Yard)

 

[pipsyp]

Here in the UK a Tesla has become more of a status symbol than anything else....almost a "look at me I can afford a 70/80k EV".

I can't afford one, but then neither would I want to. The reality is for all their in line performance, they are not particularly well made, the charging infrastructure here in the UK just isnt keeping up with demand (you only have to go to one of our motorway service stations and they are either completely full/in use with people queuing, or broken) and I'm still not entirely sold on their green credentials (though thats very much an individual viewpoint - I think Hydrogen fuel cell has more legs if the infrastructure was grown out).

It makes me laugh though as you barely ever see a Tesla on the road going at any particular rate as if they do, they'll need to charge! I just pop by in my gas guzzler (yep I know a Foz isnt exactly doing the planet any favours but doing it whilst we still can) and smirk inside that I have no range anxiety (well....the thing is terrible on fuel but takes moments to replenish).

For me, in the UK at least, Id consider going Hybrid as to be able to do local A to B journeys on electric alone is useful, but with the cost of electricity here, id still rather just pay for petrol and be done with it 😆

 

[2WheelsGood]

That’s guaranteed. Even now, folks burn up in their ICE powered vehicles attempting to escape wildfires.

You clearly—and seemingly intentionally—missed my point. I’m talking about people dying who can’t charge their cars because the California government shuts off the power grid to areas in the path of wildfires.


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[Trikepilot]

Interesting thread as I just went and round and round about this subject.

I just bought a 22 FW back in October after watching the EV market closely for probably longer than I should have. I came really close on two occasions to buying a Model Y which at the time was the only legit choice of EV for my needs. But the bottom line is at the time I decided to make a new car purchase, the FW was about half the upfront cost of a model Y. Yes, the Teslas have come down recently, but they are still too expensive for me. I can afford it but I cannot justify it.

I commute less than 6 miles roundtrip to work right now and for the last 3 years have averaged about 8k per year on my daily driver which was a 2012 Outback. So there would be little savings for me on fuel costs. We are moving in about 5 years out to our lake property and at that time, I will have a 46 mile roundtrip commute. This will make an EV more of a return on my investment.

So for now, I bought a 22 FW and am fine for the next 4-5 years. By that time the legacy automakers will hopefully get their poop together and there will be more EVs out there to choose from. We already have the Ioniqs, the Solterras, the Ariyas, and more. Public EV charging infrastructure will expand but I will still do most of my charging overnight at home on a dedicated 220v charger that I can install myself as there is already a circuit/outlet in the garage for the previous owners large air compressor.

I have no range anxiety. I get 350ish on a tank of gas in my FW. There are EVs already out there that get damn near that already. This will only improve as technology advances. I am considerably more concerned with build quality and the - possibly overblown - many reports of EVs spontaneously combusting while charging. Parking my EV in my basement garage and plugging it in only to have it burn down EVERYTHING I have is very offputting. And yes, before the trolls swarm... I know the incidence has to be low percentagewise, but the very fact that it happens randomly and for no identifiable and preventable reason is not comforting. And then there are the issues with all the EV makers shoddy build quality and QC.

All that notwithstanding... my next car in 4-5 years WILL DEFINITELY be an EV. I am excited to see how the market evolves over that span of time.

 

[AgentK]

Everything you state is very laughable. You're not accounting for the wonderful and annual brown outs every year in California, and the request by the governor "DO NOT CHARGE YOUR EV". How do you plan to handle some if these issues:

1. Houses with electrical panels that are less than 100Amps? You prepared to pay extra income taxes to subsides these home owners?
2. Who is going to pay for the taxes needed to install street parking chargers?
3. How are you going to force Apartment Complexes to install EV chargers? Owe that's right you'll fine the apartment complex until they comply. Well there goes all the low rent for low income people.
4. How are you going to generate more electricity? Where will you import said electricity?
5. How will you compensate for the push of banning natural gas that will compound the above mentioned brown outs? Oh I know, don't cook as well. Remember electric cooktops/stoves use 220v/240 volts, the same power used to power a Level 2 charger.

Again this leads back to what I said, 2035 is not even close to being feasible. It's all pie in the sky thinking.

I would suggest you think it through again, for example look up electricity consumption chart by time of day, it’s WAY lower overnight than during the day and there is plenty of capacity left overnight which is when most folks charge their vehicles. The rest is pretty much nonsense, nobody needs to force apartment complexes to install charges, many of them already doing that voluntarily around here, our office building has 1500 vehicle parking structure with 500 EV chargers and more on the way, again, without anyone forcing anything. There is already a charger almost everywhere I go on a daily basis.

 

[AgentK]

Yes, but the electrical grid isn’t growing nearly so fast. And In parts of California the grid already sucks, and it’s going to keep getting worse if they don’t do something long before electric car ownership hits the breaking point. And It’s only a matter of time before someone dies in a California wildfire because they couldn’t charge their car, because they shut the grid off in a town in the path of a wildfire. It’s going to happen. You heard it here first. [emoji6]


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It doesn’t need to grow much faster, like I’ve said in the other comment, look up electricity utilization chart, it falls off a cliff over night when most charge their EVs.

 

[bman400]

I would suggest you think it through again, for example look up electricity consumption chart by time of day, it’s WAY lower overnight than during the day and there is plenty of capacity left overnight which is when most folks charge their vehicles. The rest is pretty much nonsense, nobody needs to force apartment complexes to install charges, many of them already doing that voluntarily around here, our office building has 1500 vehicle parking structure with 500 EV chargers and more on the way, again, without anyone forcing anything. There is already a charger almost everywhere I go on a daily basis.

You're cherry picking. What about low income apartments. People that are on low income? Why was Newsome asking people NOT to charge their EV? Please educate us on that.

 

[2WheelsGood]

It doesn’t need to grow much faster, like I’ve said in the other comment, look up electricity utilization chart, it falls off a cliff over night when most charge their EVs.

We don’t need to argue about it. It’s an absolute fact that at certain times and in certain places, California already has problems delivering electricity to its residents. From my experience living in California (I left two years ago, thank god), it seems apparent that something more needs to be done about the grid reliability and delivery even if they never sold another electric car. The electric car question just adds to a problem they already don’t seem capable of solving.


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[AgentK]

You're cherry picking. What about low income apartments. People that are on low income? Why was Newsome asking people NOT to charge their EV? Please educate us on that.

Newsome asked folks to not use high demand appliances for 4 hours a day for, if I remember correctly, 2 days this year, and most people don’t even know about. Again, demand is high during the day while most people charge overnight. Regarding low income apartments, again, there already are a lot of public charging stations, in my case I see them pretty much everywhere I go on a daily basis, office parking, shopping centers/plaza, Walmart, gym, if you drive 12k miles a year that’s 230 mile per week, that’s around one hour of charging at a fast dc charger for most EVs, if not less, PER WEEK, or much less if you charge a few times, you just plug in when you do your shopping.

 

[AgentK]

We don’t need to argue about it. It’s an absolute fact that at certain times and in certain places, California already has problems delivering electricity to its residents. From my experience living in California (I left two years ago, thank god), it seems apparent that something more needs to be done about the grid reliability and delivery even if they never sold another electric car. The electric car question just adds to a problem they already don’t seem capable of solving.


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I lived in CA for over a decade now, and my power was out for probably less than 30 minutes all together. Sure there outages, so? Like I mentioned in the other comment, if you drive 12k miles a year that’s 230 miles per week, which means you need about one hour of fast charging per week for lost EVs. Most of my friends charge at home and their charge level never drops below 70%, they live at 70-90% charge, so even if they lose power for a few days they’ll be totally fine. And even when you lose power, just like you need to drive somewhere to get gas, you can drive somewhere else and get electricity.

 

[FelineFreddie]

You clearly—and seemingly intentionally—missed my point. I’m talking about people dying who can’t charge their cars because the California government shuts off the power grid to areas in the path of wildfires.


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No, I didn’t miss your point. Your claim is a red herring, one that you intentionally used to make a point you wanted to make. It’s false equivalency to claim folks will burn up in EVs during forest fires while not admitting the same thing already is happening to folks in ICE powered vehicles.…which, by the way, I agreed with you …

True, you can’t recharge your EV if the power grid is down, nor can you pump gasoline/diesel when the grid is down.

There are plenty of disadvantages to EVs in many scenarios, but cherry picking one in an attempt to prove your point is a poor way of going about it. There are far better cases to be made against EVs in those scenarios.

 

[2WheelsGood]

True, you can’t recharge your EV if the power grid is down, nor can you pump gasoline/diesel when the grid is down.

There’s a HUGE difference. As long as you can make it to any open gas station, it takes seconds to fill up. If you can’t charge your car because the grid is down, even if you can make it to a charging station, it takes hours to fill your battery. Talk about cherry-picking to prove your point…


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[2WheelsGood]

I lived in CA for over a decade now, and my power was out for probably less than 30 minutes all together.

I’m sure you won’t read this, because you’re fighting so hard to ignore the problem, but ignoring it won’t make it go away.

California's latest power grid problems are just the beginning

State officials knew ahead of the recent heat wave that the grid was on shaky ground.

www.politico.com

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[AgentK]

There’s a HUGE difference. As long as you can make it to any open gas station, it takes seconds to fill up. If you can’t charge your car because the grid is down, even if you can make it to a charging station, it takes hours to fill your battery. Talk about cherry-picking to prove your point…


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It doesn’t take hours to fill a battery, some EVs can charge 10%-80% in as little as 18 minutes. Folks evs are more likely to have full range available at any given moment because they can easily charger at home overnight every night.

 

[AgentK]

I’m sure you won’t read this, because you’re fighting so hard to ignore the problem, but ignoring it won’t make it go away.

California's latest power grid problems are just the beginning

State officials knew ahead of the recent heat wave that the grid was on shaky ground.

www.politico.com

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I know the problem you are talking about, and I’m not saying this problem doesn’t exist, it is a real problem. I’m saying it’s impact on EV owner is minimal in real day to day life.

 

[TTiimm]

The Aptera is provocative design.

Aptera Motors

Aptera is the world’s first Solar Electric Vehicle that requires no charging for most daily use - giving you the freedom to do more with less impact on the planet.

aptera.us

Not trying to stoke the coals or to convince anyone that it makes sense for them.

It's interesting from an engineering perspective, that's all, and technology doesn't advance by itself. The company is definitely pushing boundaries and challenging the status quo.

I like that (unlike Tesla) they promote the owner's "Right to repair."

 

[bman400]

It doesn’t take hours to fill a battery, some EVs can charge 10%-80% in as little as 18 minutes. Folks evs are more likely to have full range available at any given moment because they can easily charger at home overnight every night.

Do you own/drive an EV? I own and drive one, not all public chargers are Level 3 capable to charge you in 18 minutes. These Level 3 chargers are not the majority of the public chargers. Majority of them are standard Level 2 chargers that takes 2-12 hours depending on what your SOC, charging rate(3.3kw, 6.6kw, 7.2kw, etc..) and how much charge are are willing to wait it out for.

 

[2WheelsGood]

not all public chargers are Level 3 capable to charge you in 18 minutes.

Not to mention that even if 18 minutes was the norm, imagine having a line of even 10 people waiting to charge. [emoji51]


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[DragonSubie7]

Not yet noted in the EV good-bad discussion is when things "go bad".

In Phoenix the other day, a lady went over a curb and her Tesla burst into flames.
Fortunately, she and her daughter got out.

The fire department used 20,000 gallons of water to put out the fire.
On the way to the tow yard, the car burst into flames again.
The driver was able to dump the car on the road before it destroyed his flatbed.

Lithium batteries are great until they fail.. well except perhaps their creation requires mining a rare earth element that results in huge toxic pools that will last for centuries..

How is it that a "sustainable" vehicle relies on using the rarest elements on the planet that will disappear.
Not only for the batteries, but the motors require even rarer metals in their construction.

The other fallacy about the EV is that it is electrically powered, but it isn't.
The motors use electricity, but that power comes from whatever source that created it.
The green argument is that the power can come from renewables.
That's great while they work, but the problems are:
Renewables are not scalable.
- When demand increases you cannot turn up the sun or the wind to increase needed power

Renewables are subject to environmental conditions that can severely impact their ability to produce.
- A huge multi-gigawatt solar field will have its power output reduced to a trickle by a few clouds.

Renewable reliance requires storage mechanisms which are very expensive to procure and that have severe environmental consequences in their production, as well as impacts when they fail.

Also in the local news, the public utility APS reported that one of its environmentally friendly lithium battery storage units exploded and burned down for no particular reason.

Imagine your perfect EV world where all "evil" fossil fuels are eliminated and all power is created by renewable resources...
Scenario:
A heat wave results in an increase in demand (and lower output as solar panel output degrades as the temperature goes up) and a warm front brings in a low cloud deck that hangs over the area for several days.
Result:
Dead grid.

 

[Danh002]

We love our Model Y though I would like more manual controls like the fan and wiper speed.
The supercharger network has been flawless between San Diego, Sacramento and Eugene but add an extra hour at least for the long hauls.
That being said, as I sit at home in the Sierra Nevada mountains with 3+ feet of snow and no power, I'm sure glad I have my lifted Forester Sport with a set of Blizzaks.