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Cratering motor fuel sales in Norway show the death spiral that can end oil

electrek.co

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Re: Cratering motor fuel sales in Norway show the death spiral that can end oil

#161

Post by mulmen »

fragmede wrote: post #150
lamontcg wrote: post #145

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I can't remember the last time I had to wait in line for gas that wasn't at Costco. Costco is a pretty extreme outlier. But agreed that charging should shift to the home, the problem there is chargers for on-street parking though for people who don't have driveways/garages (of course this might eventually get solved by fully automated vehicles and lowering ownership of vehicles, but that's still vaporware right now w…

It's not too hard to imagine parking meters having charging ports.

Ports is right. This is only viable if the cars bring the cable.

Seattle tried installing chargers at public street parking spots and the cables were stolen.

Re: Cratering motor fuel sales in Norway show the death spiral that can end oil

#162

Post by Forbo »

bigtex wrote: post #110

Have they found a replacement for plastic yet?

A quick search tells me that plastics account for around 4-5% of oil production, so I don't think this is going to be the safety net for the industry that it might look like at first.

Re: Cratering motor fuel sales in Norway show the death spiral that can end oil

#163

Post by ben_w »

jncfhnb wrote: post #152
ben_w wrote: post #95

Earlier quoted context omitted.

When you're rich, it is. When you're poor, you can't afford the bucket.

Having the drop in the bucket is not, however, a path to being rich.

It is when your standard for "rich" is framed in terms of "can afford to buy good boots".

Re: Cratering motor fuel sales in Norway show the death spiral that can end oil

#164

Post by zdragnar »

TheRealPomax wrote: post #65
daveFNbuck wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't think most people make a special trip just to get gas. It's usually a quick added stop along the way of another trip, which is less of a nuisance than having to make two small walks to move and plug/unplug your car.

And in those cases plugging in your EV amounts to no net gain or loss, but there absolutely are people who already have to make a dedicated trip to the gas station because their own town where they do their shopping simply doesn't have one.

Sure, but this conversation was about an urban area being converted from industrial to residential.

The people who will be living there with ICEs will certainly be driving them past gas stations elsewhere in the city.

Re: Cratering motor fuel sales in Norway show the death spiral that can end oil

#165

Post by mulmen »

vGPU wrote: post #134
macNchz wrote: post #112

Earlier quoted context omitted.

On cars.com right now it looks like the electric price floor is roughly $5k, which gets you a 10 year old Nissan Leaf, though it looks like they mostly have lower mileage than comparable-age ICE cars. Used car prices have ballooned in recent years, so I’m not sure how much lower you can go without buying a complete heap. As a comparison I looked at the cheapest Nissan Sentras and Versas on the market, which are about…

A car with a 40 mile effective range is not a realistic solution.

Why not? It would have done my commute when I was struggling in Idaho and would easily do my commute since moving to civilization.

Re: Cratering motor fuel sales in Norway show the death spiral that can end oil

#166

Post by PopAlongKid »

thelastgallon wrote: post #99
macNchz wrote: post #10

A couple of comments on the article point out that if gas stations start closing due to reduced demand, it will accelerate the effect by making it more cumbersome to own a gas car. Recently, some of the industrial area near my apartment in NYC was rezoned for housing, and nearly all of the local gas stations were torn down (not because of low demand but because a 15 story building would be more profitable). The resul…

Owning a gas car will become inconvenient and expensive very soon. The number of gas stations has gone down from 202K to 115K, ~50% down[1]. Gas stations make very little money on gas, most of their income is from people buying cigarette, lotteries, lotto, beer, beverages, and some trinkets in the store. All profits are at the margins. When foot traffic drops, even by 10 - 20%, gas stations are not viable. They can i…

>Gas stations make very little money on gas, most of their income is from people buying cigarette, lotteries, lotto, beer, beverages, and some trinkets in the store.

This omits a significant factor, which is that it used to be many gas stations also had several repair bays, employing a mechanic or two.

Anecdata: between mid-1980s and 2000, four such gas station/repair businesses within a mile of my house closed, leaving three gas/convenience store businesses remaining within that same radius, some of which used to have repair service as well.

This used to be a solid small business opportunity for a solo or partnership owner/worker. I suspect that as cars became more computerized the repair business became too specialized, and also some of the stations which were leased from large oil companies were sold out from under the operator.

Re: Cratering motor fuel sales in Norway show the death spiral that can end oil

#167

Post by ZeroGravitas »

soniman wrote: post #157
randerson wrote: post #155

Earlier quoted context omitted.

With many cars now you get V2L charging, so you can use the giant battery in your car to power your fridge. You have to keep your car charged, but that is easy to do if you have a charger at home.

So you're saying that something like Powerwall will be the backup power solution? An additional $15,000?

No, they're saying the EV can act like a powerwall, a free bonus capability.

Re: Cratering motor fuel sales in Norway show the death spiral that can end oil

#168

Post by danaris »

jncfhnb wrote: post #70
goles wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Perhaps not applicable to NYC, but isnt it kind of troubling that people who cant afford a luxury vehicle (55-100k) could be put in a position where they have to spend more money (gas) to go fill up out of their way, taxed for being poor, or shut up and take public transit (if it even exists where they live)? Surely no one driving an EV ever got to their position to buy one driving an ICE. Edit: happy this comment in…

I think it’s more troubling to view owning a car as a base right that everyone should have. It’s better as a luxury. We want fewer cars and for people to live in walkable areas where cars are not needed.

That's a great position to have—anywhere in the developed world but the USA.

Here, it's a great aspirational position to have, but wholly impractical in the short or medium term.

Perhaps, if the Republican Party genuinely collapses within the next couple of years, it might become possible to pass the kinds of massive infrastructure overhauls required to make owning a car anything but a necessity in the vast majority of this country. Until and unless something that drastic happens, their adamant resistance to that kind of measure makes it very clearly impossible.

Re: Cratering motor fuel sales in Norway show the death spiral that can end oil

#169

Post by speedgoose »

soniman wrote: post #144

What happens when the electricity goes out? And the food in the fridge goes bad and nobody can get to the store because the electric car isn't charged? Have we really thought this through? Redundant energy sources makes sense.

You always have some battery left in the car. There is no need to go to 0% as it can be very inconvenient and it can also damage the battery on some types of chemistry. Most people never reached home with 0%.

So if electricity goes out, you most likely have more than enough range to drive to a nearby store or fast charger.

If electricity goes out for an extended amount of time in a large radius around you, that sucks and you may have to find alternative solutions such as walking, running, skiing, biking… It’s not scary or considered as big issues in Norway. Many many people enjoy that kind of activities even with electricity.

Electricity goes out rarely too. I think I had two short incidents in the last 10 years.

Re: Cratering motor fuel sales in Norway show the death spiral that can end oil

#170

Post by wcoenen »

mtlmtlmtlmtl wrote: post #94
arwhatever wrote: post #83

I wonder if electric cars were to approach the maximum range that most people would ever want to drive in a day, about double the stated range of the current longer-ranged cars, if that might trigger a rather profound and sudden tipping point. Who cares how quickly they charge if you’re stopping to sleep for the night anyway?

It would be nice if EV batteries were standardised and modularised enough that one could just swap out the battery for a charged one at a gas/charging station in a couple minutes.

Tesla explored this and found it to be unpractical. A battery swapping station can cost millions to build, compare that to something on the order of $50K per high power rapid charger.

https://www.powersystemsdesign.com/articles/why-did-tesla-gi...

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