This strikes me as in some ways less a contrast to yesterday’s gloomy post about autocratic takeover than a complement to it.
As you note at the end, the EVs that are “going to win” are Chinese EVs. America is going to face pressure to stall the EV transition to prop up our auto industry, lose export markets anyway, and have our top domestic automaker be Tesla whose CEO is deeply embedded in the global autocratic axis. I’m glad the new cars are less polluting! But this still seems like part of the story of the rise of the Chinese century.
Idk man. Everyone is going to get a car that works much better and is better for the environment too. I'm not going to sit here feeling bad about that fact just because China is a powerful country that makes a lot of cars.
"Everyone" is a pretty big stretch. Most people in cities who could most use an EV have no access to home level 2 charging. Their landlords are in no rush to add it, because it costs many tens of thousands of dollars to upgrade the electrical service to the entire building and install the proper wiring. Permits, design, installation are all costly. Why should landlords foot this cost? They aren't and they won't. And don't even get me started on condo boards - nobody is going to want to have an additional levy to pay for these chargers. So it will take 10 or 20 years to achieve the market saturation you seem to feel is at hand for EVs. And in cold climates, the transition will be even slower. One doesn't just instantly replace the entire electrical infrastructure of every multifamily dwelling in America. But look on the bright side...you can publish another article in 2040 saying I Told You So.
Spot on. And that's not even talking about the current deficit with power generation, poor quality power transmission / grid tech, etc. It's not realistic to upgrade all of these immediately - especially when states like CA are actually reducing power generation and other energy infrastructure. All this talk of electrification tends to sound bonkers to me. Right now, we have 3-4 major energy sources in our home. Electricity from grid and rooftop solar, NatGas for heating/cooking/drying, Gasoline for cars, and Propane for camping stoves which could be useful in a pinch. This is a highly resilient infrastructure to an energy shock like a massive grid cyberattack. If you lose power for a few days, you can still cook at home if needed or drive somewhere to get food. Once everything is dependent on electric, even a Tesla powerwall is not going to last very long.
> and have our top domestic automaker be Tesla whose CEO is deeply embedded in the global autocratic axis
This didn't have to happen. Elon Musk's political beliefs never really matched up with Trump's. It is entirely an effect of the Democrats and the institutions they control attacking him. They didn't even invite him to their EV event. They pushed an EV subsidy bill that only went to unionized companies (in other words every American car company except Tesla). They block his rocket launches for endless investigations and environmental reviews over trivial details like switching control rooms without telling the FAA and trivial imperfections in the flights. When he sent Starlink to Ukraine he was crucified in the media for expecting a payment like every other defense contractor on Earth. He was accused of being a Russian asset for denying permission to use Starlink terminals in a direct attack on Crimea that would have actually been illegal for him to approve.
There was absolutely no good reason for the Democrats to start a fight with the richest man in the world whose activities were massively beneficial to the country, but they did. Now they can FAFO.
Are we seriously pushing the narrative that Elon Musk’s extreme behavior (including blowing $44bn on Twitter) is because the Democrats were mean to him? The man is almost impulsive enough to make that believable, but the political expenditure feels much more desperate and self-serving than that. Trump was also very mean to Elon Musk, but he doesn’t mind — because it’s about business.
I remember having credulous conversations a few years ago about how Musk wasn’t buying Twitter as a political channel, he just wanted to”free speech.” I think it’s time people here started applying some critical thinking: stop believing dumb stuff just because Elon Musk says it.
Not "mean to." Directly opposing his business interests. Just like you said. Why would Elon Musk not act in his own political interests? That is his fundamental right as a citizen of the US. And his business interests are very much aligned with US interests. EVs and space launch are very important industries that the benefit the country. So why are you coming after Elon Musk for defending his interests and not the Democrats for going against the national interest by fighting with Musk? Yes, he seems impulsive and thin skinned, but those are human weaknesses that I find extremely easy to forgive.
Twitter is very uncensored. If Elon Musk banned his political opponents, why is Kamala Harris on it? Why is Noah Smith allowed to tweet things like this: https://x.com/Noahpinion/status/1796288065214013603. This is unlike the previous ownership who outright banned Trump. Yes, it's biased, but so is every media company.
Yeah, because Republicans opposed the provision where the credit would go to Tesla's unionized competitors, but not Tesla. I wonder why he supports Republicans?
What are you talking about? Democrats have been supporting the tax credit for EV's for years even when the only beneficiary was Tesla. Republicans wanted to gut it. What are you talking about?
Idk, alienating your core customer base by going full maga seems to directly oppose his business interests! There is really nothing that Tesla has anymore that isn't being replicated by other manufacturers. Any truly independent corporate board would have kicked him to the curb by now, but instead want to play footsie with securities fraud by propping up Howard Hughes 2.0.
> EVs and space launch are very important industries that the benefit the country.
Yes and what political party has historically supported Elon and subsidizing those industries? I'll wait for your reply.
> So why are you coming after Elon Musk for defending his interests and not the Democrats for going against the national interest by fighting with Musk? Yes, he seems impulsive and thin skinned, but those are human weaknesses that I find extremely easy to forgive.
Who is coming for Elon Musk? What legislation have Democrats passed to specifically hurt Musk or his business or him? What you really mean to say is why do people who lean democrat critique him at all. I think a lot of people with authoritarian desires and huge egos seem to be impulsive and thin skinned. If you can forgive those human weaknesses when their impulsive behavior lashes out and hurts others that seems like a sign of immaturity.
> Twitter is very uncensored. If Elon Musk banned his political opponents, why is Kamala Harris on it? Why is Noah Smith allowed to tweet things like this: https://x.com/Noahpinion/status/1796288065214013603. This is unlike the previous ownership who outright banned Trump. Yes, it's biased, but so is every media company.
It's been proven that Elon throttles and games the algorithm on Twitter to amplify his own posts and decrease the reach of people he doesn't like or agree with. You don't know what free speech means mate. It means the government can't punish you for saying certain things, it doesn't mean that social media platforms can't kick you off for violating their terms of service. And way to ignore why the previous owners of X banned Trump, and also you think Trump is an arbiter of free speech, and you think Elon is? Is that why both X and TruthSocial banned satire accounts? Come on now... you have got to be trolling at this point right? X also has been known to ban accounts that are critical of Elon, his business, etc. This includes journalists and comedians. You are talking out both sides of your mouth. He's such a free speech absolutists that he never speaks out against China or Russia right? You are arguing in bad faith and can't be taken seriously. (https://newrepublic.com/post/177936/twitter-suspends-accounts-journalists-critical-elon-musk)
Yeah, no fight was started. The EV event was for union-companies only, and Tesla doesn't have a union, so they were never going to be invited in the first place. Just because Elon lost his mind because he's angry at one of his kids and one of his dozen wives divorced him instead of him being able to dump them first, doesn't excuse him defaulting to autocracy. It's a little concerning that you think this is the case.
Biden is the president of the United States, not the president of the UAW. When he holds an "EV Summit" (not a "UAW Summit") he should invite the largest American manufacturer of EVs ( who also has the most domestically sourced supply chain in the industry). If the president cared about the interests of the US as a whole he would be telling the other car companies to be more like Tesla. And of all the things I listed this snub is by far the least of them. It wouldn't have taken much for the Democrats to get Elon Musk on their side, but they just couldn't swallow their pride and do it. Now they live with the consequences of their actions and I have no sympathy at all.
For most of us, being a convicted felon, adjudicated rapist and a traitor that tried to overthrow an election that was legally certified by every state was a deal breaker.
Where did I say I'm voting for that idiot? I'm not. But if you actually believe that Donald Trump (or anybody) raped a woman in the changing room of a department store and got away with it, I have a bridge to sell you.
Trump lost twice. Yep, I trust the decisions of judge and jury rather than the denials from one of the most dishonest humans on the planet. The judge described him as a rapist. I'm good with that description.
Frankly, it isn't easy to get up on the witness stand and lie. The burden was on her to prove her case.
Trump keeps telling us exactly who he is. Access Hollywood wasn't locker room talk. It was entitled sexual predator talk.
He publicly expressed sympathy for Ghislaine Maxwell, not the underage victims. He doubled down on it. Truly sick.
His fixation with Ivanka is truly creepy. Ivana accused him of rape. Nobody would be surprised if he assaulted her in one of his fits of rage.
Who persists in saying she wasn't his type after, under oath, mistaking her for his second wife? 🤦🤣 Who is he telling that transparent lie to? His followers? Himself?
It was a union-shop-only EV Summit. Truly incredible the backwards bending you do just to say you want to vote for Donald Trump. You can just admit you want to vote for him without bending over backwards!
> the largest American manufacturer of EVs ( who also has the most domestically sourced supply chain in the industry)
I assume you mean Tesla here, but it's actually Ford... You need to get updated info mate. Also why would Biden invite an automaker who doesn't support unions? Additionally, why would he invite Musk who has openly mocked and doesn't support him? Just to assuage Musk's ego? You shouldn't have to treat a grown adult like a toddler to get them on your side.
> It wouldn't have taken much for the Democrats to get Elon Musk on their side, but they just couldn't swallow their pride and do it. Now they live with the consequences of their actions and I have no sympathy at all.
We are all American, we should all be on the same side. You seem to have more sympathy for a billionaire who doesn't care about you, than people who are your fellow citizens. Democrats have done more for Elon Musk through good policies than Republicans, he threw that away because he has a huge ego and got radicalized on his own social media platform.
The man has more defense contracts than he knows what to do with. Also, the Starlink/Ukraine debacle was about WAY more than “wanting to get paid for his product”. He’s had a bunch of chances to be the hero you seem to think he is, and he’s consistently dropped the ball.
It's been a while since I saw someone work so hard to lick Elon's boots. Way to blame Democrats as a whole for how Elon is behaving. Its typical DARVO behavior. Elon engages in conspiracy theories, antisemitism, racism, misinformation, and generally pushed away his own customer base because people critiqued him or challenged him on a social media platform. To ignore all of that and just blame Democrats is a a really low info take...
>This didn't have to happen. Elon Musk's political beliefs never really matched up with Trump's. It is entirely an effect of the Democrats and the institutions they control attacking him.
Elon is self interested and likes money and power. Who exactly is attacking him? Unless you mean people who say mean things about him or critique him? Just because he is rich and overall built some good businesses on the back of the US taxpayer he is above critique?
> They didn't even invite him to their EV event. They pushed an EV subsidy bill that only went to unionized companies (in other words every American car company except Tesla).
That is because Elon Musk doesn't have unions. Additionally, the EV subsidy credit can still be applied to EV's that Tesla makes.
> They block his rocket launches for endless investigations and environmental reviews over trivial details like switching control rooms without telling the FAA and trivial imperfections in the flights.
Please look up and tell us how many rocket launches they have blocked from SpaceX. To ignore environmental reviews for what you consider trivial rules when every other launch company follows them is a bad faith argument. What you are really trying to say is that because you like Musk and his companies, that they should be allowed a certain level of leeway when it comes to certain things. Compare how many launches they have "blocked" vs how many actually go through without issue. Regardless of how you feel about certain species, there is a real threat of waste and environmental harm when it comes to rocket launches no matter who does them.
> When he sent Starlink to Ukraine he was crucified in the media for expecting a payment like every other defense contractor on Earth. He was accused of being a Russian asset for denying permission to use Starlink terminals in a direct attack on Crimea that would have actually been illegal for him to approve.
Now I know you are arguing in bad faith, because there was way more to it than that. I think you keep mixing up the media and people on social media with opinions first of all. Additionally, the US government had a private agreement with Starlink a couple months after the war started and Elon said he was providing it for free additioanlly. Don't say you are going to provide something for free and then try and get payment later, its bad taste. It's especially bad taste when it comes out like 6 months later that the US government had a private deal with Starlink to pay for it. The reason why people called him a Russian puppet is because he turned off and limited Starlink in Russian occupied areas of Ukraine to Ukraine forces. Meanwhile Russian forces used Starlink and he didn't limit them. Musk then said he was afraid of nuclear escalation because he spoke to the Russian ambassador to the US who told him that.
> There was absolutely no good reason for the Democrats to start a fight with the richest man in the world whose activities were massively beneficial to the country, but they did. Now they can FAFO.
Who are these Democrats who speak of who started a fight with him? Again it goes back to fairness, you think that just because Musk is rich he should be allowed to always be right and have his ego stroked? To ignore how he has double standards, is a known liar, hypocrite and literally forgets that the Obama administration helped subsidize SolarCity and SpaceX is just bad faith debating mate. Even your last comment where you say FAFO, just goes to show you think his bad behavior is justified even if he is entirely self interested and it harms America. Literal teenager behavior.
The real danger is the Xi and CCP's domestic mismanagement of the Chinese economy might put a damper on the Chinese century and they opt to roll the dice on armed conflict rather than lose their perceived opportunity for national greatness.
I don’t understand how you can think Xi is mismanaging the economy under an article about Chinese domination for the next generation of vehicle manufacturing (not to mention all of the components of electrics cars, from raw materials to batteries.)
Xi is mismanaging the Chinese economy if you use the current US/Euro standard which prioritizes labor standards and consumer power. As Noah’s written, that’s not Xi’s yardstick.
He’s also mismanaging the economy if you use any standard that cares about people’s well-being. It’s true that he cares more about some subset of technologies than about overall GDP.
That’s my point. He’s managing the economy extremely well from the point of view of increasing the military and economic power Chinese state vis a vis the US. That he’s mostly doing this by sacrificing the (at least short-term) well being of the Chinese people isn’t relevant to the question of whether Xi is managing his economic goal well, and it makes his success even more dangerous to the US.
FWIW - I’m not sure I believe it, but there’s a reasonable argument that he’s taking a Bezos-like strategy. Build the power of the Chinese manufacturing economy to the point that it’s irreplaceable to the rest of the world, then use the leverage to make the country rich. (And to take Taiwan while he’s at it.)
The real estate catastrophe suggests that the formula "make a quintillion tons of debt to subsidize some manufacturing industry" is not the best formula after all. The current debt levels and the fake gdp growth data are a testament to this.
In this regard Deng Xiaoping was a much wiser man.
Maybe? But the US has higher debt and deficits, and a worse housing situation, and I wouldn’t say has avoided housing-driven economic macro issues in any better way.
And worse housing situation, just look at the ratio between annual income and cost of a home in a big city compared to the US. Chinese on average have a much, much lower income and house prices are extremely high, especially in big cities.
The ghost cities in china don't help to lower the prices where there is not sufficient housing. If a city have been overbuilt in guandong, it doesn't lower house prices in shangai.
MotorTrend sent a bunch of their staff to China to test a handful of their BEVs and the quality isn’t comparable to American vehicles, at least not yet. They don’t drive nearly as well as they look.
On a meta level, I do appreciate that US companies and politicians get paranoid about competition from other countries relatively easily. We were wrong that the Soviet Union would be a long-term competitor, and we were wrong about Japan being an economic threat. China currently looks much more formidable than either of those, but of course they have their own problems. I think getting worried about Chinese EVs even if their quality isn't quite there yet is the right way to go.
Sure, my point is that we should be competing and this idea that circulates in conservative media that EVs are a waste and China is so far ahead anyway is just wrong. If anything, that pessimism will mean we do forfeit a burgeoning market to China.
It sure would be interesting to study why China is going to win. How do they have a lower cost structure and what are they giving up to get it? And, what do we do to mitigate it?
One advantage China has is they don't have right wingers politicizing EVs. Put solar on your roof and it should be a right winger's dream scenario - energy and transportation independence.
Our educated class does email jobs in law, finance, marketing, biotech and Saas or marketing software, while a ton of the Chinese educated class works in advanced manufacturing. You’re probably high socio-economic status - how many people do you know in advanced manufacturing? Did you consider that career? I sure didn’t.
Our non-educated class works in retail, or if in manufacturing or public sector, fights pretty successfully for labor rights. They also do a lot more drugs, have more broken families, can rely on better safety nets and have less work ethic and conscientiousness than the Chinese equivalent.
The reason we’re in the game at all is due to immigration, a healthy software startup landscape, Elon Musk (who now sucks for a lot of reasons) and inertia from past victories (ie. Intel, GM and Boeing.)
If what you write is true, then you should support the removal of subsidies for EVs and batteries that Biden pushed into the IRA since that money is adding to our national debt, as well as elimination of the EPA mileage rules that punish ICE cars since they are no longer needed.
You also fail to mention the huge tariffs on Chinese EVs while using BYD as your example of cost and efficiency. You also say EVs are great for performance, but the BYD Atta 3 from your example has a 0-60 time of over 7 seconds, which is not fast, barely faster than a regular Toyota Corolla.
You mention the huge gasoline distribution network, and how it will become less profitable, but as EVs and hybrids get more common, gasoline demand will go down, and supply will not (refining petroleum to make jet fuel, diesel for heavy equipment, fuel oil and naphtha for plastic still needs to be done, and will always create gasoline as a proportion) so as an economist you know the price will go down and thus spur demand for ICE cars.
You also don’t mention how the charging network promised in the IRA has resulted in very few new charging stations, and only Tesla has an adequate charging network, but it won’t with the unimportable BYD cars anyway.
The big automakers are rolling back their big EV transition plans, and probably know more about demand than Bloomberg reporters.
So if your last post was overly gloomy, this one seems to be written while you were smoking a bunch of hopium. I’ll be glad to buy an EV when they are cost competitive without debt increasing subsidies, but am sticking with my quiet, fast, efficient Toyota Crown Hybrid.
> The big automakers are rolling back their big EV transition plans, and probably know more about demand than Bloomberg reporters.
They sure didn't when they let Tesla take the emerging EV market from them and took a decade to even mount a response, and I suspect they still don't now. Or maybe they do and they know that they will fail to compete. They still haven't figured out how to manufacture an EV that can turn a profit. To transition to EVs they will have to spend a fortune on capex while cannibalizing their profitable markets in favor of on that loses money on every car. They are heavily indebted already (vs Tesla which has basically no debt) and may not have the capital to weather such a transition until they are able to turn a profit on EVs.
And to make matters worse, their dealer based sales model is another problem. The dealers depend on maintenance to turn a profit, so they hate to sell EVs which require little of it. The dealers have the upper hand here because they are legally protected by franchise agreements that prevent the manufacturers from selling around them.
Also the cost of capital (interest rates went up) and big 3 OEMs sacrificed market share and cut production of lower cost vehicles to focus on more expensive trucks/SUVs.
Tbh I think most of the legacy automakers are simply not gonna make it.
From an amoral strategy perspective they should try to sell as many gas cars as they can for now, not invest in new models, and wind down operations in an orderly way
Why should we support the elimination of EPA rules that punish ICE cars just because EVs will take over anyway? The point of those rules isn’t to *punish* the cars - it’s to ensure that cars don’t pollute too much. That still matters.
The tariffs on BYD matter for whether the cheapest current electric car is cheaper than current ICE cars. But the point is that in the long run, companies everywhere will learn how to produce electric cars at those prices - even Chevrolet and Ford. Those tariffs ensure that the EV transition will be delayed slightly in the US while US carmakers catch up, rather than being left in the dust by Chinese carmakers.
Someone else already addressed the point about gas prices. It’s true that falling demand with a constant supply would make gas prices come down. But if the petroleum industry maintains some profitability (necessary if it’s going to last for decades) then the price can never fall below the production cost, which involves some fixed costs for the infrastructure, as well as costs that depend on how much gas is produced. If global gasoline demand falls a bit, then can shut down the most expensive wells, and this will lower price. But if gasoline demand starts to fall by 50% or more, then this decrease in price will start being overtaken by the increased price of amortizing all the fixed costs of a global distribution network over a smaller amount of gasoline sales. (Maybe they can avoid this if some parts of the world go to zero demand so that they don’t have to maintain all that infrastructure.)
The big automakers aren’t “rolling back” their transition plans - they are slowing it down, because they expect it will not happen quite as quickly as they used to think. But they have known for years that it *will* come.
I agree that EVs will eventually be the best option and cost competitive on price, when battery technology advances and depends less on cobalt and nickel and motors that use less rare earth metals, or the supply chain builds up to supply them from non Chinese sources. When this happens, subsidies won’t be needed and more people will buy them. I will buy one when that happens.
As I said, gasoline is a necessary byproduct of petroleum refining and if even demand for it falls, supply will not. Diesel is still needed for construction equipment (including for mining battery minerals), for agricultural machinery, for freight trains, for container and cargo ships, and long distance buses. Jet fuel is not going to be replaced by sustainable fuels that cost 5x of petroleum based ones. Heating oil is needed until everyone in cold areas and their electric utilities support low temperature heat pumps or switch to natural gas. Asphalt is needed for road surfacing, and the increase weight of BEVs will hasten its need. Plastics are used everywhere, including in EV manufacturing and I don’t think bio plastics are making big headway. Petroleum production has been rising consistently, even with more EVs and I don’t expect it to fall anytime soon.
California is an interesting experiment. Its ever increasing regulations on refiners are increasing their costs, and Phillips is shutting down its San Pedro refinery now. Since pipelines from Texas refineries don’t extend to California, and the Jones Act prevents shipments of gasoline from the Gulf, it will soon be importing gasoline from Southeast Asia, and prices will rise there. We’ll probably see more EVs in California because the gasoline will be more unaffordable, although their policies also make electricity more expensive than other states, and their rules about what cars can be sold there will probably also go into effect. I’m glad I don’t live there anymore.
Correct. However "optimistic" one may be about EV over ICE -- I'm not sure why we need to have attitudes about technologies -- the policy is the same: subsidize the sale of EV in a way that mimics the cost advantage that EV's would have over ICE if we had a tax on net CO2 emissions until we have one, but ensure the subsidies are funded on the margin with taxes on consumption, not income.
What a moronic assertion. Do you deny that the emission of CO2 into the atmosphere had negative externalities? Or do you more foolishly deny that the government shouldn’t price externalities?
I have read these sources before, they’re ridiculous and bunk. The amount of brain power required to understand Carbon Dioxide’s externalities is elementary at best, yet we still debate it like it’s tobacco in the 80s.
Tax emissions, let the market do its thing otherwise.
I would love to see a major mainstream scientific publication that factored in reduced deaths from cold, more arable farmland, and the CO2 fertilization effect. Do you have one to cite?
Sorry? Higher atmospheric CO2 is a benefit to life? I’m sure the victims of Hurricanes Helene and Milton, both strengthened by climate change-induced higher water temperatures, would like to disagree with you
How is it inconvenient? Would you prefer more death and destruction so you can have the political advantage to scare people into supporting more extreme climate policy?
And if you think this is an existential threat, you have absolutely no idea what you are talking about.
Sorry, the now regular monumental rainfalls from storms in the US and around the world are a danger to world agricultural's ability to sustain over 8 billion people. When you have storms dumping 10-40 inches of rain in 24-48 hour period due to extremely hot oceans due to Climate Change then you have a threat to all of our livelihoods.
Inexcusable nonsense. There are very few nutrients that are not toxic when ingested in excess. If you, Kevin Simpson, breathe 100% oxygen for several days, your lungs will be damaged irreparably, yet I'm sure you would proclaim that O2 is "a benefit to life."
Where I live it costs about eight times as much to drive an ICEV the same distance as an EV. Gas would have to come down a long way in price. Even if gas is free, the lifetime cost of owning an ICEV may exceed that for an EV.
I don't know if you're only including the cost of gas and electricity when you say it costs 8x as much to drive an ICEV as an EV, but you must have a combination of very low electricity costs, high gas costs, and an efficient EV.
My plug-in hybrid with a 17kwh battery can drive about 45 miles on a charge. This (2.6 miles/kwh) is less efficient than a Tesla Model 3 (reported 4-5 miles/kwh). But, for me, with electricity costing 24 cents/kwh, gas would have to be over $4/gallon before it's worthwhile for me to plug in (not taking into account charging efficiency losses). Gas around here is currently $3/gallon.
That’s why I said “where I live” because the economics are very sensitive to location. I am in Toronto where it costs me about 7 cents (US) per kWh and about $4.15 (US) per (US) gallon. There are other places in Canada (Alberta) where the prices would be similar to yours.
Average price per kWh in the US is $.166. You’re paying approximately 50% more than the US average for electricity, which really sucks for you. According to AAA, today’s average price for a gallon of regular unleaded (not premium, which some cars claim to require to achieve rated MPG) is $3.177. So you have slightly under-average priced gas. Your car is apparently getting around 44MPG based on the numbers presented above, which means the average car owner is using a whopping 76% more gas/mile than you, based on the US average for ICE cars (I am excluding light trucks and vans, which is even worse) listed by the DoE. All of this is a way to say: you are a pretty extreme outlier.
To compare numbers to mine, I pay $.14 per kWh in the mid-Atlantic and drive a very speedy Tesla. This works out to $.04 per mile, or approximately 80 MPGe using the average price of gas listed above. I’m sorry you’re getting shanked on electricity prices, but congrats on driving such an efficient car. You should buy a more efficient electric car and see if you can install solar or charge at off-hours.
Unfortunately that's the price of electricity on Long Island in NY. Blame the torpedoing of the Shoreham nuclear power plant, among other things.
Your numbers sound great (and more typical), but even they don't add up to the "ICE cars have 8x the running costs of EVs" comment I was responding to. Unless you have solar, in which case that number approaches infinity.
If I could install solar in my roof I would do it in a heartbeat. I do think It's hilarious that we're having a discussion of the form "not enough power plants make my electricity too expensive for electric cars" and literally in the next breath "unless you have 100 square meters free on your roof and the willingness to make a (rapidly plummeting) capital investment, at which point electricity is effectively free." I don't think ICE cars have a similar story, and I think that will tend to put an upper-bound on electricity prices in the future.
The competing energy visions put forward by EV advocates do not make sense. On one hand, all charging is done at home when it is, er, dark outside. On the other, increasing solar supply somehow magically gets stored during the day when all EVs are in parking garages and not charging on their level 2 home chargers. EVs are a nice distraction from the real issue, which is that taking 3500lb of metal with you everywhere you go is itself horribly wasteful and inefficient in terms of both energy and the time wasted by people sitting in traffic.
What about cost of electricity vs gas? I have a magnificent 4 door Chevy Bolt for the last five years. I have not spent a cent on gas as I have driven it 10,000 miles. I get a 345 Mile charge overnight in my garage about once a week or sometimes every four days! I have saved a ton of money, suffered no inconvenience, on the road in bad traffic I get more juice more quickly whenever I need it than virtually any of the gas guzzlers I have to beat in order to change lanes in heavy morning traffic, and I don’t miss for one second shelling out $50+ at a filling station every week—so what’s the hell is wrong, convenient and inexpensive with any of that??
Also, the US market share for EVs is smaller than the EU one, so this rebound is maybe just the catch-up to EU levels to then plateau, like they're doing here.
Yep. EV sales are going to plateau while EVs drop in cost due to both battery improvements and economies of scale. People will insist on paying more for total cost of ownership because they like showing they can burn money. /s
98 Terawatts of additional generating capacity would be required to replace every ICE in the US with an EV. This is why it will not happen quickly. While we can probably agree that not EVERY vehicle will be electric, there is still about 30 years of power generation build out required before ICE shuffles off the playing board.
And most (59%) electricity in China is coal generated, so those EVs are not reducing carbon emissions very much. The reason EVs are popular in China is that the production is subsidized and manufacturers have quotas, and EVs are not subject to consumption or other taxes while ICE cars are not. China produces ICE cars for export, mostly to Russia since other imports are under sanctions, and Southeast Asia.
Even if you make just one or two longer trips per month, it still doesn't make much sense for many to own an EV.
I live in a big European country that is much more densely populated than the US. You can arrive anywhere with a 500km trip.
I have to make a 500km trip about once a month, and it obviously I would never, never use an EV to do it. Refilling gas is super-fast on the highway and it takes like 2-3 minutes, and then you can go.
With a tesla model 3, at highway speeds, when it is cold (from what i can see online) you can maybe do around 250km, for me it would mean one complete charge and a bit more to make the last few km, or like two 80-85% and a last shorter charge for the last few km. Assuming that I'm starting the trip at 100% charge. If I'm correct it would add like at least 45 minutes to the trip, likely some more.
On a 3.30 trip it doesn't make much sense honestly.
It would be better in the summer or when it's warmer, but for some few months it would be like that.
And this is a best case scenario with a really good EV that has an extremely fast charging speed and a good price for what you get. At least in europe 95% of the alternatives are far worse in one or all the categories mentioned above.
The newly announced renault 5 base price is 35.7k and has a max charging speed of 100kw and a smaller range.
A much, much bigger problem here in europe is that there are a ton more people that live in condos and have no way to charge it at home, compared to the US, and the vast majority of them park in the streets (me and my family included, but again, the average person doesn't have a garage). And there are exactly zero chances that charging stations will be built on sidewalks. Not only it would be extremely impractical (1) sidewalk are often really narrow, 2) do you reserve half the sidewalk "spots" for EVs when there are still hundreds of millions of petrol cars? 3) the cost of that?), it would also be a nightmare from a logistical point of view.
The best of both worlds is by far PHEV for the foreseeable future, where you can get much of the advantages of the EV but still aren't forced to hunt for a charging station, or wait long times to "fill the tank".
I disagree that price is the only problem: for first, I've seen a ton of forecasts about incredible adoption rates for EVs ten years ago that didn't pan out, along with forecasts of "this will be cheaper in 2025" that really never materialized.
And second, the charging problem is a real one: I think that we need better battery technology. Some startups are promising C/3 discharge rates and 70-100% better battery density. That would be game-changing. At that point you could really charge it weekly at a supercharger-like station for like 5 minutes to fill half of the "tank", and you'd solve the chargning problem for like 98% of people.
There is no doubt that one day EVs will be the obvious choice for everyone, but I think the super-hyped EV enthusiasts need to assess the issue more realistically and don't assume that pointing out flaws is because "uh conservatives" or "uh did you run the math??" (not talking about you in particular).
And I hate it because despite what many would think after reading my comment I really like EVs. It's just that there still persist one or two huge PITAs (at least for me and many other people) that doesn't make it worth it for now and likely some years to come.
Whether or not it makes sense today for you to buy an EV, the fact remains that EVs are steadily improving and falling in price and eventually it will make sense for you to buy an EV.
Agree. This post appears to be glossing over a LOT of issues, including safety (as a woman, I am not thrilled about the idea of being stuck at a charging station at night, unable to leave.) Not to mention local unavailability of public charging stations, the 2-3k expense of installing a home charger, and the unfeasibility of charging for people in many apartments.
I can see buying a hybrid, but not a EV, in the foreseeable future. It just doesn’t meet my needs. A hybrid or an ICE vehicle does.
How is being stuck at a charging station at night, unable to leave, any different from being stuck at a diner, unable to leave because the waiter hasn’t come back with your check yet?
I do not have to stop at a diner to get to my destination on a trip. I can get food or coffee at a drive through. If I have to make a pit stop, Starbucks has clean bathrooms and well lit parking lots, plus, coffee.
I do have to stop to refuel when low in order to get to my destination. It’s not a choice. I refuel or I am stuck. Gas refill is a few minutes. EV recharge is much longer and that’s potentially risky.
Women traveling alone generally do not make unnecessary nighttime stops.
I have to tell you that even as a reasonably strong and healthy man I often feel a sense of "unsafe" when I'm charging at the back end of some giant empty mall parking lot at 2am and I'm the only one there and the car is plugged in so I can't just drive away.
It's just a matter of time before criminals figure out what a fabulous opportunity this is to (at least) rob people.
My hope is that most chargers are built next to 24 hour gas stations and diners where there is perpetual human presence (at least potentially) but that's not the case at the moment.
Yeah I think the future of charging stations is going to be incorporating restaurants, convenience stores, and other activities that keep human eyes watching 24/7 - not bare pumps out in a parking lot like some gas stations.
Indeed - I'm actually surprised by how few entrepreneurs are currently taking advantage of this opportunity. Obviously the kinds of facilities that are available now vary wildly but as I said in another reply - I've driven across the nation and on many shorter long-distance trips in my T3 and in most places that are "between" major destinations the chargers are in major mall parking lots where there are no services of any kind (not even bathrooms) after the mall closes, usually around 9pm.
Any food truck with hot coffee and some basic snacks and a port-o-poty would probably do quite well and would also come to be known as the "late night" food option in the local area. I'm surprised this hasn't become the norm or perhaps there are local zoning/merchant laws preventing such operations in parking lots?
I think that your ultimate conclusion is the "between the lines" implication of everything in the article. I've driven my 3 from NYC to Montreal a few dozen times and across the continent once. The inconvenience very quickly becomes routine and the benefits rapidly outweigh the PITAs for me but obviously your mileage may vary (ha!).
However, the future holds all sorts of marvels that will be upon us in a flash and we'll all say "remember when we had to..." about all the current shortcomings.
If the thrust of the article is that the die has been cast and the future of EVs is now assured and just a matter of time before they are the predominant means of personal transportation, I think it's very hard to argue the contrary in good faith.
Honestly for me there are zero benefits that would outweigh me in the cold inside my car watching some video waiting 20-25 minutes for the car to charge. Two times in the same trip. It's a big no.
I could think of doing it if I had some compelling advantage, but the cost of buying a new decent EV is just waaaaay too much for me and I don't have a box for the car, meaning that even if I don't do any long trip, I still have to seat every few days at a charging station for several tens of minutes for the car to charge.
Also, here the cost of a tesla supercharger should be like 0.50-0.55 c/kwh that is not really that convenient compared to the gasoline.
But the biggest problem is that I just can't pay 20k more for an EV that is somewhat longer range and spacious enough. I love sportier cars but I can give up the better torque if the price is that big.
There is no reason for a few ICE cars to continue to be sold for people with special needs for long distanced road travel, at least until some newer technology is developed such as quick in-out batter replacement or faster charging. Of course as specialty vehicles they will probably be more expensive, so drivers will be faced with the choice.
If a vehicle is better for 99% of your trips, and just once every three months you do a trip where the vehicle adds 30 minutes to your already long day, how much of a problem is that?
It’s not like the cars can’t make the trip - it just means that your lunch break has to be at a charging station.
You should read the post. While EVs today are not the be-all end-all for everyone, the trajectory for EVs will make them the be-all end-all for everyone. The issues you have today are becoming less problematic and will soon (in the grand scheme of things) stop being a problem.
Why would you be unable to leave? It doesn't seem that different to an unmanned gas station to me.
Obviously can't speak for your personal situation/crime in your area, but FWIW safety while charging hasn't been a concern for my wife (though to be fair, we only use public chargers very infrequently, for the reasons covered in the post). Of course I'd hope as EVs become more popular, they get closer together and more customer friendly with lighting/shops to increase safety further.
You can’t leave until you get enough charge to get to the next charging station, unless you want to be stranded. You’re stuck.
There are generally lots of well lit, manned gas stations along travel routes, often with food and bathrooms, and gassing up takes a few minutes. That is generally not true of EV chargers.
When you are traveling, which was the situation being discussed, you are limited to what’s available on your route.
There are currently zero public EV chargers in my county.
In general, women do not go out alone at night in remote, isolated places. We don’t go out alone to eat dinner in remote isolated places. We don’t go to movie theaters at night in remote isolated places.
We do drive alone at night, because gas stations are well lit, generally busy, and we only have to be there a few minutes and there are generally other people around for the brief time we’re there. Even then, sometimes they’re not safe. Most of us have friends who have had scary late night encounters.
Ask your women friends why being stuck alone at a remote charging station late at night would be unacceptable. They’re not generally busy, so there aren’t other people around, and you are stuck there long enough to be noticeable to shady people.
The thing is that right now ICE cars is the vast, vast, vast majority of sales, and the "vibes" I get from people is that virtually all of them will stick with ICE cars for their next car.
So maybe in 2040-2045 the scenario you describe will pan out. For now and the next few years are the BEVs that are "the few cars being sold".
Also, I can't stress this enough: forget the chargin problem and the ridicolous EV infrastructure (from the map I can see that in my 50k populated city there are 21 public chargin "boxes" (not stations) that have between 25 and 44kw), IIRC the US average transaction for a new vehicle is like 50k, I don't have the data for my country but I can tell you that the best selling car here (by far, I mean, it hugely outsells everything else by a ton) is not hundreds of thousands of fkin huge f150 lariat for sale at 65.000 USD (yeah, many of them are lower trims for fleets, but still..), but it is a 14k that you can bring home for like 10k with state incentives and the second one has a slightly higher MSRP.
A shitty semi-econobox renault 5 for 32900€ (35.7k $) with questionable range and slow chargning times is really not gonna cut it.
Wait a minute. A 500km trip takes you 3.5 hours? You drive at an average of 140km per hour? The only European country where driving that fast is ever legal is Germany, and I don’t think the unlimited speed sections of the autobahn include 500km long stretches. This all seems very odd to me.
By contrast, here in the UK, I drove recently from London to Durham, which is a 250 mile (400km) trip, and it took 4.5 hours. I could have done the journey on a single charge pretty easily, as my car has a 330 mile summer range and easily 300 miles at this time of year (yes, at motorway speeds), but I personally can’t do that long a journey without a break. I stopped for lunch for 30mins on the way, plugged the car in while I ate, and the car was ready before I was.
This whole notion of driving for four or more hours at a stretch with no break, or only a ten minute break, is a strange idea (does no one have kids?), and it’s also pretty dangerous, because fatigue really kicks in after 2.5 hours of driving, no matter how safe you think you are.
I have three kids and we absolutely push some legs of our drive to 3 1/2 - 4 hours without a stop. Making stops on road trips with children sucks; we consolidate them into as few and as short stops as we can.
With kids on road trips you just want to get to where you are going as fast as you can with as little interaction with the public as possible.
I guess this shows how everyone does things differently. But certainly we stopped for breaks quite often, and judging by the scene at every motorway service station I’ve ever seen, lots of other families do that too. My kids’ bladders could not last 3.5 hours when they were small, not a chance
It's not germany but here the limit is 130 kmh, and it is possible to have 150 kmh in some traits if it is deemed feasible.
In any case my real cruising speed is a likely bit higher, around 135 kmh or a bit less.
Consider that like 30% of drivers here have a cruising speed of probably 150-160 kmh. From my sample of several tens of trips, I'm fairly confident to say that at least 5-10% of the drivers, at least on the highway I usually travel on, go even higher than that.
Not that it's legal, it's just that things go like this lol.
Also yes, I take usually take a break, but that's like a short break to go to the bathroom or take a coffee.
Two 25 minute forced breaks sitting in my car doing absolutely nothing is something I want to avoid. I know that the torque is fantastic, but I don't have 45k to spend on a decent EV and I would absolutely, positively hate to routinely find a charger every few days and sit there doing nothing + the forced charges for longer trips.
But you said 500km in 3.5 hours which is an *average* of more than 140km/h! That sounds crazy fast — well above the legal limit for most of the way. Also, you’d only have to charge once en route, not twice. But if you can’t afford a new car, the whole thing is moot anyway, unless you’re buying second hand.
I'm checking now with the google maps. The total in km is 491, subtract 10 km to go from my home to the highway + 5-10 km to exit the highway and arrive at destination.
Its around 470, that you can do in about 3.5 h at 130-135, so yeah, it's about right. One time I've gone there, do what I had to do and came back.
The average time is between 3.5 and 4 hours likely, depending on traffic conditions and if you have to stop because an accident occurred.
Honestly it's surprising that people are surprised that you can go 130-140 on the highway. Yeah, it's normal here, I know that in many countries everyone goes at most at 110 kmh, but this is not how it works here. 130, even 140 (even if it's not illegal) is not crazy fast LOL. Maybe you are not used to it, but it's perfectly drivable.
500 divided by 3.5 is 143 km/h, which is what you originally said and thus how I worked out the maths. If it’s 470 instead, then the average is 135, as you said.
140km/h is 87mph. That is extremely fast! But I’ve looked it up and it’s the legal limit in Poland, and there are 9 other European countries that allow 130kmh. The UK limit is 70mph, 112km/h, and there’s no way you could ever drive at 70mph for 3.5 hours on UK motorways, you’d always have extended periods well below that due to traffic and roadworks. The average speed on UK motorways, taking into account delays from traffic / roadworks, is just 57mph (90km/h)…
Anyhoo, back to the bigger point: you wouldn’t need to charge twice per leg for your journey, just once. There are even some EVs that would enable you to drive the whole journey, plug in at your destination, do what you need to do, and be ready by the time you returned.
In California, on Highway 5, especially if you time your trip for off-peak hours, it's not totally unreasonable to cruise at 85mph on the long straight stretches even if the speed limit is only 75mph. But, yes, a significant part of the drive time is getting to and from highway five.
When it's very cold you would need to charge twice (at 80%) to make the full trip comfortably, considering the much higher consumption at higher speeds (I know that the source is reddit, but from what I read, at 150kmh you are 30% less efficient than 110 kmh on a tesla model 3, on average, so you could very well another lose 15-20% going 130-140), and che much lower range.
Also, and I didn't consider the big loss in efficiency of charging when it's that cold.
On the other hand, bad weather can very well mean lower speeds due to the conditions, so better efficiency than travelling at 130-140 kmh.
Maybe even strong winds have a noticeable effect.
In any case I saw many videos of teslas near freezing temperatures and it drops quite a bit, around 250-280km, and these are videos from the US, and were tested likely at 60-70 mph. Also, I can't heat up the battery before the tripsince I don't have a charger.
The full trip is almost 500km with around 470 at high speeds. The best combination is likely two charges at 80% since 5-80% is much faster than going full 100% since the charging process dramatically slows down when going from 70 to 100%.
So 80% of 270 is around 220km. I would need two 5-80% charges and a bit more to comfortably make all the trip.
At least if I'm correct with the calculations.
For the highway speeds: I try to make the trip when the traffic is lower, and usually you can make almost all the trip at those speeds because there are very few semi-trucks in certain days at certain hours. The limit is 130kmh everywhere, but the law allows some traits at 150 kmh if it is deemed feasable. I don't know if there are highways with that limit.
Also, consider that here nobody cares about speed limits.
As I said, my armchar estimate is that 20-30% of the drivers likely go 150-160kmh.
Yessir. More closely matching the gasoline experience will mean a lot to a significant number of potential EV buyers. And it’s just a matter of time. Ten years on the outside in my non-expert opinion.
I read some industry experts saying that assuming that the technology for a prototype solid state battery is here today (likely the best candidate for a real game-change), you need 6-7 years at least to properly and thoroughly test and validate these batteries for real world usage, then you need start actual mass production, then scale it and it in real world vehicles. So likely at least 10 years, realistically a few more to have a superior product at reasonable prices.
This does make sense. Every family I know with an EV has an ICE for the other car.
Hybrids make even more sense.
The bottom line is tech is only going to be adopted if it makes people’s lives better. All the EV apologists saying “your case is edge” or “you only make that trip a few times a year” are missing the point - why would anyone adopt a technology that does *less* than their previous tech and causes more inconvenience?
And some people travel with children. Sitting at a charging station for an extra hour every 200 miles on a holiday road trip with kids in the back would be beyond hellish. And it would make some trips impossible with how tight school holiday schedules have become. It would add at least 2-3 hours to the CT to MI road trip we do nearly 4-5 times a year, not to mention all the other road trips we do as a family.
And for moms, there are days when you really drive around that much getting kids to things and need a quick fill up.
The safety issue at night is real, and some times night road trips are unavoidable.
There are just so many practical issues with EVs. The bottom line is that having to wait to fill up and losing power in the cold are huge downsides that render EVs unusable for many. What suburban mom gives AF how fast a car can vroom vroom from 0-60 if it takes an extra 3 hours of frustration and aggravation to get to Midwest Grandma’s house for Thanksgiving because of charging times? Technology isn’t valuable because it is cool or “clean” or excites some urban tech bros; it’s valuable because it *makes ordinary life better in a way ordinary people can recognize.*
Why would I want to adopt a technology that makes my life harder to impossible in the ways that matter most to me?
When women tell you THIS DOESN’T WORK FOR US could you please take us at our word?
Forgive me, but the Model Y is one of the most popular cars in America. We saw them out in the desolate southwest on our road trip summer of 2023. Didn't see any stuck on the side of the road.
If Grandma lives less then 200 miles away, then the EV is a time saver. Charge up at Grandma's house and no gas stop on the way home.
People forget that oil changes are necessary at regular intervals. I do every 5000 miles. With my old Prius, that was an oil change and tire rotation after every 10-11 trips to the gas station. That's a regular time sink that isn't necessary with an EV. No more oil change. Just the tire rotation, saving time and money.
I got 405K on my Prius with the original battery. Only one brake job at 300K. That's a big time saver and money saver.
At a minimum, go hybrid. They're way more efficient in the city. ICE is terrible for city driving.
It's two stops on a 1,000km (600 mile) roundtrip. That's less than an hour. If combining it with a bathroom break or getting food or just standing up, it's quite a bit less than an hour of extra time.
I am actually a parent that did long road trips with the family. Kids need to stop more often than adults. We planned our trips to take multiple things into account.
Yeah I can stop when I want to and go to the bath or take a coffee and then go back driving. But for like 10 minutes, not 25 minutes for two times.
The EV is still a worse choice for the rest of the month because I don't have a box and I should find a public spot, go there, sit there for like how much? 45-50 minutes for a full charge from let's say 5% to 100%? And what is the loss in efficiency in capacity/charging speed when it's very cold outside?
Why should I spend likely one hour in total to go to the charger (considering 5-10 to go there and come back), waiting inside doing nothing?
What is the advantage? The torque? I don't care about the torque. Not with these compromises.
An EV here costs 10-15-20k more than a comparable ICE, with basically no advantage (unless you have a box/garage) and much more PITAs.
I don't know if it's just a "cultural" difference because many readers of this blog are from the US, where there are tons of houses in the suburbs with parking spots, but the reality in many european countries, especially in bigger cities is like this: a dozens and dozens of 5-10 storey condos, one after the other, with a number of garages that is a fraction of the total amount of cars owned by those who inhabit the condo, and people on average parking in the streets in a radius of 500m from their home.
If you have a chargin box in your home you have much lower electricity prices and you "fill the tank" every night.
If you don't have this you're basically buying a car that costs even twice as much, has much lower range, it's extremely more impractical to refuel, and honestly not that much torque, because most manufacturers put lower power motors in their EVs compared to tesla.
A yaris (full-hybrid) costs like 19k compared to 33k for the renault 5. The yaris is better in basically everything (it's also slightly bigger externally and more spacious internally) except for horsepower (130 vs 150) and it's wildly better in terms of refueling, chargning, etc.
For what reason should anyone buy a renault 5, especially if they can't charge at home?
Yeah, shitty infrastructure is one big problem, I don't buy stuff hoping that in the future everything will work.
The reality is that a yaris full-hybrid costs almost half compared to a renault 5, it has incomparably better refueling options and range, and it is overral a better, more functional and more spacious car. It also likely has that good torque of EVs, being a full-hybrid with a fairly strong electric motor.
Maybe you are the one making stupid excuses for buying a new toy that costs more than an ICE, but is more fast and quick.
Oh right but you're a hero because you're saving the planet yeah.
I'm on my second electric vehicle. I fully endorse this message. Let me add a little anecdotal evidence to the story. I live in southern Georgia where we recently experienced a severe hurricane. Our electricity was out for five days. A Facebook friend posted a snide comment the electrics were useless with no electricity. NOT TRUE! My vehicle was only charged to 80%. However, over the five days,I charged all my household electronic devices and we drove freely. We were able to bypass the insanely long lines at gas stations. My biggest EV related outage problem was my electrical garage door opener. Once my grandson and his stepfather helped me raise it. We were good to go.
I'm constantly surprised at how little attention surge in Chinese EV adoption is getting relative to commentary on slowdown of adoption in the US and Europe. Chinese EV sales have gone from 6% in 2020 to 38% in 2023. That's an unbelievably rapid shift. For comparison it took Norway 4 years to go from 6% to 39%, and Norway is a rich country of 5 million people, whereas China is the most populous country and the biggest car market in the world. This is a far bigger story than the small negative shifts in US and Europe and we in the fat west need to stop naval gazing and pay attention.
China is not a free market the consumer takes what they are given. I assume forcing EVs upon us with massive artificial economic pressure is the plan, but it would at least be nice if you could hide that fact
The Chinese consumer isn't being forced to buy an EV, but they are getting access to very cheap EVs because of massive state subsidy. That's been the explicit goal of the Chinese government with made in China 2025. It's kind of like Uber subsidising rides with VC money to outcompete taxi firms. Was the western consumer 'forced' to take Uber over taxis? Regardless of how they got there the fact is that China is now in a very good position in terms of their capacity for production of cheap, high quality EVs and with their domestic adoption.
The reason the Chinese are buying them is because they don't have an established car culture. Alot of Chinese people are just buying their first or second car, and this have no expectations around the convenience of a gas car.
Noah really underestimates how much an issue that is going to be with EVs in the US until they can get charging from 0 to 100 under 15 minutes in in the US.
EV advocates can yell at the top of their lungs that "you only have to supercharge on long trips!" But sometimes people have to drive 100 miles or whatever unexpectedly after work, etc. Ain't nobody gonna tolerate having to wait to charge a car they paid $50K for. People are flat out of their mind thinking it's okay that an EV takes 30 minutes to charge. These people do not underestimate how people use cars.
In America, the sweet spot is battery electric hybrids. I already own one, and my next car will be a plug in hybrid. That's what most American car companies neef to focus on. The best of both worlds.
Alexander, Tesla did solve the fast-charging problem. It solved it so well that last year, the Society of Automotive Engineers settled on the Tesla plug as the North American Charging Standard. Other carmakers are supposed to transition to it starting in 2025, maybe for the 2026 model year.
Also, it's more like 10-80 or 10-90. Carmakers advise against topping off at 100% charge regularly to preserve battery range, since through regular use the batteries chemically degrade. EV drivers generally don't try to drive to 0%, and around 10% the vehicle turns on energy failsafes like restricting the top speed and turning off climate control to conserve energy at low percentages.
Isn't the fact that China is still a relatively poor country (such that most ordinary Chinese have only just become rich enough to afford a car at all) been a big factor in the tremendous competitiveness of their EV industry, as it can achieve far greater economies of scale (by building the first cars for hundreds of millions of Chinese households) than the car industries of western countries, which mostly are only building new cars to replace those which wear out?
China is also positioning BYD and its other cars to enter developing markets in Latin America and Africa, like its own, to provide a low-price vehicle and beat American, Japanese and European carmakers to export markets.
yes they are forced. The government taxes away their income, making them highly price sensitive, and then gives that money to one industry to artificially undercut their competition. That is just a very corrupt/complicated way of forcing the consumer: you just show the mailed fist of government at tax season, rather than at the car dealership.
Yes, our government forced us to switch over to Uber. They placed huge restrictions on taxis that made them inconvenient, inflexible, and expensive, and then gave a few corporations total freedom to provide the same service with almost no restriction at all. Saying the consumer has a choice under those circumstances is laughable.
That’s not to mention that many uber drivers would not be able to support themselves on Uber payments where they live without massive government assistance. So the subsidy problem I outlined above also applies
Ok that's fair and consistent, viewing subsidies as a forcing mechanism. I suppose I just think it looks like their policies have been very effective for achieving their stated goals (some of which are also ostensibly the goals of western governments, which are looking relatively much less successful). Again I think there's a tendency to focus too much on exports and 'dumping' and too little on Chinese domestic EV adoption and the development of their auto tech / manufacturing sector. I personally don't really see commitment to free markets as an end in itself, and I certainly don't expect Chinese policy makers to think that way.
Yes things are easier in a one party state run by a hereditary mandarin class whose every policy initiative is a cynical ploy to increase centralized control.
What I don’t like is seeing fellow citizens lament that fact
Weren't the restrictions (such as medallions) that make taxis inconvenient, inflexible and expensive, imposed for a reason, most likely to minimize traffic congestion in cities caused by taxis?
So why (other than corruption) did city and national governments allow Uber to circumvent these restrictions?
One problem was that during the Great Depression, many car owners were doing the stone-age version of Uber and using their personal cars to carry fares for pocket cash. So many car owners had the same idea that supply outstripped demand and that just to get that pocket cash, they cut their fares so low they were making less than gas money.
Monopoly was seen as the answer to broker a balance between having a vehicle available at a reasonable price for consumers and a fare set to a point where the driver can recoup their costs with a set rate of profit, like an electric, water and gas utility. One way to achieve that was a barrier to entry, knowing that a maximum number of vehicles ensured a taxi operator would make money.
Uber moved fast, broke things, but realized when it clawed back the VC subsidies that despite its superior GPS and AI dispatching, its technology was not able to help them get under the operating costs of a taxi (about $4 a mile) or overcome the tyranny of what transit consultant Jarrett Walker refers to as geometry. (Uber's passenger per hour productivity is between 1-2 per driver, 40% of miles driven are deadheads, and it is physically beyond Uber's power to increase productivity.)
politicians are cowards who will never admit a mistake. Rather than go to an old constituency, the taxi drivers, and explain that protective regulations have become overly burdensome on the consumer and will have to be repealed, they opted to totally destroy that sector and replace it with a new source of support: big tech
Uber subsidizing rides to take market share from taxis turned out to be history's costliest lesson in Chesterton's Fence.
A basic Uber ride without the subsidies has converged with the regulated fares of taxi monopolies. With its technological superiority, Uber still can't manage to turn a profit on its services and likely never will. The value of a taxi enterprise was always in the monopoly, not the provision of service.
You will have to accept that fact that your tastes don’t align with the average American consumer. Toyota continues to sell hybrids at great profit, while EVs are money losers for everyone besides Tesla
They aren’t moving anything forward for anyone they are dumping toxins into the global environment to build batteries that will be powered by their dirty electrical grid for their entire operating life cycle.
Vertical integration between sales and the manufacturer is not crony capitalism, and dealers used to serve a valid purpose. The manufacturers are stuck with old contracts but are slowly working to crush the dealers and sell directly to the consumer. That’s the opposite of cronyism, that’s ruthless competition.
Anyway the American consumer is still getting the end product they want out of the arrangement, which is hybrids and pickup trucks.
Nothing you say changes the fact that their grid is filthy and they have no credible plans to clean it up.
If it does get cleaner it’s because their power needs will shrink along with their population and economy over the next decades, in which case all infrastructure investment right now is probably just money thrown into a pit of nonsense, just a repeat of the infrastructure/real estate bubbles that they’ve been winding down for the past several years
Vlad, China's grid has a higher percentage of renewables than the U.S. 26% versus 19%. I suspect they're locked into taking up a lot of the solar panels they are building. It makes logical sense and economic sense.
There is a massive subsidy in terms of money and time when it comes to getting plates and registering BEVS in China. Many times they waive high fees for registration and ICE cars take years to get plates.
First production rechargeable electric car 1886 or thereabouts. There's a reason why ICE won for the whole of the next century and that is connected with your "almost never have to charge away from home" claim because such claims have to take into account the severity of the event which almost never happens. You wear seatbelts for this reason, even though they are almost never needed and you personally have never benefited from one. The "almost never* event with EV is the one 400 mile roadtrip you make to see your folks at Christmas with a four hour queue, in winter, for a charger halfway because all the other EVs do the same. I am prepared to base my whole car strategy on avoiding that one annual experience
"I am prepared to base my whole car strategy on avoiding that one annual experience"
Why not rent a gasoline car that one weekend, if you're so concerned, and save money and the planet in the meantime? I think there is often something else behind resistance to EVs, namely cultural war identity bullshit.
I am British. We have all sorts of bullshit going on, but not EV vs ICE based identity statements. Planet saving wise my most responsible course of action is to get a further 70k miles out of my existing 100k car before replacing it.
Presumably if the problem with making that journey by EV is that there's a 4-hour queue at the charging station (because it's Christmas and millions of other people are making similar journeys at the same time), then it would also be extremely difficult (and expensive) to rent an ICE car for that journey for more or less the same reason?
Or I can just keep my ICE car and not go through all that extra cost and bullsh*t every time we need to take a road trip?
How am I “saving money” if I have to pay 1200$ dollars for a rental car for 2 weeks every Christmas vacation? Is the “savings” suppose to come from fuel costs? Does this magical place have free electricity?
Surely the real “almost never” event is when your car breaks down on the side of the road in the middle of nowhere, which is much more likely to happen in an ICE car
The last few times I *almost* got stranded, a flat tyre was the culprit. Luckily I drive a sensible ICE with a full-sized spare so I was able to swap it over and get on my way.
Almost all electric cars omit the spare these days so I'd have been utterly screwed.
Batteries throughout the 20th century couldn’t maintain very much of a charge. Just compare the old-fashioned copper-top AA battery you use for a remote control to the lithium ion battery in your phone. There’s a reason John Goodenough won the Nobel prize a few years ago, and it’s because the lithium ion battery has so much more power density than anything else that suddenly we can have meaningful electric scooters and pocket sized mobile telephones, and also usable electric cars and trucks and everything else.
You should try to understand the post. The only solution proposed to the range problem is people realising it is not a problem. I am saying actually it is.
So you're the 1% of exceptions? There's no issue if 1% have ICE cars, so keep yours. Nobody cares. Just know that gas stations will start closing down at some point, so your trips will get harder to plan.
What if we could add continual charging on the interstate highways….while you drive on them, your battery is kept charged. Sort of a form of public transportation that could be paid for by tolls.
You just described a train, but worse. Just use a train. If you insist on bringing your car instead of renting one at your destination there's the possibility of loading your car on a cargo train, though not enough people want that right now for that to be a common service.
Yes, that is a big advantage, considering that most power outages are just a few hours due to a thunderstorm, and you usually don’t want to be going anywhere during those few hours.
That’s nice. I already have a generator for that purpose.
Now I need a vehicle that will get me, my husband, and our three kids from Connecticut to Ann Arbor on Wednesday, November 27, between 11:30 am, when school gets out, and 10 pm, which is already a bit past bedtime for both grandparents and first graders.
LOL... let me reverse it.... your ICE cannot provide backup power, so you have to buy a generator. Your ICE vehicle costs more to operate, requires more maintenance, and is louder/less comfortable to drive. Life is about perspective I suppose.. for the rare occasions one need to make a trip like yours...rent.. it is a hell of a lot cheaper.
I'm 66 years old and retired from the work force. My home has 7.8KW of solar panels on the roof, sufficient that for 6 sunny months of the year I can power my EV with essentially free solar energy. My EV runs on the Sun. We decided that rather having a home battery, we would use solar energy to subsidize our transport costs.
Understand that an EV has a single gear and therefore no gear box. There's no excessive heat and vibration to be damped from internal combustions that ultimately diminishes the life of an ICE vehicle.
An EV is a computer on wheels and that means software becomes a crucial component. Software like Google Maps, Spotify, Netflix, YouTube, Zoom video conferencing. Software tightly coupled with mobile phones.
And now EVs are evolving to become robots on wheels with the inclusion of Neural Network computers.
I don’t want a robot on wheels. I don’t want my car connecting with tech or phones or internet. That is so creepy. No no no! I have my own brain and memory and maps and human skills to navigate. I hate the computer than is already in my car. Give me KNOBS!
I just want a car that will reliably get me from point a to point b with a quick fill up.
You overlooked efficiency and cost per mile. My Tesla model Y has averaged ~~ 121 miles per gallon equivalent over the 40,000 miles I’ve driven it. Cost is about 3.5 cents a mile. My deisel Jetta at 44 mpg was about 10 cents per mile. Electric motors are very good at converting energy into forward motion. ICE not so much. This is the primary reason they will win!
I really want to like EVs, wish my next vehicle would be one and I know we'll get there eventually. But the idea of buying one was killed stone dead a couple of years ago. I live in central Europe and you may recall that when Nord Stream was blown up we faced a severe electricity crunch. My local government at this time started talking about passing emergency laws that would restrict people from driving ... but only if they drove an EV. ICE cars would still be allowed to drive.
So this established the precedent that trapping EV users at home is an acceptable strategy to ensure grid stability. Which is, let's face it, kinda reasonable as blackouts are really bad, but it's also a tradeoff you just don't face with ICE. The "petrol privilege" is something I can't get out of my mind since. I live in a city so can't just build a solar farm on my roof, meaning I have to trust the government to properly manage the energy supply. And I just don't. It's not their fault, this particular government is one of the more competent ones, but levels of international electricity trading are very high so problems in one area (e.g. Germany) spill over to other areas. Thus I must also trust the competence of all the other big countries in Europe, even though they're dominated by fanatical greens and socialists who are trying to replace the entire grid with unstable renewables. Impossible to trust them in that context.
In other words, ICE has a decentralization advantage.
Petrol has never been rationed in your country? I’m no EV true believer, but ICE cars are dependent on a specific type of energy, whereas EVs can use any energy source.
Any source of electricity e.g. coal, gas, oil, solar, nuclear…
There are charger adapters from what I’ve heard (a steady stream of brands have been getting access to Tesla’s Supercharger network) but I’m not an expert.
An individual could reasonably run an EV on gasoline (by charging it with a gasoline-powered electrical generator) as a fallback option in case of blackout, but there is no comparable backup plan to run an ICE car on electricity.
Well, "on our homes" is different to "on roads" isn't it? And in cities people tend to live in apartment blocks, so there is no roof (that we own).
I don't get the comment about Putin. You seem obsessed, to bring up such a random tangent in this thread. I actually can't vote where I live, so I didn't vote in this government, but the terrain here isn't particularly suitable for solar panels so I wouldn't support them trying to build farms anyway. There are other kinds of renewable power that work better here.
I am sorry, but it gets really tiring listening to people whine about their government. Unlike Russia, you have the ability to influence your government. Their failure is your failure. Losing an election is due to your failure to convince others of your point of view. There will be more elections. (Maybe, not here if Trump wins.)
ICE most definitely doesn't have a decentralization advantage, it just looks that way because of the extremely common presence of fossil fuel infrastructure, but when you trace that back to its source it is extremely centralized in refineries and harbours bringing it in.
It's at least as decentralized as electricity generation, if not moreso, and the system is naturally buffered because it doesn't have to balance on a second by second basis.
It also has the advantage that governments are mostly leaving it alone and don't run the distribution infrastructure, whereas they are much more involved with the grid.
EVs aren't the problem: they're a more versatile technology in that you could still run them on gasoline (by charging them with a gasoline-powered electrical generator) in case of blackout.
The problem seems to be more with trying to rely on wind and/or solar power in a northern European country, which led the government to commandeer private EV batteries for the purpose of keeping the lights on during a Dunkelflaute.
They only go offline due to low power demand (when it obviously isn't a problem), regular maintenance (easily predictable) or catastrophic failure (extremely rare): none of these are in the same category as solar power going offline due to night time, or wind power going offline due to anticyclonic weather conditions.
1.Hybrids are better for a lot of the country. Especially for winter.
2. What happens if we've hit lowest battery prices now? It seems that all the ever-cheaper batteries forecasts are based on a. Let's not talk about 3rd world labor and environmental practices having to stay the same, and b. China endlessly subsidizing its industry.
It’s incredibly unlikely that we’ve hit the lowest battery prices given the amount of investment in the space. Cotton is cheaper now than when it used literal slave labor.
What lots of people in this comment section criticizing EVs are missing is the "wait and see effect." Cars are durable goods. We expect OEMs to produce better products in the near future since their initial options will have lots of learning pains. We also expect prices to drop. No major rush to buy a new car.
"Cheaper to maintain" keeps being repeated ad nauseam, but when EVs have to be repaired it is almost always more expensive than ICE vehicles. Hertz found this out very quickly and experienced no maintenance cost savings with their EV fleet.
Having spent 35 years or so in the Automotive space, you may well be right, but it going to take decades to transition from 275 million or so registered cars and trucks.
Automation is not a bad thing but there will be dislocation. The dealer network will not survive its current state with a majority of EV sales. EVs currently do not have a dependable used vehicle market. The reason is the game musical chairs. Who wants to be the schmuck to get stuck buying a new battery pack. You don’t have a new car market without a used car market. Battery pack costs are going to have to come way down. Unless, of course, we eliminate leasing....
You blithely wisk away the problems of Apartment complexes. Who is going to install those chargers? It won’t be the complex owners unless you allow for much higher rental costs. New Apartment construction may have them. I also don’t know how many times I can say this but our grid and generation will not sustain 275 million cars and trucks charging overnight.
CA just had a brownout in 9 counties. Oops, if you needed a charge, I wouldn’t want to be in NC or FL after a hurricane if I needed to go somewhere with electricity out. So, I completely agree in time, we may become all electric...but it isn’t in 5 years or 10 years. Possibly 20 or more, but you'll have to figure out what to do with the TOTAL industry that represents 8% of exports and 3% of our GDP. The parts business, aftermarket busines...We;re not talking about 36,000 Longshoreman who are fighting automation....the jobs were talking about might be in the millions.
So which group do you work for, API, NADA, or OPEC? Because this is their current FUD (fear, uncertainty, doubt) program to protect their trillions of dollars in investments to keep the status quo.
As with any large scale change, there are many obstacles, most of which are solvable and will get there in time. Right now, EV's are not a solution for everyone, but there are many that can and will take advantage of the lower operation cost, lower maintenance, good performance and other aspects they offer. Yes, the changes and impacts down the road will be significant, but that is to be expected. Change is hard, but there are good reasons to push for these changes.
For what its worth, my condo installed EV chargers for every spot. The 3rd party installation vendor did so free of charge and will make it back on the cost of electricity. This is happening all over. It would be cheaper in the long run if condos did it themselves but, for the time being, this model is gaining traction.
They can't make it back on the"cost of electricity". They must charge you a delivery charge above the cost of electricity to make any money. Are these surcharges being considered on the comparison costs?
I bought two old Gen2 Priuses for my kids. One had a new Toyota battery pack. The other I replaced when it died. $8K for two old cars with brand new batteries. 50 mpg.
The good new is if Noah is right we can stop the wasted billions in taxpayer funds to build charging stations! Don't need 'em everyone is dong it at home "for free".
The last time I check in on home charging, using your 110 volt will take 24 hours, the next one was about $1500 to install and that wasn’t the supercharger. Unless they bring that cost down or somehow make the 110-volt outlet quicker, most Americans, even in homes, don’t necessarily have $1500 lying around. Remember on a two car family you’d need two chargers
You can buy a single level 2 charger that will charge two cars. The charger has the intelligence to switch the charge from one car to the other. For the 110-volt outlet charger, the charger comes with the car.
I think Israel's pager attack demonstrated that there's potentially a huge drawback with EVs - security.
We now know more about how the pager attack was done but initially it looked like they potentially overloaded the batteries remotely.
EV battery fires are some of the most viscous and destructive fires, and if it was possible to overload batteries remotely (eg in a terror attack) the destructive potential would be huge.
Having a fleet of incredibly complex machines, with an opaque supply chain, provided from countries around the world, all of which have remote access to software updates, may provide the opportunity for a most devastating pre emprltive strike.
I wouldn't be surprised if in the next year concerns start to be raised about the serious risks Internet in a move to a large portion of EVs.
Wasn't the pager attack a case of the Israelis tricking Hezbollah into buying their pagers from a front company under Israel's control, and which rigged them with explosives?
An exploding TV remote battery can't kill me. An exploding cell phone battery might kill me but is more likely to give me injuries. An exploding car battery will almost certainly kill its occupants.
Definitely a reason not to allow Chinese-built cars in our countries.
Some people are complaining that the battery won't last. This problem has been resolved with Lithium Iron Phosphate (LFP) battery chemistry. LFP battery packs will last well over 3000 full charge cycles. I can easily manage 400 KMs on a full charge. 3000 times 400 KMs = 1,200,000 KMs before the battery pack degrades to 75% of its original capacity.
Agreed. At normal USA consumer annual mileage (12k-20k per year from rough memory), the interior is probably rotting from UV damage by 500k miles. Definitely "the lifetime of the vehicle".
When people talk about how more common gas stations are I ask- are you closer to a 110v outlet right now or a gas station? I charge my chevy bolt at home on 110 and rarely need more than that. And the electricity for my car can come from anything. Hydro, nuclear, coal- whatever! It is way more flexible than petrol.
No, it cannot come from "anything". It can only come from electricity. That electricity can be generated by many sources, but that is not what is powering your vehicle. There is no flexibility for powering your vehicle.
I am a happy EV owner, over 3 years and on my second Ford Mustang Mach-E. I share your enthusiasm and hopes for the future. My total maintenance costs for the first one were US$55 over 3 years, and that was for an overpriced dealer tire rotation. However, I felt that there are a few incorrect statements in this post that should be looked at again, as I have some direct experience.
First, it is incorrect that battery life will be harmed (to a recognizable extent) by charging more frequently (at home) such as nightly. Some battery technologies should only be charged to 80-90%, but newer ones like LiFePO4 - used on some models of Tesla, Ford, probably others - can go to 100%. There is enough data now to say that previous assumptions are myths, including one study that showed 800,000 mile life for the battery packs. Studies also show from many years of Tesla data that cars have primarily been fast-charged retain most of the expected range.
Second, noise. While it might be true that EVs are slightly quieter backing out of a parking space (hybrids as well), they are noisier on the road. Several reasons: tires designed for EVs are noisier as they have to have stiffer sidewalls to support greater weights; manufacturers may reduce the amount of sound insulation to reduce that weight. My Mustang is noisier than my previous car (Audi A4). Newer battery technology will also reduce the weight of EVs "real soon now".
Third, range estimates must be taken with a huge bucket of salt. While all cars have lower range in winter, the reduction is much more significant for EVs. While I never believed my Audi's claim of 485 miles on a full tank, my two Mustangs promised range of over 270 miles (which is plenty for me, btw) reduce by almost 40% in winter. I do have the luxury of plugging in whenever I want, and I don't come close to the 38-40 miles average for Americans.
This strikes me as in some ways less a contrast to yesterday’s gloomy post about autocratic takeover than a complement to it.
As you note at the end, the EVs that are “going to win” are Chinese EVs. America is going to face pressure to stall the EV transition to prop up our auto industry, lose export markets anyway, and have our top domestic automaker be Tesla whose CEO is deeply embedded in the global autocratic axis. I’m glad the new cars are less polluting! But this still seems like part of the story of the rise of the Chinese century.
Idk man. Everyone is going to get a car that works much better and is better for the environment too. I'm not going to sit here feeling bad about that fact just because China is a powerful country that makes a lot of cars.
"Everyone" is a pretty big stretch. Most people in cities who could most use an EV have no access to home level 2 charging. Their landlords are in no rush to add it, because it costs many tens of thousands of dollars to upgrade the electrical service to the entire building and install the proper wiring. Permits, design, installation are all costly. Why should landlords foot this cost? They aren't and they won't. And don't even get me started on condo boards - nobody is going to want to have an additional levy to pay for these chargers. So it will take 10 or 20 years to achieve the market saturation you seem to feel is at hand for EVs. And in cold climates, the transition will be even slower. One doesn't just instantly replace the entire electrical infrastructure of every multifamily dwelling in America. But look on the bright side...you can publish another article in 2040 saying I Told You So.
Spot on. And that's not even talking about the current deficit with power generation, poor quality power transmission / grid tech, etc. It's not realistic to upgrade all of these immediately - especially when states like CA are actually reducing power generation and other energy infrastructure. All this talk of electrification tends to sound bonkers to me. Right now, we have 3-4 major energy sources in our home. Electricity from grid and rooftop solar, NatGas for heating/cooking/drying, Gasoline for cars, and Propane for camping stoves which could be useful in a pinch. This is a highly resilient infrastructure to an energy shock like a massive grid cyberattack. If you lose power for a few days, you can still cook at home if needed or drive somewhere to get food. Once everything is dependent on electric, even a Tesla powerwall is not going to last very long.
That is, if they work better, if they are better for the environment, and ultimately, if they are affordable without subsidies.
"just because China is a powerful country that makes a lot of cars"
China isn't just "a" powerful country. It is the only competition to the Western model of governance and society.
You would have written "just because the Soviet Union is a powerful country that makes xxx"?
Or argued for the superiority of German cars during World War II?
So, you'd prefer they drive gasoline cars because they are our rival?
He wrote "everyone". Not every Chinese person or even every person other than Americans and American allies.
I replied to you.
> and have our top domestic automaker be Tesla whose CEO is deeply embedded in the global autocratic axis
This didn't have to happen. Elon Musk's political beliefs never really matched up with Trump's. It is entirely an effect of the Democrats and the institutions they control attacking him. They didn't even invite him to their EV event. They pushed an EV subsidy bill that only went to unionized companies (in other words every American car company except Tesla). They block his rocket launches for endless investigations and environmental reviews over trivial details like switching control rooms without telling the FAA and trivial imperfections in the flights. When he sent Starlink to Ukraine he was crucified in the media for expecting a payment like every other defense contractor on Earth. He was accused of being a Russian asset for denying permission to use Starlink terminals in a direct attack on Crimea that would have actually been illegal for him to approve.
There was absolutely no good reason for the Democrats to start a fight with the richest man in the world whose activities were massively beneficial to the country, but they did. Now they can FAFO.
Are we seriously pushing the narrative that Elon Musk’s extreme behavior (including blowing $44bn on Twitter) is because the Democrats were mean to him? The man is almost impulsive enough to make that believable, but the political expenditure feels much more desperate and self-serving than that. Trump was also very mean to Elon Musk, but he doesn’t mind — because it’s about business.
I remember having credulous conversations a few years ago about how Musk wasn’t buying Twitter as a political channel, he just wanted to”free speech.” I think it’s time people here started applying some critical thinking: stop believing dumb stuff just because Elon Musk says it.
Not "mean to." Directly opposing his business interests. Just like you said. Why would Elon Musk not act in his own political interests? That is his fundamental right as a citizen of the US. And his business interests are very much aligned with US interests. EVs and space launch are very important industries that the benefit the country. So why are you coming after Elon Musk for defending his interests and not the Democrats for going against the national interest by fighting with Musk? Yes, he seems impulsive and thin skinned, but those are human weaknesses that I find extremely easy to forgive.
Twitter is very uncensored. If Elon Musk banned his political opponents, why is Kamala Harris on it? Why is Noah Smith allowed to tweet things like this: https://x.com/Noahpinion/status/1796288065214013603. This is unlike the previous ownership who outright banned Trump. Yes, it's biased, but so is every media company.
The IRA made Teslas able to get a $7500 tax credit. Seems right in line with Musk's business interests to me.
Yeah, because Republicans opposed the provision where the credit would go to Tesla's unionized competitors, but not Tesla. I wonder why he supports Republicans?
The only reason to support Republicans is crony Capitalism.
There is no excuse to support Trump. He's a shitty human, shitty American, and was a historically shitty President.
What are you talking about? Democrats have been supporting the tax credit for EV's for years even when the only beneficiary was Tesla. Republicans wanted to gut it. What are you talking about?
Idk, alienating your core customer base by going full maga seems to directly oppose his business interests! There is really nothing that Tesla has anymore that isn't being replicated by other manufacturers. Any truly independent corporate board would have kicked him to the curb by now, but instead want to play footsie with securities fraud by propping up Howard Hughes 2.0.
> EVs and space launch are very important industries that the benefit the country.
Yes and what political party has historically supported Elon and subsidizing those industries? I'll wait for your reply.
> So why are you coming after Elon Musk for defending his interests and not the Democrats for going against the national interest by fighting with Musk? Yes, he seems impulsive and thin skinned, but those are human weaknesses that I find extremely easy to forgive.
Who is coming for Elon Musk? What legislation have Democrats passed to specifically hurt Musk or his business or him? What you really mean to say is why do people who lean democrat critique him at all. I think a lot of people with authoritarian desires and huge egos seem to be impulsive and thin skinned. If you can forgive those human weaknesses when their impulsive behavior lashes out and hurts others that seems like a sign of immaturity.
> Twitter is very uncensored. If Elon Musk banned his political opponents, why is Kamala Harris on it? Why is Noah Smith allowed to tweet things like this: https://x.com/Noahpinion/status/1796288065214013603. This is unlike the previous ownership who outright banned Trump. Yes, it's biased, but so is every media company.
It's been proven that Elon throttles and games the algorithm on Twitter to amplify his own posts and decrease the reach of people he doesn't like or agree with. You don't know what free speech means mate. It means the government can't punish you for saying certain things, it doesn't mean that social media platforms can't kick you off for violating their terms of service. And way to ignore why the previous owners of X banned Trump, and also you think Trump is an arbiter of free speech, and you think Elon is? Is that why both X and TruthSocial banned satire accounts? Come on now... you have got to be trolling at this point right? X also has been known to ban accounts that are critical of Elon, his business, etc. This includes journalists and comedians. You are talking out both sides of your mouth. He's such a free speech absolutists that he never speaks out against China or Russia right? You are arguing in bad faith and can't be taken seriously. (https://newrepublic.com/post/177936/twitter-suspends-accounts-journalists-critical-elon-musk)
Yeah, no fight was started. The EV event was for union-companies only, and Tesla doesn't have a union, so they were never going to be invited in the first place. Just because Elon lost his mind because he's angry at one of his kids and one of his dozen wives divorced him instead of him being able to dump them first, doesn't excuse him defaulting to autocracy. It's a little concerning that you think this is the case.
Biden is the president of the United States, not the president of the UAW. When he holds an "EV Summit" (not a "UAW Summit") he should invite the largest American manufacturer of EVs ( who also has the most domestically sourced supply chain in the industry). If the president cared about the interests of the US as a whole he would be telling the other car companies to be more like Tesla. And of all the things I listed this snub is by far the least of them. It wouldn't have taken much for the Democrats to get Elon Musk on their side, but they just couldn't swallow their pride and do it. Now they live with the consequences of their actions and I have no sympathy at all.
For most of us, being a convicted felon, adjudicated rapist and a traitor that tried to overthrow an election that was legally certified by every state was a deal breaker.
Where did I say I'm voting for that idiot? I'm not. But if you actually believe that Donald Trump (or anybody) raped a woman in the changing room of a department store and got away with it, I have a bridge to sell you.
Trump lost twice. Yep, I trust the decisions of judge and jury rather than the denials from one of the most dishonest humans on the planet. The judge described him as a rapist. I'm good with that description.
Frankly, it isn't easy to get up on the witness stand and lie. The burden was on her to prove her case.
Trump keeps telling us exactly who he is. Access Hollywood wasn't locker room talk. It was entitled sexual predator talk.
He publicly expressed sympathy for Ghislaine Maxwell, not the underage victims. He doubled down on it. Truly sick.
His fixation with Ivanka is truly creepy. Ivana accused him of rape. Nobody would be surprised if he assaulted her in one of his fits of rage.
Who persists in saying she wasn't his type after, under oath, mistaking her for his second wife? 🤦🤣 Who is he telling that transparent lie to? His followers? Himself?
It was a union-shop-only EV Summit. Truly incredible the backwards bending you do just to say you want to vote for Donald Trump. You can just admit you want to vote for him without bending over backwards!
> the largest American manufacturer of EVs ( who also has the most domestically sourced supply chain in the industry)
I assume you mean Tesla here, but it's actually Ford... You need to get updated info mate. Also why would Biden invite an automaker who doesn't support unions? Additionally, why would he invite Musk who has openly mocked and doesn't support him? Just to assuage Musk's ego? You shouldn't have to treat a grown adult like a toddler to get them on your side.
> It wouldn't have taken much for the Democrats to get Elon Musk on their side, but they just couldn't swallow their pride and do it. Now they live with the consequences of their actions and I have no sympathy at all.
We are all American, we should all be on the same side. You seem to have more sympathy for a billionaire who doesn't care about you, than people who are your fellow citizens. Democrats have done more for Elon Musk through good policies than Republicans, he threw that away because he has a huge ego and got radicalized on his own social media platform.
The man has more defense contracts than he knows what to do with. Also, the Starlink/Ukraine debacle was about WAY more than “wanting to get paid for his product”. He’s had a bunch of chances to be the hero you seem to think he is, and he’s consistently dropped the ball.
It's been a while since I saw someone work so hard to lick Elon's boots. Way to blame Democrats as a whole for how Elon is behaving. Its typical DARVO behavior. Elon engages in conspiracy theories, antisemitism, racism, misinformation, and generally pushed away his own customer base because people critiqued him or challenged him on a social media platform. To ignore all of that and just blame Democrats is a a really low info take...
>This didn't have to happen. Elon Musk's political beliefs never really matched up with Trump's. It is entirely an effect of the Democrats and the institutions they control attacking him.
Elon is self interested and likes money and power. Who exactly is attacking him? Unless you mean people who say mean things about him or critique him? Just because he is rich and overall built some good businesses on the back of the US taxpayer he is above critique?
> They didn't even invite him to their EV event. They pushed an EV subsidy bill that only went to unionized companies (in other words every American car company except Tesla).
That is because Elon Musk doesn't have unions. Additionally, the EV subsidy credit can still be applied to EV's that Tesla makes.
> They block his rocket launches for endless investigations and environmental reviews over trivial details like switching control rooms without telling the FAA and trivial imperfections in the flights.
Please look up and tell us how many rocket launches they have blocked from SpaceX. To ignore environmental reviews for what you consider trivial rules when every other launch company follows them is a bad faith argument. What you are really trying to say is that because you like Musk and his companies, that they should be allowed a certain level of leeway when it comes to certain things. Compare how many launches they have "blocked" vs how many actually go through without issue. Regardless of how you feel about certain species, there is a real threat of waste and environmental harm when it comes to rocket launches no matter who does them.
> When he sent Starlink to Ukraine he was crucified in the media for expecting a payment like every other defense contractor on Earth. He was accused of being a Russian asset for denying permission to use Starlink terminals in a direct attack on Crimea that would have actually been illegal for him to approve.
Now I know you are arguing in bad faith, because there was way more to it than that. I think you keep mixing up the media and people on social media with opinions first of all. Additionally, the US government had a private agreement with Starlink a couple months after the war started and Elon said he was providing it for free additioanlly. Don't say you are going to provide something for free and then try and get payment later, its bad taste. It's especially bad taste when it comes out like 6 months later that the US government had a private deal with Starlink to pay for it. The reason why people called him a Russian puppet is because he turned off and limited Starlink in Russian occupied areas of Ukraine to Ukraine forces. Meanwhile Russian forces used Starlink and he didn't limit them. Musk then said he was afraid of nuclear escalation because he spoke to the Russian ambassador to the US who told him that.
> There was absolutely no good reason for the Democrats to start a fight with the richest man in the world whose activities were massively beneficial to the country, but they did. Now they can FAFO.
Who are these Democrats who speak of who started a fight with him? Again it goes back to fairness, you think that just because Musk is rich he should be allowed to always be right and have his ego stroked? To ignore how he has double standards, is a known liar, hypocrite and literally forgets that the Obama administration helped subsidize SolarCity and SpaceX is just bad faith debating mate. Even your last comment where you say FAFO, just goes to show you think his bad behavior is justified even if he is entirely self interested and it harms America. Literal teenager behavior.
The real danger is the Xi and CCP's domestic mismanagement of the Chinese economy might put a damper on the Chinese century and they opt to roll the dice on armed conflict rather than lose their perceived opportunity for national greatness.
I don’t understand how you can think Xi is mismanaging the economy under an article about Chinese domination for the next generation of vehicle manufacturing (not to mention all of the components of electrics cars, from raw materials to batteries.)
Xi is mismanaging the Chinese economy if you use the current US/Euro standard which prioritizes labor standards and consumer power. As Noah’s written, that’s not Xi’s yardstick.
He’s also mismanaging the economy if you use any standard that cares about people’s well-being. It’s true that he cares more about some subset of technologies than about overall GDP.
That’s my point. He’s managing the economy extremely well from the point of view of increasing the military and economic power Chinese state vis a vis the US. That he’s mostly doing this by sacrificing the (at least short-term) well being of the Chinese people isn’t relevant to the question of whether Xi is managing his economic goal well, and it makes his success even more dangerous to the US.
FWIW - I’m not sure I believe it, but there’s a reasonable argument that he’s taking a Bezos-like strategy. Build the power of the Chinese manufacturing economy to the point that it’s irreplaceable to the rest of the world, then use the leverage to make the country rich. (And to take Taiwan while he’s at it.)
Xi and the CCP are forgoing efficiency, future growth, and human welfare to juice a few sectors of the economy (construction and export.)
The real estate catastrophe suggests that the formula "make a quintillion tons of debt to subsidize some manufacturing industry" is not the best formula after all. The current debt levels and the fake gdp growth data are a testament to this.
In this regard Deng Xiaoping was a much wiser man.
Maybe? But the US has higher debt and deficits, and a worse housing situation, and I wouldn’t say has avoided housing-driven economic macro issues in any better way.
China has a higher total debt even compared to the US:
here: https://www.euronews.com/business/2024/01/29/enough-is-enough-with-300-billion-in-debt-court-says-its-time-to-liquidate-chinas-evergran#:~:text=Real%20estate%20drove%20China's%20economic,for%20a%20middle%2Dincome%20country.
and here: https://www.reuters.com/markets/imf-fiscal-chief-us-china-must-rein-debt-face-different-challenges-2023-10-11/
And worse housing situation, just look at the ratio between annual income and cost of a home in a big city compared to the US. Chinese on average have a much, much lower income and house prices are extremely high, especially in big cities.
The ghost cities in china don't help to lower the prices where there is not sufficient housing. If a city have been overbuilt in guandong, it doesn't lower house prices in shangai.
I don’t see where in either of those articles it says Chinese debt is higher than US?
All the top sources when you google the question say the opposite, on both an absolute and per capita basis. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_government_debt
Superior tech, when??? How much??? One word: Cybertruck
MotorTrend sent a bunch of their staff to China to test a handful of their BEVs and the quality isn’t comparable to American vehicles, at least not yet. They don’t drive nearly as well as they look.
On a meta level, I do appreciate that US companies and politicians get paranoid about competition from other countries relatively easily. We were wrong that the Soviet Union would be a long-term competitor, and we were wrong about Japan being an economic threat. China currently looks much more formidable than either of those, but of course they have their own problems. I think getting worried about Chinese EVs even if their quality isn't quite there yet is the right way to go.
Sure, my point is that we should be competing and this idea that circulates in conservative media that EVs are a waste and China is so far ahead anyway is just wrong. If anything, that pessimism will mean we do forfeit a burgeoning market to China.
It sure would be interesting to study why China is going to win. How do they have a lower cost structure and what are they giving up to get it? And, what do we do to mitigate it?
One advantage China has is they don't have right wingers politicizing EVs. Put solar on your roof and it should be a right winger's dream scenario - energy and transportation independence.
Our educated class does email jobs in law, finance, marketing, biotech and Saas or marketing software, while a ton of the Chinese educated class works in advanced manufacturing. You’re probably high socio-economic status - how many people do you know in advanced manufacturing? Did you consider that career? I sure didn’t.
Our non-educated class works in retail, or if in manufacturing or public sector, fights pretty successfully for labor rights. They also do a lot more drugs, have more broken families, can rely on better safety nets and have less work ethic and conscientiousness than the Chinese equivalent.
The reason we’re in the game at all is due to immigration, a healthy software startup landscape, Elon Musk (who now sucks for a lot of reasons) and inertia from past victories (ie. Intel, GM and Boeing.)
You missed the point.
You asked a questions then provided “one advantage” China has. I agree with that one, but provided others.
Next time don’t phrase your comment like a question if you don’t want people to answer it.
Nothing conventional about your “the other political party is to blame”, and only one of us knows what an acronym is.
If what you write is true, then you should support the removal of subsidies for EVs and batteries that Biden pushed into the IRA since that money is adding to our national debt, as well as elimination of the EPA mileage rules that punish ICE cars since they are no longer needed.
You also fail to mention the huge tariffs on Chinese EVs while using BYD as your example of cost and efficiency. You also say EVs are great for performance, but the BYD Atta 3 from your example has a 0-60 time of over 7 seconds, which is not fast, barely faster than a regular Toyota Corolla.
You mention the huge gasoline distribution network, and how it will become less profitable, but as EVs and hybrids get more common, gasoline demand will go down, and supply will not (refining petroleum to make jet fuel, diesel for heavy equipment, fuel oil and naphtha for plastic still needs to be done, and will always create gasoline as a proportion) so as an economist you know the price will go down and thus spur demand for ICE cars.
You also don’t mention how the charging network promised in the IRA has resulted in very few new charging stations, and only Tesla has an adequate charging network, but it won’t with the unimportable BYD cars anyway.
The big automakers are rolling back their big EV transition plans, and probably know more about demand than Bloomberg reporters.
So if your last post was overly gloomy, this one seems to be written while you were smoking a bunch of hopium. I’ll be glad to buy an EV when they are cost competitive without debt increasing subsidies, but am sticking with my quiet, fast, efficient Toyota Crown Hybrid.
> The big automakers are rolling back their big EV transition plans, and probably know more about demand than Bloomberg reporters.
They sure didn't when they let Tesla take the emerging EV market from them and took a decade to even mount a response, and I suspect they still don't now. Or maybe they do and they know that they will fail to compete. They still haven't figured out how to manufacture an EV that can turn a profit. To transition to EVs they will have to spend a fortune on capex while cannibalizing their profitable markets in favor of on that loses money on every car. They are heavily indebted already (vs Tesla which has basically no debt) and may not have the capital to weather such a transition until they are able to turn a profit on EVs.
And to make matters worse, their dealer based sales model is another problem. The dealers depend on maintenance to turn a profit, so they hate to sell EVs which require little of it. The dealers have the upper hand here because they are legally protected by franchise agreements that prevent the manufacturers from selling around them.
Also the cost of capital (interest rates went up) and big 3 OEMs sacrificed market share and cut production of lower cost vehicles to focus on more expensive trucks/SUVs.
Tbh I think most of the legacy automakers are simply not gonna make it.
From an amoral strategy perspective they should try to sell as many gas cars as they can for now, not invest in new models, and wind down operations in an orderly way
Why should we support the elimination of EPA rules that punish ICE cars just because EVs will take over anyway? The point of those rules isn’t to *punish* the cars - it’s to ensure that cars don’t pollute too much. That still matters.
The tariffs on BYD matter for whether the cheapest current electric car is cheaper than current ICE cars. But the point is that in the long run, companies everywhere will learn how to produce electric cars at those prices - even Chevrolet and Ford. Those tariffs ensure that the EV transition will be delayed slightly in the US while US carmakers catch up, rather than being left in the dust by Chinese carmakers.
Someone else already addressed the point about gas prices. It’s true that falling demand with a constant supply would make gas prices come down. But if the petroleum industry maintains some profitability (necessary if it’s going to last for decades) then the price can never fall below the production cost, which involves some fixed costs for the infrastructure, as well as costs that depend on how much gas is produced. If global gasoline demand falls a bit, then can shut down the most expensive wells, and this will lower price. But if gasoline demand starts to fall by 50% or more, then this decrease in price will start being overtaken by the increased price of amortizing all the fixed costs of a global distribution network over a smaller amount of gasoline sales. (Maybe they can avoid this if some parts of the world go to zero demand so that they don’t have to maintain all that infrastructure.)
The big automakers aren’t “rolling back” their transition plans - they are slowing it down, because they expect it will not happen quite as quickly as they used to think. But they have known for years that it *will* come.
I agree that EVs will eventually be the best option and cost competitive on price, when battery technology advances and depends less on cobalt and nickel and motors that use less rare earth metals, or the supply chain builds up to supply them from non Chinese sources. When this happens, subsidies won’t be needed and more people will buy them. I will buy one when that happens.
As I said, gasoline is a necessary byproduct of petroleum refining and if even demand for it falls, supply will not. Diesel is still needed for construction equipment (including for mining battery minerals), for agricultural machinery, for freight trains, for container and cargo ships, and long distance buses. Jet fuel is not going to be replaced by sustainable fuels that cost 5x of petroleum based ones. Heating oil is needed until everyone in cold areas and their electric utilities support low temperature heat pumps or switch to natural gas. Asphalt is needed for road surfacing, and the increase weight of BEVs will hasten its need. Plastics are used everywhere, including in EV manufacturing and I don’t think bio plastics are making big headway. Petroleum production has been rising consistently, even with more EVs and I don’t expect it to fall anytime soon.
California is an interesting experiment. Its ever increasing regulations on refiners are increasing their costs, and Phillips is shutting down its San Pedro refinery now. Since pipelines from Texas refineries don’t extend to California, and the Jones Act prevents shipments of gasoline from the Gulf, it will soon be importing gasoline from Southeast Asia, and prices will rise there. We’ll probably see more EVs in California because the gasoline will be more unaffordable, although their policies also make electricity more expensive than other states, and their rules about what cars can be sold there will probably also go into effect. I’m glad I don’t live there anymore.
Well, if demand decreases while supply stays the same, that usually results in prices falling.
Correct. However "optimistic" one may be about EV over ICE -- I'm not sure why we need to have attitudes about technologies -- the policy is the same: subsidize the sale of EV in a way that mimics the cost advantage that EV's would have over ICE if we had a tax on net CO2 emissions until we have one, but ensure the subsidies are funded on the margin with taxes on consumption, not income.
co2 tax is simply another government policy arbitrarily inflicted on us. How many times do you have to learn that co2 is a benefit to life?
What a moronic assertion. Do you deny that the emission of CO2 into the atmosphere had negative externalities? Or do you more foolishly deny that the government shouldn’t price externalities?
The academic community has not made a good faith effort to try to determine the overall externalities of CO2 emissions. They may well be positive, at least for now. For more details, see https://daviddfriedman.substack.com/p/critique-of-comprehensive-evidence
“They may as well be positive, at least for now”
… What?
I have read these sources before, they’re ridiculous and bunk. The amount of brain power required to understand Carbon Dioxide’s externalities is elementary at best, yet we still debate it like it’s tobacco in the 80s.
Tax emissions, let the market do its thing otherwise.
I would love to see a major mainstream scientific publication that factored in reduced deaths from cold, more arable farmland, and the CO2 fertilization effect. Do you have one to cite?
Beneficial to plant life. Are you a plant?
No, but the food I eat eats plants, so it is beneficial to me.
Sorry? Higher atmospheric CO2 is a benefit to life? I’m sure the victims of Hurricanes Helene and Milton, both strengthened by climate change-induced higher water temperatures, would like to disagree with you
Hurricanes have not been increasing in intensity or number over the past few decades.
This is true, and an inconvenient truth at that. That being said, man-made climate change is an existential challenge.
How is it inconvenient? Would you prefer more death and destruction so you can have the political advantage to scare people into supporting more extreme climate policy?
And if you think this is an existential threat, you have absolutely no idea what you are talking about.
Sorry, the now regular monumental rainfalls from storms in the US and around the world are a danger to world agricultural's ability to sustain over 8 billion people. When you have storms dumping 10-40 inches of rain in 24-48 hour period due to extremely hot oceans due to Climate Change then you have a threat to all of our livelihoods.
Inexcusable nonsense. There are very few nutrients that are not toxic when ingested in excess. If you, Kevin Simpson, breathe 100% oxygen for several days, your lungs will be damaged irreparably, yet I'm sure you would proclaim that O2 is "a benefit to life."
hey Ron you're arguing against something I didn't say. I win.
I like this framing, it will probably encourage me to support such a tax credit more than I would otherwise
Where I live it costs about eight times as much to drive an ICEV the same distance as an EV. Gas would have to come down a long way in price. Even if gas is free, the lifetime cost of owning an ICEV may exceed that for an EV.
I don't know if you're only including the cost of gas and electricity when you say it costs 8x as much to drive an ICEV as an EV, but you must have a combination of very low electricity costs, high gas costs, and an efficient EV.
My plug-in hybrid with a 17kwh battery can drive about 45 miles on a charge. This (2.6 miles/kwh) is less efficient than a Tesla Model 3 (reported 4-5 miles/kwh). But, for me, with electricity costing 24 cents/kwh, gas would have to be over $4/gallon before it's worthwhile for me to plug in (not taking into account charging efficiency losses). Gas around here is currently $3/gallon.
That’s why I said “where I live” because the economics are very sensitive to location. I am in Toronto where it costs me about 7 cents (US) per kWh and about $4.15 (US) per (US) gallon. There are other places in Canada (Alberta) where the prices would be similar to yours.
Average price per kWh in the US is $.166. You’re paying approximately 50% more than the US average for electricity, which really sucks for you. According to AAA, today’s average price for a gallon of regular unleaded (not premium, which some cars claim to require to achieve rated MPG) is $3.177. So you have slightly under-average priced gas. Your car is apparently getting around 44MPG based on the numbers presented above, which means the average car owner is using a whopping 76% more gas/mile than you, based on the US average for ICE cars (I am excluding light trucks and vans, which is even worse) listed by the DoE. All of this is a way to say: you are a pretty extreme outlier.
To compare numbers to mine, I pay $.14 per kWh in the mid-Atlantic and drive a very speedy Tesla. This works out to $.04 per mile, or approximately 80 MPGe using the average price of gas listed above. I’m sorry you’re getting shanked on electricity prices, but congrats on driving such an efficient car. You should buy a more efficient electric car and see if you can install solar or charge at off-hours.
Unfortunately that's the price of electricity on Long Island in NY. Blame the torpedoing of the Shoreham nuclear power plant, among other things.
Your numbers sound great (and more typical), but even they don't add up to the "ICE cars have 8x the running costs of EVs" comment I was responding to. Unless you have solar, in which case that number approaches infinity.
If I could install solar in my roof I would do it in a heartbeat. I do think It's hilarious that we're having a discussion of the form "not enough power plants make my electricity too expensive for electric cars" and literally in the next breath "unless you have 100 square meters free on your roof and the willingness to make a (rapidly plummeting) capital investment, at which point electricity is effectively free." I don't think ICE cars have a similar story, and I think that will tend to put an upper-bound on electricity prices in the future.
The competing energy visions put forward by EV advocates do not make sense. On one hand, all charging is done at home when it is, er, dark outside. On the other, increasing solar supply somehow magically gets stored during the day when all EVs are in parking garages and not charging on their level 2 home chargers. EVs are a nice distraction from the real issue, which is that taking 3500lb of metal with you everywhere you go is itself horribly wasteful and inefficient in terms of both energy and the time wasted by people sitting in traffic.
What about cost of electricity vs gas? I have a magnificent 4 door Chevy Bolt for the last five years. I have not spent a cent on gas as I have driven it 10,000 miles. I get a 345 Mile charge overnight in my garage about once a week or sometimes every four days! I have saved a ton of money, suffered no inconvenience, on the road in bad traffic I get more juice more quickly whenever I need it than virtually any of the gas guzzlers I have to beat in order to change lanes in heavy morning traffic, and I don’t miss for one second shelling out $50+ at a filling station every week—so what’s the hell is wrong, convenient and inexpensive with any of that??
Also, the US market share for EVs is smaller than the EU one, so this rebound is maybe just the catch-up to EU levels to then plateau, like they're doing here.
Yep. EV sales are going to plateau while EVs drop in cost due to both battery improvements and economies of scale. People will insist on paying more for total cost of ownership because they like showing they can burn money. /s
98 Terawatts of additional generating capacity would be required to replace every ICE in the US with an EV. This is why it will not happen quickly. While we can probably agree that not EVERY vehicle will be electric, there is still about 30 years of power generation build out required before ICE shuffles off the playing board.
And most (59%) electricity in China is coal generated, so those EVs are not reducing carbon emissions very much. The reason EVs are popular in China is that the production is subsidized and manufacturers have quotas, and EVs are not subject to consumption or other taxes while ICE cars are not. China produces ICE cars for export, mostly to Russia since other imports are under sanctions, and Southeast Asia.
Even if you make just one or two longer trips per month, it still doesn't make much sense for many to own an EV.
I live in a big European country that is much more densely populated than the US. You can arrive anywhere with a 500km trip.
I have to make a 500km trip about once a month, and it obviously I would never, never use an EV to do it. Refilling gas is super-fast on the highway and it takes like 2-3 minutes, and then you can go.
With a tesla model 3, at highway speeds, when it is cold (from what i can see online) you can maybe do around 250km, for me it would mean one complete charge and a bit more to make the last few km, or like two 80-85% and a last shorter charge for the last few km. Assuming that I'm starting the trip at 100% charge. If I'm correct it would add like at least 45 minutes to the trip, likely some more.
On a 3.30 trip it doesn't make much sense honestly.
It would be better in the summer or when it's warmer, but for some few months it would be like that.
And this is a best case scenario with a really good EV that has an extremely fast charging speed and a good price for what you get. At least in europe 95% of the alternatives are far worse in one or all the categories mentioned above.
The newly announced renault 5 base price is 35.7k and has a max charging speed of 100kw and a smaller range.
A much, much bigger problem here in europe is that there are a ton more people that live in condos and have no way to charge it at home, compared to the US, and the vast majority of them park in the streets (me and my family included, but again, the average person doesn't have a garage). And there are exactly zero chances that charging stations will be built on sidewalks. Not only it would be extremely impractical (1) sidewalk are often really narrow, 2) do you reserve half the sidewalk "spots" for EVs when there are still hundreds of millions of petrol cars? 3) the cost of that?), it would also be a nightmare from a logistical point of view.
The best of both worlds is by far PHEV for the foreseeable future, where you can get much of the advantages of the EV but still aren't forced to hunt for a charging station, or wait long times to "fill the tank".
I disagree that price is the only problem: for first, I've seen a ton of forecasts about incredible adoption rates for EVs ten years ago that didn't pan out, along with forecasts of "this will be cheaper in 2025" that really never materialized.
And second, the charging problem is a real one: I think that we need better battery technology. Some startups are promising C/3 discharge rates and 70-100% better battery density. That would be game-changing. At that point you could really charge it weekly at a supercharger-like station for like 5 minutes to fill half of the "tank", and you'd solve the chargning problem for like 98% of people.
There is no doubt that one day EVs will be the obvious choice for everyone, but I think the super-hyped EV enthusiasts need to assess the issue more realistically and don't assume that pointing out flaws is because "uh conservatives" or "uh did you run the math??" (not talking about you in particular).
Unfortunately many people "just pointing out flaws" are driven by culture war-fuelled idiocy.
And I hate it because despite what many would think after reading my comment I really like EVs. It's just that there still persist one or two huge PITAs (at least for me and many other people) that doesn't make it worth it for now and likely some years to come.
Whether or not it makes sense today for you to buy an EV, the fact remains that EVs are steadily improving and falling in price and eventually it will make sense for you to buy an EV.
But it's not today. It's not a great prediction telling that "one day they will win".
Especially since many were so sure that today we would have been at like 30% market share.
Agree. This post appears to be glossing over a LOT of issues, including safety (as a woman, I am not thrilled about the idea of being stuck at a charging station at night, unable to leave.) Not to mention local unavailability of public charging stations, the 2-3k expense of installing a home charger, and the unfeasibility of charging for people in many apartments.
I can see buying a hybrid, but not a EV, in the foreseeable future. It just doesn’t meet my needs. A hybrid or an ICE vehicle does.
How is being stuck at a charging station at night, unable to leave, any different from being stuck at a diner, unable to leave because the waiter hasn’t come back with your check yet?
I do not have to stop at a diner to get to my destination on a trip. I can get food or coffee at a drive through. If I have to make a pit stop, Starbucks has clean bathrooms and well lit parking lots, plus, coffee.
I do have to stop to refuel when low in order to get to my destination. It’s not a choice. I refuel or I am stuck. Gas refill is a few minutes. EV recharge is much longer and that’s potentially risky.
Women traveling alone generally do not make unnecessary nighttime stops.
I have to tell you that even as a reasonably strong and healthy man I often feel a sense of "unsafe" when I'm charging at the back end of some giant empty mall parking lot at 2am and I'm the only one there and the car is plugged in so I can't just drive away.
It's just a matter of time before criminals figure out what a fabulous opportunity this is to (at least) rob people.
My hope is that most chargers are built next to 24 hour gas stations and diners where there is perpetual human presence (at least potentially) but that's not the case at the moment.
Yeah I think the future of charging stations is going to be incorporating restaurants, convenience stores, and other activities that keep human eyes watching 24/7 - not bare pumps out in a parking lot like some gas stations.
Indeed - I'm actually surprised by how few entrepreneurs are currently taking advantage of this opportunity. Obviously the kinds of facilities that are available now vary wildly but as I said in another reply - I've driven across the nation and on many shorter long-distance trips in my T3 and in most places that are "between" major destinations the chargers are in major mall parking lots where there are no services of any kind (not even bathrooms) after the mall closes, usually around 9pm.
Any food truck with hot coffee and some basic snacks and a port-o-poty would probably do quite well and would also come to be known as the "late night" food option in the local area. I'm surprised this hasn't become the norm or perhaps there are local zoning/merchant laws preventing such operations in parking lots?
Strange. This post explicitly addressed that.
No, it really didn’t. Glossing over real problems is not equivalent to addressing them.
I think that your ultimate conclusion is the "between the lines" implication of everything in the article. I've driven my 3 from NYC to Montreal a few dozen times and across the continent once. The inconvenience very quickly becomes routine and the benefits rapidly outweigh the PITAs for me but obviously your mileage may vary (ha!).
However, the future holds all sorts of marvels that will be upon us in a flash and we'll all say "remember when we had to..." about all the current shortcomings.
If the thrust of the article is that the die has been cast and the future of EVs is now assured and just a matter of time before they are the predominant means of personal transportation, I think it's very hard to argue the contrary in good faith.
Honestly for me there are zero benefits that would outweigh me in the cold inside my car watching some video waiting 20-25 minutes for the car to charge. Two times in the same trip. It's a big no.
I could think of doing it if I had some compelling advantage, but the cost of buying a new decent EV is just waaaaay too much for me and I don't have a box for the car, meaning that even if I don't do any long trip, I still have to seat every few days at a charging station for several tens of minutes for the car to charge.
Also, here the cost of a tesla supercharger should be like 0.50-0.55 c/kwh that is not really that convenient compared to the gasoline.
But the biggest problem is that I just can't pay 20k more for an EV that is somewhat longer range and spacious enough. I love sportier cars but I can give up the better torque if the price is that big.
There is no reason for a few ICE cars to continue to be sold for people with special needs for long distanced road travel, at least until some newer technology is developed such as quick in-out batter replacement or faster charging. Of course as specialty vehicles they will probably be more expensive, so drivers will be faced with the choice.
I’m not convinced that a few trips to see family members in far flung cities by car is all that rare to be thought of as a special need.
If a vehicle is better for 99% of your trips, and just once every three months you do a trip where the vehicle adds 30 minutes to your already long day, how much of a problem is that?
It’s not like the cars can’t make the trip - it just means that your lunch break has to be at a charging station.
It’s a big problem if I am stuck some remote place, a woman alone at night, charging a vehicle and unable to leave. No thank you.
It’s not the 30 plus minutes. It’s a matter of personal safety.
You should read the post. While EVs today are not the be-all end-all for everyone, the trajectory for EVs will make them the be-all end-all for everyone. The issues you have today are becoming less problematic and will soon (in the grand scheme of things) stop being a problem.
I read the post, which is why I commented.
The issues I pointed out do not currently have a near-term ETA for being resolved. Hybrids actually DO resolve those issues.
Pretending a problem is not a problem does not solve that problem.
Why would you be unable to leave? It doesn't seem that different to an unmanned gas station to me.
Obviously can't speak for your personal situation/crime in your area, but FWIW safety while charging hasn't been a concern for my wife (though to be fair, we only use public chargers very infrequently, for the reasons covered in the post). Of course I'd hope as EVs become more popular, they get closer together and more customer friendly with lighting/shops to increase safety further.
You can’t leave until you get enough charge to get to the next charging station, unless you want to be stranded. You’re stuck.
There are generally lots of well lit, manned gas stations along travel routes, often with food and bathrooms, and gassing up takes a few minutes. That is generally not true of EV chargers.
When you are traveling, which was the situation being discussed, you are limited to what’s available on your route.
There are currently zero public EV chargers in my county.
Isn’t that what happens whenever you eat dinner out? I’m not seeing how charging stations are worse than diners or movie theaters.
In general, women do not go out alone at night in remote, isolated places. We don’t go out alone to eat dinner in remote isolated places. We don’t go to movie theaters at night in remote isolated places.
We do drive alone at night, because gas stations are well lit, generally busy, and we only have to be there a few minutes and there are generally other people around for the brief time we’re there. Even then, sometimes they’re not safe. Most of us have friends who have had scary late night encounters.
Ask your women friends why being stuck alone at a remote charging station late at night would be unacceptable. They’re not generally busy, so there aren’t other people around, and you are stuck there long enough to be noticeable to shady people.
I would think this would be obvious.
The thing is that right now ICE cars is the vast, vast, vast majority of sales, and the "vibes" I get from people is that virtually all of them will stick with ICE cars for their next car.
So maybe in 2040-2045 the scenario you describe will pan out. For now and the next few years are the BEVs that are "the few cars being sold".
Also, I can't stress this enough: forget the chargin problem and the ridicolous EV infrastructure (from the map I can see that in my 50k populated city there are 21 public chargin "boxes" (not stations) that have between 25 and 44kw), IIRC the US average transaction for a new vehicle is like 50k, I don't have the data for my country but I can tell you that the best selling car here (by far, I mean, it hugely outsells everything else by a ton) is not hundreds of thousands of fkin huge f150 lariat for sale at 65.000 USD (yeah, many of them are lower trims for fleets, but still..), but it is a 14k that you can bring home for like 10k with state incentives and the second one has a slightly higher MSRP.
A shitty semi-econobox renault 5 for 32900€ (35.7k $) with questionable range and slow chargning times is really not gonna cut it.
You used too many "vast"s. It's pretty much exactly Noah's point that by 2040-2045, EVs will have won out.
Wait a minute. A 500km trip takes you 3.5 hours? You drive at an average of 140km per hour? The only European country where driving that fast is ever legal is Germany, and I don’t think the unlimited speed sections of the autobahn include 500km long stretches. This all seems very odd to me.
By contrast, here in the UK, I drove recently from London to Durham, which is a 250 mile (400km) trip, and it took 4.5 hours. I could have done the journey on a single charge pretty easily, as my car has a 330 mile summer range and easily 300 miles at this time of year (yes, at motorway speeds), but I personally can’t do that long a journey without a break. I stopped for lunch for 30mins on the way, plugged the car in while I ate, and the car was ready before I was.
This whole notion of driving for four or more hours at a stretch with no break, or only a ten minute break, is a strange idea (does no one have kids?), and it’s also pretty dangerous, because fatigue really kicks in after 2.5 hours of driving, no matter how safe you think you are.
I have three kids and we absolutely push some legs of our drive to 3 1/2 - 4 hours without a stop. Making stops on road trips with children sucks; we consolidate them into as few and as short stops as we can.
With kids on road trips you just want to get to where you are going as fast as you can with as little interaction with the public as possible.
I guess this shows how everyone does things differently. But certainly we stopped for breaks quite often, and judging by the scene at every motorway service station I’ve ever seen, lots of other families do that too. My kids’ bladders could not last 3.5 hours when they were small, not a chance
It's not germany but here the limit is 130 kmh, and it is possible to have 150 kmh in some traits if it is deemed feasible.
In any case my real cruising speed is a likely bit higher, around 135 kmh or a bit less.
Consider that like 30% of drivers here have a cruising speed of probably 150-160 kmh. From my sample of several tens of trips, I'm fairly confident to say that at least 5-10% of the drivers, at least on the highway I usually travel on, go even higher than that.
Not that it's legal, it's just that things go like this lol.
Also yes, I take usually take a break, but that's like a short break to go to the bathroom or take a coffee.
Two 25 minute forced breaks sitting in my car doing absolutely nothing is something I want to avoid. I know that the torque is fantastic, but I don't have 45k to spend on a decent EV and I would absolutely, positively hate to routinely find a charger every few days and sit there doing nothing + the forced charges for longer trips.
But you said 500km in 3.5 hours which is an *average* of more than 140km/h! That sounds crazy fast — well above the legal limit for most of the way. Also, you’d only have to charge once en route, not twice. But if you can’t afford a new car, the whole thing is moot anyway, unless you’re buying second hand.
?? 135*3+67 = 472km, that is about right.
I'm checking now with the google maps. The total in km is 491, subtract 10 km to go from my home to the highway + 5-10 km to exit the highway and arrive at destination.
Its around 470, that you can do in about 3.5 h at 130-135, so yeah, it's about right. One time I've gone there, do what I had to do and came back.
The average time is between 3.5 and 4 hours likely, depending on traffic conditions and if you have to stop because an accident occurred.
Honestly it's surprising that people are surprised that you can go 130-140 on the highway. Yeah, it's normal here, I know that in many countries everyone goes at most at 110 kmh, but this is not how it works here. 130, even 140 (even if it's not illegal) is not crazy fast LOL. Maybe you are not used to it, but it's perfectly drivable.
500 divided by 3.5 is 143 km/h, which is what you originally said and thus how I worked out the maths. If it’s 470 instead, then the average is 135, as you said.
140km/h is 87mph. That is extremely fast! But I’ve looked it up and it’s the legal limit in Poland, and there are 9 other European countries that allow 130kmh. The UK limit is 70mph, 112km/h, and there’s no way you could ever drive at 70mph for 3.5 hours on UK motorways, you’d always have extended periods well below that due to traffic and roadworks. The average speed on UK motorways, taking into account delays from traffic / roadworks, is just 57mph (90km/h)…
Anyhoo, back to the bigger point: you wouldn’t need to charge twice per leg for your journey, just once. There are even some EVs that would enable you to drive the whole journey, plug in at your destination, do what you need to do, and be ready by the time you returned.
In California, on Highway 5, especially if you time your trip for off-peak hours, it's not totally unreasonable to cruise at 85mph on the long straight stretches even if the speed limit is only 75mph. But, yes, a significant part of the drive time is getting to and from highway five.
When it's very cold you would need to charge twice (at 80%) to make the full trip comfortably, considering the much higher consumption at higher speeds (I know that the source is reddit, but from what I read, at 150kmh you are 30% less efficient than 110 kmh on a tesla model 3, on average, so you could very well another lose 15-20% going 130-140), and che much lower range.
Also, and I didn't consider the big loss in efficiency of charging when it's that cold.
On the other hand, bad weather can very well mean lower speeds due to the conditions, so better efficiency than travelling at 130-140 kmh.
Maybe even strong winds have a noticeable effect.
In any case I saw many videos of teslas near freezing temperatures and it drops quite a bit, around 250-280km, and these are videos from the US, and were tested likely at 60-70 mph. Also, I can't heat up the battery before the tripsince I don't have a charger.
The full trip is almost 500km with around 470 at high speeds. The best combination is likely two charges at 80% since 5-80% is much faster than going full 100% since the charging process dramatically slows down when going from 70 to 100%.
So 80% of 270 is around 220km. I would need two 5-80% charges and a bit more to comfortably make all the trip.
At least if I'm correct with the calculations.
For the highway speeds: I try to make the trip when the traffic is lower, and usually you can make almost all the trip at those speeds because there are very few semi-trucks in certain days at certain hours. The limit is 130kmh everywhere, but the law allows some traits at 150 kmh if it is deemed feasable. I don't know if there are highways with that limit.
Also, consider that here nobody cares about speed limits.
As I said, my armchar estimate is that 20-30% of the drivers likely go 150-160kmh.
Yessir. More closely matching the gasoline experience will mean a lot to a significant number of potential EV buyers. And it’s just a matter of time. Ten years on the outside in my non-expert opinion.
I read some industry experts saying that assuming that the technology for a prototype solid state battery is here today (likely the best candidate for a real game-change), you need 6-7 years at least to properly and thoroughly test and validate these batteries for real world usage, then you need start actual mass production, then scale it and it in real world vehicles. So likely at least 10 years, realistically a few more to have a superior product at reasonable prices.
I'm referring to this, precisely:
"To do the build-out, production, and validation could easily take seven or more years, Galyen said."
https://spectrum.ieee.org/solid-state-battery-production-challenges
Thanks, will read!
https://twitter.com/vsiv/status/1849427192792412621
I win! Just kidding but maybe this is impressive idk.
Most families have two cars, though, and it makes a lot of sense to own *an* EV even if you don't own two EVs.
This does make sense. Every family I know with an EV has an ICE for the other car.
Hybrids make even more sense.
The bottom line is tech is only going to be adopted if it makes people’s lives better. All the EV apologists saying “your case is edge” or “you only make that trip a few times a year” are missing the point - why would anyone adopt a technology that does *less* than their previous tech and causes more inconvenience?
So, your point is you don't want to lose one hour per month charging an EV on a long trip. OK.
It’s more than that.
And some people travel with children. Sitting at a charging station for an extra hour every 200 miles on a holiday road trip with kids in the back would be beyond hellish. And it would make some trips impossible with how tight school holiday schedules have become. It would add at least 2-3 hours to the CT to MI road trip we do nearly 4-5 times a year, not to mention all the other road trips we do as a family.
And for moms, there are days when you really drive around that much getting kids to things and need a quick fill up.
The safety issue at night is real, and some times night road trips are unavoidable.
There are just so many practical issues with EVs. The bottom line is that having to wait to fill up and losing power in the cold are huge downsides that render EVs unusable for many. What suburban mom gives AF how fast a car can vroom vroom from 0-60 if it takes an extra 3 hours of frustration and aggravation to get to Midwest Grandma’s house for Thanksgiving because of charging times? Technology isn’t valuable because it is cool or “clean” or excites some urban tech bros; it’s valuable because it *makes ordinary life better in a way ordinary people can recognize.*
Why would I want to adopt a technology that makes my life harder to impossible in the ways that matter most to me?
When women tell you THIS DOESN’T WORK FOR US could you please take us at our word?
Forgive me, but the Model Y is one of the most popular cars in America. We saw them out in the desolate southwest on our road trip summer of 2023. Didn't see any stuck on the side of the road.
If Grandma lives less then 200 miles away, then the EV is a time saver. Charge up at Grandma's house and no gas stop on the way home.
People forget that oil changes are necessary at regular intervals. I do every 5000 miles. With my old Prius, that was an oil change and tire rotation after every 10-11 trips to the gas station. That's a regular time sink that isn't necessary with an EV. No more oil change. Just the tire rotation, saving time and money.
I got 405K on my Prius with the original battery. Only one brake job at 300K. That's a big time saver and money saver.
At a minimum, go hybrid. They're way more efficient in the city. ICE is terrible for city driving.
It's two stops on a 1,000km (600 mile) roundtrip. That's less than an hour. If combining it with a bathroom break or getting food or just standing up, it's quite a bit less than an hour of extra time.
I am actually a parent that did long road trips with the family. Kids need to stop more often than adults. We planned our trips to take multiple things into account.
Why should I lose one hour sitting in a car in a charging station, in the cold, on a highway, when I can avoid it?
1. It's healthy to get up every few hours. Bathroom break. Get some food to eat.
2. The EV is a better choice for the rest of month.
Places that have EV chargers do not necessarily have food or bathrooms available.
Yeah I can stop when I want to and go to the bath or take a coffee and then go back driving. But for like 10 minutes, not 25 minutes for two times.
The EV is still a worse choice for the rest of the month because I don't have a box and I should find a public spot, go there, sit there for like how much? 45-50 minutes for a full charge from let's say 5% to 100%? And what is the loss in efficiency in capacity/charging speed when it's very cold outside?
Why should I spend likely one hour in total to go to the charger (considering 5-10 to go there and come back), waiting inside doing nothing?
What is the advantage? The torque? I don't care about the torque. Not with these compromises.
An EV here costs 10-15-20k more than a comparable ICE, with basically no advantage (unless you have a box/garage) and much more PITAs.
I don't know if it's just a "cultural" difference because many readers of this blog are from the US, where there are tons of houses in the suburbs with parking spots, but the reality in many european countries, especially in bigger cities is like this: a dozens and dozens of 5-10 storey condos, one after the other, with a number of garages that is a fraction of the total amount of cars owned by those who inhabit the condo, and people on average parking in the streets in a radius of 500m from their home.
If you have a chargin box in your home you have much lower electricity prices and you "fill the tank" every night.
If you don't have this you're basically buying a car that costs even twice as much, has much lower range, it's extremely more impractical to refuel, and honestly not that much torque, because most manufacturers put lower power motors in their EVs compared to tesla.
A yaris (full-hybrid) costs like 19k compared to 33k for the renault 5. The yaris is better in basically everything (it's also slightly bigger externally and more spacious internally) except for horsepower (130 vs 150) and it's wildly better in terms of refueling, chargning, etc.
For what reason should anyone buy a renault 5, especially if they can't charge at home?
Come on. You're now counting minutes on that once a month 500km trip.
It appears you are complaining more about your shitty infrastructure and shitty policies.
Reality is that EVs are a superior technology and represent a better option for our planet. Get your act together!
Norway is getting it done. Stop making excuses.
No, they’re counting minutes for weekly charging as well. Reread. It’s not practical for them with current infrastructure.
Yeah, shitty infrastructure is one big problem, I don't buy stuff hoping that in the future everything will work.
The reality is that a yaris full-hybrid costs almost half compared to a renault 5, it has incomparably better refueling options and range, and it is overral a better, more functional and more spacious car. It also likely has that good torque of EVs, being a full-hybrid with a fairly strong electric motor.
Maybe you are the one making stupid excuses for buying a new toy that costs more than an ICE, but is more fast and quick.
Oh right but you're a hero because you're saving the planet yeah.
Oddly where I live I see quite a few EVs but no charging stations, so I am assuming they charge while at the office
At least here there are like 21 (slow) public chargers for the whole city. Reported on the map.
I'm on my second electric vehicle. I fully endorse this message. Let me add a little anecdotal evidence to the story. I live in southern Georgia where we recently experienced a severe hurricane. Our electricity was out for five days. A Facebook friend posted a snide comment the electrics were useless with no electricity. NOT TRUE! My vehicle was only charged to 80%. However, over the five days,I charged all my household electronic devices and we drove freely. We were able to bypass the insanely long lines at gas stations. My biggest EV related outage problem was my electrical garage door opener. Once my grandson and his stepfather helped me raise it. We were good to go.
I'm constantly surprised at how little attention surge in Chinese EV adoption is getting relative to commentary on slowdown of adoption in the US and Europe. Chinese EV sales have gone from 6% in 2020 to 38% in 2023. That's an unbelievably rapid shift. For comparison it took Norway 4 years to go from 6% to 39%, and Norway is a rich country of 5 million people, whereas China is the most populous country and the biggest car market in the world. This is a far bigger story than the small negative shifts in US and Europe and we in the fat west need to stop naval gazing and pay attention.
China is not a free market the consumer takes what they are given. I assume forcing EVs upon us with massive artificial economic pressure is the plan, but it would at least be nice if you could hide that fact
The Chinese consumer isn't being forced to buy an EV, but they are getting access to very cheap EVs because of massive state subsidy. That's been the explicit goal of the Chinese government with made in China 2025. It's kind of like Uber subsidising rides with VC money to outcompete taxi firms. Was the western consumer 'forced' to take Uber over taxis? Regardless of how they got there the fact is that China is now in a very good position in terms of their capacity for production of cheap, high quality EVs and with their domestic adoption.
The reason the Chinese are buying them is because they don't have an established car culture. Alot of Chinese people are just buying their first or second car, and this have no expectations around the convenience of a gas car.
Noah really underestimates how much an issue that is going to be with EVs in the US until they can get charging from 0 to 100 under 15 minutes in in the US.
EV advocates can yell at the top of their lungs that "you only have to supercharge on long trips!" But sometimes people have to drive 100 miles or whatever unexpectedly after work, etc. Ain't nobody gonna tolerate having to wait to charge a car they paid $50K for. People are flat out of their mind thinking it's okay that an EV takes 30 minutes to charge. These people do not underestimate how people use cars.
In America, the sweet spot is battery electric hybrids. I already own one, and my next car will be a plug in hybrid. That's what most American car companies neef to focus on. The best of both worlds.
Alexander, Tesla did solve the fast-charging problem. It solved it so well that last year, the Society of Automotive Engineers settled on the Tesla plug as the North American Charging Standard. Other carmakers are supposed to transition to it starting in 2025, maybe for the 2026 model year.
Also, it's more like 10-80 or 10-90. Carmakers advise against topping off at 100% charge regularly to preserve battery range, since through regular use the batteries chemically degrade. EV drivers generally don't try to drive to 0%, and around 10% the vehicle turns on energy failsafes like restricting the top speed and turning off climate control to conserve energy at low percentages.
Isn't the fact that China is still a relatively poor country (such that most ordinary Chinese have only just become rich enough to afford a car at all) been a big factor in the tremendous competitiveness of their EV industry, as it can achieve far greater economies of scale (by building the first cars for hundreds of millions of Chinese households) than the car industries of western countries, which mostly are only building new cars to replace those which wear out?
China is also positioning BYD and its other cars to enter developing markets in Latin America and Africa, like its own, to provide a low-price vehicle and beat American, Japanese and European carmakers to export markets.
yes they are forced. The government taxes away their income, making them highly price sensitive, and then gives that money to one industry to artificially undercut their competition. That is just a very corrupt/complicated way of forcing the consumer: you just show the mailed fist of government at tax season, rather than at the car dealership.
Yes, our government forced us to switch over to Uber. They placed huge restrictions on taxis that made them inconvenient, inflexible, and expensive, and then gave a few corporations total freedom to provide the same service with almost no restriction at all. Saying the consumer has a choice under those circumstances is laughable.
That’s not to mention that many uber drivers would not be able to support themselves on Uber payments where they live without massive government assistance. So the subsidy problem I outlined above also applies
Ok that's fair and consistent, viewing subsidies as a forcing mechanism. I suppose I just think it looks like their policies have been very effective for achieving their stated goals (some of which are also ostensibly the goals of western governments, which are looking relatively much less successful). Again I think there's a tendency to focus too much on exports and 'dumping' and too little on Chinese domestic EV adoption and the development of their auto tech / manufacturing sector. I personally don't really see commitment to free markets as an end in itself, and I certainly don't expect Chinese policy makers to think that way.
Yes things are easier in a one party state run by a hereditary mandarin class whose every policy initiative is a cynical ploy to increase centralized control.
What I don’t like is seeing fellow citizens lament that fact
Weren't the restrictions (such as medallions) that make taxis inconvenient, inflexible and expensive, imposed for a reason, most likely to minimize traffic congestion in cities caused by taxis?
So why (other than corruption) did city and national governments allow Uber to circumvent these restrictions?
George, that was one reason.
One problem was that during the Great Depression, many car owners were doing the stone-age version of Uber and using their personal cars to carry fares for pocket cash. So many car owners had the same idea that supply outstripped demand and that just to get that pocket cash, they cut their fares so low they were making less than gas money.
Monopoly was seen as the answer to broker a balance between having a vehicle available at a reasonable price for consumers and a fare set to a point where the driver can recoup their costs with a set rate of profit, like an electric, water and gas utility. One way to achieve that was a barrier to entry, knowing that a maximum number of vehicles ensured a taxi operator would make money.
Uber moved fast, broke things, but realized when it clawed back the VC subsidies that despite its superior GPS and AI dispatching, its technology was not able to help them get under the operating costs of a taxi (about $4 a mile) or overcome the tyranny of what transit consultant Jarrett Walker refers to as geometry. (Uber's passenger per hour productivity is between 1-2 per driver, 40% of miles driven are deadheads, and it is physically beyond Uber's power to increase productivity.)
What Walker means by geometry: https://humantransit.org/2011/03/how-universal-is-transits-geometry.html
and https://humantransit.org/2016/07/elon-musk-doesnt-understand-geometry.html
Don’t worry though, the same people are currently busy making Uber as expensive and inconvenient as the old taxis, and the cycle will being again
politicians are cowards who will never admit a mistake. Rather than go to an old constituency, the taxi drivers, and explain that protective regulations have become overly burdensome on the consumer and will have to be repealed, they opted to totally destroy that sector and replace it with a new source of support: big tech
Uber subsidizing rides to take market share from taxis turned out to be history's costliest lesson in Chesterton's Fence.
A basic Uber ride without the subsidies has converged with the regulated fares of taxi monopolies. With its technological superiority, Uber still can't manage to turn a profit on its services and likely never will. The value of a taxi enterprise was always in the monopoly, not the provision of service.
Everyone takes what they are given. I would have bought an electric vehicle 15 years ago when I bought my car but the market only gave me a hybrid.
You will have to accept that fact that your tastes don’t align with the average American consumer. Toyota continues to sell hybrids at great profit, while EVs are money losers for everyone besides Tesla
Don't we take what we're given here in the USA? Aren't we subject to crony Capitalism dealer laws that artificially increase the price of cars?
Frankly, I applaud China for moving their country more quickly to EVs. It helps the planet and everyone on it, including you.
Does that mean I approve of their political structure or any of their other policies? No.
They aren’t moving anything forward for anyone they are dumping toxins into the global environment to build batteries that will be powered by their dirty electrical grid for their entire operating life cycle.
Vertical integration between sales and the manufacturer is not crony capitalism, and dealers used to serve a valid purpose. The manufacturers are stuck with old contracts but are slowly working to crush the dealers and sell directly to the consumer. That’s the opposite of cronyism, that’s ruthless competition.
Anyway the American consumer is still getting the end product they want out of the arrangement, which is hybrids and pickup trucks.
So, you think it would be a net benefit for China to build out the ICE infrastructure for 1B people, right?
You do get that China is the #1 supplier of solar panels, right? Pretty good in wind, too.
You're just making shit up.
Nothing you say changes the fact that their grid is filthy and they have no credible plans to clean it up.
If it does get cleaner it’s because their power needs will shrink along with their population and economy over the next decades, in which case all infrastructure investment right now is probably just money thrown into a pit of nonsense, just a repeat of the infrastructure/real estate bubbles that they’ve been winding down for the past several years
Vlad, China's grid has a higher percentage of renewables than the U.S. 26% versus 19%. I suspect they're locked into taking up a lot of the solar panels they are building. It makes logical sense and economic sense.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Renewable_energy_in_China#:~:text=In%20early%202020%2C%20renewable%20energy,29.4%25%20of%20total%20power%20generation.
Ok, Vladimir. Keep selling oil to China. 🤡
https://www.justice.gov/atr/economic-effects-state-bans-direct-manufacturer-sales-car-buyers
Thanks for providing a citation for what I said
That link references laws which you damn well did not reference. 🤦🤡
There is a massive subsidy in terms of money and time when it comes to getting plates and registering BEVS in China. Many times they waive high fees for registration and ICE cars take years to get plates.
First production rechargeable electric car 1886 or thereabouts. There's a reason why ICE won for the whole of the next century and that is connected with your "almost never have to charge away from home" claim because such claims have to take into account the severity of the event which almost never happens. You wear seatbelts for this reason, even though they are almost never needed and you personally have never benefited from one. The "almost never* event with EV is the one 400 mile roadtrip you make to see your folks at Christmas with a four hour queue, in winter, for a charger halfway because all the other EVs do the same. I am prepared to base my whole car strategy on avoiding that one annual experience
"I am prepared to base my whole car strategy on avoiding that one annual experience"
Why not rent a gasoline car that one weekend, if you're so concerned, and save money and the planet in the meantime? I think there is often something else behind resistance to EVs, namely cultural war identity bullshit.
I am British. We have all sorts of bullshit going on, but not EV vs ICE based identity statements. Planet saving wise my most responsible course of action is to get a further 70k miles out of my existing 100k car before replacing it.
Personally I would not want to buy a main vehicle that required me to regularly rent another vehicle. Too much hassle.
Presumably if the problem with making that journey by EV is that there's a 4-hour queue at the charging station (because it's Christmas and millions of other people are making similar journeys at the same time), then it would also be extremely difficult (and expensive) to rent an ICE car for that journey for more or less the same reason?
A 4-hour queue is typical for Electrify America chargers. ;)
In a world with mass EV adoption, if it’s the same weekend that everyone else wants to drive home to visit family, the that is going to cost a lot.
Which is exactly the point I was making.
I was replying to Joachim
Or I can just keep my ICE car and not go through all that extra cost and bullsh*t every time we need to take a road trip?
How am I “saving money” if I have to pay 1200$ dollars for a rental car for 2 weeks every Christmas vacation? Is the “savings” suppose to come from fuel costs? Does this magical place have free electricity?
Surely the real “almost never” event is when your car breaks down on the side of the road in the middle of nowhere, which is much more likely to happen in an ICE car
Ok but actually pretty rare if you buy a newish ICE car from a high reliability marque (Toyota not land rover)
And set that against actually running out of fuel in the middle of nowhere, almost impossible in an ICE.
I have been driving for decades and have been stranded zero times. Not really a factor.
The last few times I *almost* got stranded, a flat tyre was the culprit. Luckily I drive a sensible ICE with a full-sized spare so I was able to swap it over and get on my way.
Almost all electric cars omit the spare these days so I'd have been utterly screwed.
I’ve only ever been stranded because of a tire issue.
Batteries throughout the 20th century couldn’t maintain very much of a charge. Just compare the old-fashioned copper-top AA battery you use for a remote control to the lithium ion battery in your phone. There’s a reason John Goodenough won the Nobel prize a few years ago, and it’s because the lithium ion battery has so much more power density than anything else that suddenly we can have meaningful electric scooters and pocket sized mobile telephones, and also usable electric cars and trucks and everything else.
You should read the post. While EVs today do not solve all problems, EVs are dropping in cost and will solve those problems in the future.
You should try to understand the post. The only solution proposed to the range problem is people realising it is not a problem. I am saying actually it is.
So you're the 1% of exceptions? There's no issue if 1% have ICE cars, so keep yours. Nobody cares. Just know that gas stations will start closing down at some point, so your trips will get harder to plan.
What if we could add continual charging on the interstate highways….while you drive on them, your battery is kept charged. Sort of a form of public transportation that could be paid for by tolls.
People do not just drive on interstates. My own driving on interstates is close to zero, including on long trips.
You just described a train, but worse. Just use a train. If you insist on bringing your car instead of renting one at your destination there's the possibility of loading your car on a cargo train, though not enough people want that right now for that to be a common service.
Nice.... a couple of more positives to mention...
1) At an individual level, EVs are your natural back-up generator for your house.
2) At a grid level, there are a couple of advantages
a) EVs can offer load balancing (V2G)...
b) Using electricity as the power transmission source is superior to other forms because
i) response is very fast from source to consumer
ii) cost of electric lines is less than gas/oil (both setup and operations)
Overall, electrifying with support from storage the energy system in the US is more efficient and productive at a first principles level.
Ah yes, using your car’s fuel to charge your laptop in a potential emergency, real big advantage, there
Yes, that is a big advantage, considering that most power outages are just a few hours due to a thunderstorm, and you usually don’t want to be going anywhere during those few hours.
In my experience, most power outages are less than 5 minutes.
Sure. I meant most power outages that do more than reset the clock on your oven.
It's not a very large hit to range. Now, keeping on the climate control is another matter.
We had multi day outages during the wildfires. Yes, I used my car to charge my phone and laptop. WTF?
That’s nice. I already have a generator for that purpose.
Now I need a vehicle that will get me, my husband, and our three kids from Connecticut to Ann Arbor on Wednesday, November 27, between 11:30 am, when school gets out, and 10 pm, which is already a bit past bedtime for both grandparents and first graders.
Can an EV do that?
My ICE can.
I plugged in Stamford, CT to Ann Arbor, MI on 11/27 at 11:30 am into my Tesla app. It gives an arrival estimate (including charging) of 10:48 pm.
LOL... let me reverse it.... your ICE cannot provide backup power, so you have to buy a generator. Your ICE vehicle costs more to operate, requires more maintenance, and is louder/less comfortable to drive. Life is about perspective I suppose.. for the rare occasions one need to make a trip like yours...rent.. it is a hell of a lot cheaper.
My wife did one way rentals just recently. 1 day to get there. 1 day to return a week later. $100.
I'm 66 years old and retired from the work force. My home has 7.8KW of solar panels on the roof, sufficient that for 6 sunny months of the year I can power my EV with essentially free solar energy. My EV runs on the Sun. We decided that rather having a home battery, we would use solar energy to subsidize our transport costs.
Understand that an EV has a single gear and therefore no gear box. There's no excessive heat and vibration to be damped from internal combustions that ultimately diminishes the life of an ICE vehicle.
An EV is a computer on wheels and that means software becomes a crucial component. Software like Google Maps, Spotify, Netflix, YouTube, Zoom video conferencing. Software tightly coupled with mobile phones.
And now EVs are evolving to become robots on wheels with the inclusion of Neural Network computers.
Thisxis truly a transport revolution.
I don’t want a robot on wheels. I don’t want my car connecting with tech or phones or internet. That is so creepy. No no no! I have my own brain and memory and maps and human skills to navigate. I hate the computer than is already in my car. Give me KNOBS!
I just want a car that will reliably get me from point a to point b with a quick fill up.
All cars pretty much use computers these days.
Noah
You overlooked efficiency and cost per mile. My Tesla model Y has averaged ~~ 121 miles per gallon equivalent over the 40,000 miles I’ve driven it. Cost is about 3.5 cents a mile. My deisel Jetta at 44 mpg was about 10 cents per mile. Electric motors are very good at converting energy into forward motion. ICE not so much. This is the primary reason they will win!
No, Noah mentioned that.
I really want to like EVs, wish my next vehicle would be one and I know we'll get there eventually. But the idea of buying one was killed stone dead a couple of years ago. I live in central Europe and you may recall that when Nord Stream was blown up we faced a severe electricity crunch. My local government at this time started talking about passing emergency laws that would restrict people from driving ... but only if they drove an EV. ICE cars would still be allowed to drive.
So this established the precedent that trapping EV users at home is an acceptable strategy to ensure grid stability. Which is, let's face it, kinda reasonable as blackouts are really bad, but it's also a tradeoff you just don't face with ICE. The "petrol privilege" is something I can't get out of my mind since. I live in a city so can't just build a solar farm on my roof, meaning I have to trust the government to properly manage the energy supply. And I just don't. It's not their fault, this particular government is one of the more competent ones, but levels of international electricity trading are very high so problems in one area (e.g. Germany) spill over to other areas. Thus I must also trust the competence of all the other big countries in Europe, even though they're dominated by fanatical greens and socialists who are trying to replace the entire grid with unstable renewables. Impossible to trust them in that context.
In other words, ICE has a decentralization advantage.
Petrol has never been rationed in your country? I’m no EV true believer, but ICE cars are dependent on a specific type of energy, whereas EVs can use any energy source.
If it's been rationed it would have to be before I was born. I have never heard of that happening.
EVs can use any source? Pretty sure locked into one source and one charger type.
Any source of electricity e.g. coal, gas, oil, solar, nuclear…
There are charger adapters from what I’ve heard (a steady stream of brands have been getting access to Tesla’s Supercharger network) but I’m not an expert.
One source. Electricity. Can't plug car into "nuclear". Same way ICE limited to gas, EVs are limted to plug in electricity. It isn't an "advantage".
An individual could reasonably run an EV on gasoline (by charging it with a gasoline-powered electrical generator) as a fallback option in case of blackout, but there is no comparable backup plan to run an ICE car on electricity.
If you're locked into a single charger type you got screwed by IP law and scummy business practices, that has nothing to do with EV technology.
Here in America, we can put solar panels on our homes. Seems like a better decentralization option to me.
Not if you live in a large city.
Or (if like far more Europeans than North Americans) you live at latitudes comparable to the Alaskan panhandle.
A large city doesn't need to mean high density.
Are you sure? Roads and buildings are all potential solar collectors. Batteries can go just about anywhere.
You vote in the government. Their failure is your failure. Go live in Russia. There you can blame failure on Putin. Just don't say it out loud.
Well, "on our homes" is different to "on roads" isn't it? And in cities people tend to live in apartment blocks, so there is no roof (that we own).
I don't get the comment about Putin. You seem obsessed, to bring up such a random tangent in this thread. I actually can't vote where I live, so I didn't vote in this government, but the terrain here isn't particularly suitable for solar panels so I wouldn't support them trying to build farms anyway. There are other kinds of renewable power that work better here.
I am sorry, but it gets really tiring listening to people whine about their government. Unlike Russia, you have the ability to influence your government. Their failure is your failure. Losing an election is due to your failure to convince others of your point of view. There will be more elections. (Maybe, not here if Trump wins.)
ICE most definitely doesn't have a decentralization advantage, it just looks that way because of the extremely common presence of fossil fuel infrastructure, but when you trace that back to its source it is extremely centralized in refineries and harbours bringing it in.
It's at least as decentralized as electricity generation, if not moreso, and the system is naturally buffered because it doesn't have to balance on a second by second basis.
It also has the advantage that governments are mostly leaving it alone and don't run the distribution infrastructure, whereas they are much more involved with the grid.
EVs aren't the problem: they're a more versatile technology in that you could still run them on gasoline (by charging them with a gasoline-powered electrical generator) in case of blackout.
The problem seems to be more with trying to rely on wind and/or solar power in a northern European country, which led the government to commandeer private EV batteries for the purpose of keeping the lights on during a Dunkelflaute.
I'm totally opposed to using EVs for grid backup for this reason: they make the EV batteries slaves to two opposing masters.
Because nuclear, coal, and gas power plants never go offlline.
They only go offline due to low power demand (when it obviously isn't a problem), regular maintenance (easily predictable) or catastrophic failure (extremely rare): none of these are in the same category as solar power going offline due to night time, or wind power going offline due to anticyclonic weather conditions.
1.Hybrids are better for a lot of the country. Especially for winter.
2. What happens if we've hit lowest battery prices now? It seems that all the ever-cheaper batteries forecasts are based on a. Let's not talk about 3rd world labor and environmental practices having to stay the same, and b. China endlessly subsidizing its industry.
It’s incredibly unlikely that we’ve hit the lowest battery prices given the amount of investment in the space. Cotton is cheaper now than when it used literal slave labor.
What lots of people in this comment section criticizing EVs are missing is the "wait and see effect." Cars are durable goods. We expect OEMs to produce better products in the near future since their initial options will have lots of learning pains. We also expect prices to drop. No major rush to buy a new car.
Exactly, if buying now hybrids are the best choice for most folks.
Hybrids don’t have the advantage of fewer moving parts.
Hybrids have the advantage of being able to fuel up in 2 minutes at midnight on the Ohio Turnpike in late December.
And that matters a lot to me.
"Cheaper to maintain" keeps being repeated ad nauseam, but when EVs have to be repaired it is almost always more expensive than ICE vehicles. Hertz found this out very quickly and experienced no maintenance cost savings with their EV fleet.
How much is the higher cost of maintaining EVs driven by price-gouging monopolists of one kind or another?
No regular oil changes. Very, very rare brake jobs. I'd rather have one expensive fix than 20 smaller trips to the mechanic.
Having spent 35 years or so in the Automotive space, you may well be right, but it going to take decades to transition from 275 million or so registered cars and trucks.
Automation is not a bad thing but there will be dislocation. The dealer network will not survive its current state with a majority of EV sales. EVs currently do not have a dependable used vehicle market. The reason is the game musical chairs. Who wants to be the schmuck to get stuck buying a new battery pack. You don’t have a new car market without a used car market. Battery pack costs are going to have to come way down. Unless, of course, we eliminate leasing....
You blithely wisk away the problems of Apartment complexes. Who is going to install those chargers? It won’t be the complex owners unless you allow for much higher rental costs. New Apartment construction may have them. I also don’t know how many times I can say this but our grid and generation will not sustain 275 million cars and trucks charging overnight.
CA just had a brownout in 9 counties. Oops, if you needed a charge, I wouldn’t want to be in NC or FL after a hurricane if I needed to go somewhere with electricity out. So, I completely agree in time, we may become all electric...but it isn’t in 5 years or 10 years. Possibly 20 or more, but you'll have to figure out what to do with the TOTAL industry that represents 8% of exports and 3% of our GDP. The parts business, aftermarket busines...We;re not talking about 36,000 Longshoreman who are fighting automation....the jobs were talking about might be in the millions.
So which group do you work for, API, NADA, or OPEC? Because this is their current FUD (fear, uncertainty, doubt) program to protect their trillions of dollars in investments to keep the status quo.
As with any large scale change, there are many obstacles, most of which are solvable and will get there in time. Right now, EV's are not a solution for everyone, but there are many that can and will take advantage of the lower operation cost, lower maintenance, good performance and other aspects they offer. Yes, the changes and impacts down the road will be significant, but that is to be expected. Change is hard, but there are good reasons to push for these changes.
For what its worth, my condo installed EV chargers for every spot. The 3rd party installation vendor did so free of charge and will make it back on the cost of electricity. This is happening all over. It would be cheaper in the long run if condos did it themselves but, for the time being, this model is gaining traction.
They can't make it back on the"cost of electricity". They must charge you a delivery charge above the cost of electricity to make any money. Are these surcharges being considered on the comparison costs?
I bought two old Gen2 Priuses for my kids. One had a new Toyota battery pack. The other I replaced when it died. $8K for two old cars with brand new batteries. 50 mpg.
You should read Noah's post. He didn't say EVs won. He said they will win.
The good new is if Noah is right we can stop the wasted billions in taxpayer funds to build charging stations! Don't need 'em everyone is dong it at home "for free".
The last time I check in on home charging, using your 110 volt will take 24 hours, the next one was about $1500 to install and that wasn’t the supercharger. Unless they bring that cost down or somehow make the 110-volt outlet quicker, most Americans, even in homes, don’t necessarily have $1500 lying around. Remember on a two car family you’d need two chargers
You can buy a single level 2 charger that will charge two cars. The charger has the intelligence to switch the charge from one car to the other. For the 110-volt outlet charger, the charger comes with the car.
I never got around to writing a post on this but:
I think Israel's pager attack demonstrated that there's potentially a huge drawback with EVs - security.
We now know more about how the pager attack was done but initially it looked like they potentially overloaded the batteries remotely.
EV battery fires are some of the most viscous and destructive fires, and if it was possible to overload batteries remotely (eg in a terror attack) the destructive potential would be huge.
Having a fleet of incredibly complex machines, with an opaque supply chain, provided from countries around the world, all of which have remote access to software updates, may provide the opportunity for a most devastating pre emprltive strike.
I wouldn't be surprised if in the next year concerns start to be raised about the serious risks Internet in a move to a large portion of EVs.
Wasn't the pager attack a case of the Israelis tricking Hezbollah into buying their pagers from a front company under Israel's control, and which rigged them with explosives?
You can't "overload it remotely" and the outlets that promptly hypothesized that when the attack happened were clickbaiting or just ignorant.
There are a ton of explanations online about why this is basically impossible and basically scaremongering.
By your reasoning we should ditch our cell phones and any iot device that has a battery.. including TV remotes..
An exploding TV remote battery can't kill me. An exploding cell phone battery might kill me but is more likely to give me injuries. An exploding car battery will almost certainly kill its occupants.
Definitely a reason not to allow Chinese-built cars in our countries.
Some people are complaining that the battery won't last. This problem has been resolved with Lithium Iron Phosphate (LFP) battery chemistry. LFP battery packs will last well over 3000 full charge cycles. I can easily manage 400 KMs on a full charge. 3000 times 400 KMs = 1,200,000 KMs before the battery pack degrades to 75% of its original capacity.
Then what?
How many ICE cars have you had that wen't over 750K miles without degrading in quality?
Agreed. At normal USA consumer annual mileage (12k-20k per year from rough memory), the interior is probably rotting from UV damage by 500k miles. Definitely "the lifetime of the vehicle".
When people talk about how more common gas stations are I ask- are you closer to a 110v outlet right now or a gas station? I charge my chevy bolt at home on 110 and rarely need more than that. And the electricity for my car can come from anything. Hydro, nuclear, coal- whatever! It is way more flexible than petrol.
No, it cannot come from "anything". It can only come from electricity. That electricity can be generated by many sources, but that is not what is powering your vehicle. There is no flexibility for powering your vehicle.
I can buy a gas or diesel generator to generate electricity to power my vehicle.
I am a happy EV owner, over 3 years and on my second Ford Mustang Mach-E. I share your enthusiasm and hopes for the future. My total maintenance costs for the first one were US$55 over 3 years, and that was for an overpriced dealer tire rotation. However, I felt that there are a few incorrect statements in this post that should be looked at again, as I have some direct experience.
First, it is incorrect that battery life will be harmed (to a recognizable extent) by charging more frequently (at home) such as nightly. Some battery technologies should only be charged to 80-90%, but newer ones like LiFePO4 - used on some models of Tesla, Ford, probably others - can go to 100%. There is enough data now to say that previous assumptions are myths, including one study that showed 800,000 mile life for the battery packs. Studies also show from many years of Tesla data that cars have primarily been fast-charged retain most of the expected range.
Second, noise. While it might be true that EVs are slightly quieter backing out of a parking space (hybrids as well), they are noisier on the road. Several reasons: tires designed for EVs are noisier as they have to have stiffer sidewalls to support greater weights; manufacturers may reduce the amount of sound insulation to reduce that weight. My Mustang is noisier than my previous car (Audi A4). Newer battery technology will also reduce the weight of EVs "real soon now".
Third, range estimates must be taken with a huge bucket of salt. While all cars have lower range in winter, the reduction is much more significant for EVs. While I never believed my Audi's claim of 485 miles on a full tank, my two Mustangs promised range of over 270 miles (which is plenty for me, btw) reduce by almost 40% in winter. I do have the luxury of plugging in whenever I want, and I don't come close to the 38-40 miles average for Americans.
Cheers!