I see, that one percent. OK, there is certainly some selection bias at work. I continue to believe, though, that a lot of the “that is not practical for me” is, simply put, ignorance rather than considered analysis.
Agreed that 5-10 years for fleet replacement isn’t going to happen. Was that really the claim? I forget exactly what claim was made and can’t be bothered to go find it now. I think 5-10 years for the majority of new car sales to be plugins seems achievable, but we shall see. Two out of three of the problems you named are arguably already in the category of “solved”, the remaining one being charging infrastructure for the half-ish of people who don’t have dedicated parking. As for “convincingly” I guess that’s what we’re talking about — there’s an important gap between something being solved, and John Q. Public being convinced that it was solved. (Heck, JQP isn’t necessarily convinced that the earth is round.)
I see no reason to doubt ICE cars will ultimately go away entirely (unless you stretch the definition of “cars” to include specialist vehicles not intended for use on public roads). Possibly not in my lifetime, though.
I agree with most everything you say here, and that perception is a lot (though not all) of the battle. The 5-10 thing is from the very top of the thread, and what spawned my responses. It’s easy to lose that in a long thread like this. I love my electric motorcycle, and it’s the best way to get around on short trips. I still think we’re a good ways from a satisfactory replacement for my Tundra pick up, but would love to be proven wrong.
People seem to be excited about Rivian. I’m not in the market for a pickup so I haven’t looked into it very hard. I realize they’re not shipping yet but if I recall correctly they’re well-capitalized and have a plant.
I picture any real “Green New Deal” as including subsidized EV conversion for existing ICE vehicles. It’s the only serious way to make a big step towards carbon neutrality in a short period of time. Get the big car companies on board by allowing them a window of exclusivity on conversion of their own models.
The market will still gravitate towards EVs-by-design, because you really can’t make a conversion as good as a ground-up design, but it would be silly to throw away millions of perfectly good ICE vehicles.
Basically, yeah. It ruins the tire (making it irreparable – most smaller punctures can be patched), and creates a huge mess for the mechanic working on the car.
God forbid someone not speak textbook-perfect Queen’s English. Sure, there’s some curious expressions, idioms, and phrasing used in Indian-English – just as there is in any other English-speaking country.
Well, the conspiracy theorist says the motor mfrs are in league with the tyre mfrs. Tyre guys give up a sale of one extra/spare tyre in each new car and car mfrs save a few bucks. But tyre mfrs get many more tyres sold overall due to foam usage - where previously such punctures were repaired and did not result in a new tyre sale.
Looks like if you want something smaller than a Mini, it’s either a Mirage, a Spark, a Fiat 500, or a Smart Car. I’m told the Smart is like driving a golf cart, but the Fiat seems like a viable choice.
I don’t know if this was said only in fun, or in earnest.
Either way, I hadn’t really thought about how electric-primary cars are reaching a certain tipping point, and that the rallies, Indys, and other big ticket races are going to start staging all-electric races as the main events, not as novelties.
Not great for engine purists, I guess, but march of time and all that.
You know it was the Volt that was discontinued. I think I saw so many articles about slow sales of the Chevy Bolt that I conflated the two. Everyone go buy a Bolt! Out family has a Volt and a Bolt so we were all in.
As the family currently has a Prius maybe not yet. But the Bolt is the first EV that had me thinking this is worth having for a daily driver. Plus would have had to fork over $$$ to get charging set up in the driveway. If there is a need for 2nd car for commuting reasons I will seriously consider the Bolt.
I love my Bolt, it’s super zippy, makes no noise, and has me a little spoiled. We got them (mine replaced a 10 year old Prius) when there was still a $7500 federal tax credit, and $3000 in our state. The state also covered some cost of the level 2 chargers in our garage. I love my Bolt, it’s super zippy, makes no noise, and has me a little spoiled. I got the one with all of the safety features so it can yell at me for my poor driving instead of my spouse. Have had it since Nov and I think the longest trip was ~120miles round trip. I am disappointed in the lack of charging options generally but I just assume I’ll charge at home, although the local state park (~mile from home) has a free charger!
Honestly if I could get by without a car I totally would and just do a weekend/weeklong/etc rental for the times I want to get out of town though geocaching is a hobby for the spouse and by association me as I like to go along so owning probably wins out over renting.
Right now it has been nice to have the car as life has said time to move (and the wife is Canadian and wants to go back north) so actually having the car has been great. We are just over an hour drive from home while it gets prepped and even closer to the border for searching up there for a new place.
Electricity storage is in its infancy. Look for interface standards that allow new batteries to be swapped in regardless of the underlying storage technology.
Would certainly be interesting to see how U.S. consumers would respond to major disincentives to owning ICE cars and big incentives to buy EVs, like Norway has. Politically impossible at the moment, but you can dream…
In earnest. If an electric car can be a gas replacement without sacrificing range, performance or capacity, it’ll be much easier for people to accept them. A road rally is a good test of that. (Better than an electric NASCAR in 2021.)
I agree that a bug-for-big clone of a gas car is easier to sell in that there’s no explaining to do. It’s not an ideal goal other than for easy selling though, because it’s a very different machine in some ways with different trade offs. Better in many regards, but worse in some others. Refueling time and range are two such. I think the trade offs weigh heavily to the advantage of EVs overall for real world use, but in an event where refueling time is of the essence (no pun intended) an EV will be severely disadvantaged vs a gas-fueled car. This doesn’t make EVs worse, other than for that one contrived set of rules, it’s just how it is.
