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Are electric cars too expensive to tempt motorists away from petrol vehicles?

theguardian.com

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Re: Are electric cars too expensive to tempt motorists away from petrol vehicles?

#101

Post by mrangle »

kiba wrote: post #18
speedgoose wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In city centres for sure. In the country side, the population density makes public transports more challenging. People could walk or bike or ski but that would reduce their life quality. It’s difficult to reduce your life quality unless you are forced. I don’t see country side people giving up their cars.

Most people live in urban areas. Even in suburban areas, the bicycle could be a viable form of transportation. My grocery store is literally under ten minutes away by bike, but it is essentially a nightmare to bike to because of a lack of safe cycling infrastructures.

Bicycling is a viable form of transportation, for short distances and recreation. However, it isn't an option for many if not most needs outside of the house even in suburbia. Not to mention the rural areas / exurbs. A Mom of a couple of kids can't transport her weekly food shop on a bike. Ignoring the inherent danger in getting to the store.

I feel like this is a planning conversation for before the era when they decided to make US planning completely car centric and isolating, in a manner that can't be easily nor quickly reversed in a real way.

Re: Are electric cars too expensive to tempt motorists away from petrol vehicles?

#102

Post by badpun »

mg wrote: post #8

This reminds me of the discussions some years ago whether one should invest in an SSD when buying a new laptop or stay with a spinning disk. Nowadays, barely any new laptops are released without an SSD. When it comes to electric versus petrol, I often think about the fact that the sun sends more energy to earth in an hour than all of mankind uses in a year. I guess that in theory, all that energy could be captured wi…

The amount of digging and extremely polluting chemical processing required to manufacture an electric car is massive. After that, you need to power it, which means expanding the electric grid and power facilities (which means even more destruction of environment). And, at the end of the day, the power used to charge these cars is still more likely than not gonna come from fossil fuels.

I feel we’re pushing the electric cars too early on people. The grid is far from being green yet, and the batteries are not that great in terms of efficiency, safety (spontaneous combustion anyone?) and the toll on natural environment. And yet governments are not doing any deeper analysis, and are just ramming those things down people’s throats.

Re: Are electric cars too expensive to tempt motorists away from petrol vehicles?

#103

Post by mrangle »

poisonborz wrote: post #25

Petrol cars were too expensive for decades

They're still too expensive. They are made "affordable" via financing. That was a banking solution. EVs can be financed. Yet they are still too expensive, over the life of the car. "Expense" also including the inconvenient differences in the manner in which they have to be used.

EVs are awaiting an unforseen tech solution to their expense.

Re: Are electric cars too expensive to tempt motorists away from petrol vehicles?

#104

Post by ndsipa_pomu »

mrangle wrote: post #96
ndsipa_pomu wrote: post #63

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I would dispute that driving leads to a higher quality of life than walking/biking/skiing due to the health problems from lack of exercise. Driving certainly helps with long commutes, but are long commute times increasing the quality of life?

Driving isn't negotiable, when living in the USA outside of the few major metros. Unless you've done it, you may not know what I mean. Most of the US is truly remote, even from the closest grocery store. Health doesn't play into the practical consideration of the way most of the country needs to traverse needed distances.

I've visited the U.S. a couple of times on holiday and even from that perspective, it's stunning just how many places are designed exclusively around the car. Even just walking from one shop to the next is awkward as they often have fences or hedges to separate them, so you have to walk from the shop, through the extensive car park, onto the main road that has no sidewalk and then into the next car park.

But yes, you're right. If you design exclusively around the car then not using a car becomes very awkward. Also, without any meaningful public transport, the suburbs also lock in car usage.

However, car usage is only really practical up to a certain density of people due to their poor space usage. When you get more people using cars, you need more roads and car parking space. This tends to separate the various amenities to fit in all the extra space, which then means that more people will need a car to travel to them due to the extra distance. That leads to yet more roads and more separation of the shops etc. until you reach a point where there's massive congestion at popular times. However, building more roads leads to induced demand and even more congestion, when the actual solution is to move facilities closer to where people live/work so that they're not forced into driving everywhere.

Re: Are electric cars too expensive to tempt motorists away from petrol vehicles?

#105

Post by mrangle »

wazoox wrote: post #98
cpursley wrote: post #77

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Petrol fire is much easier to extinguish than a battery fire. Yeah, touch interfaces is a disease on most modern vehicles (but especially electric). The infrastructure is the weakest link after the raw material chain required to build them. Oh, and recycling/disposal.

Petrol fire is much more common than battery fires, which are vanishingly rare. The oil infrastructure must be dismantled as fast as possible. Recycling of batteries is a chicken-egg problem : it's ramping up, but is necessarily lagging behind EV market penetration. It's an eminently solvable problem -- lead batteries are recycled way over 95% already. Remember : a vehicle lasts about 12 to 14 years. in 2035 (12 year…

>our fossil fuel consumption must have been reduced drastically compared to now.

Tens of millions of people, and possibly more, see this argument as low credibility. Meaning, that the argument for EVs should probably be made according to their inherent merits and not climate arguments.

Put another way, I'd be careful about tangling up the EV push in divisive climate politics. As one is arguably likely to taint EVs in the minds of the public, leading to ever greater pushback in regard to their adoption. Don't underestimate public response to being told that they have to change their lifestyle because of hotly debated assertions. No matter whether or not you think they should be debated.

Re: Are electric cars too expensive to tempt motorists away from petrol vehicles?

#106

Post by badpun »

baq wrote: post #64
aregreabn wrote: post #42

[flagged]

You’re assuming petrol won’t be more expensive. It might be, it might not.

Right now, the price of oil is still not set by market prices, but kept artificially high by the OPEC cartel. Petrol could be much cheaper if the oil producing countries wouldn’t optimize the production (and hence, price) for maximum gains.

Re: Are electric cars too expensive to tempt motorists away from petrol vehicles?

#107

Post by TheLoafOfBread »

bryanlarsen wrote: post #90
Bissness wrote: post #81

Electric cars do not make sense to own if you are not also owning a garage where you can charge them overnight. Also, if you are unwilling to add 1+ hour(s) to your travel time on longer distances.

I did a 3000km trip 4 times (twice each way) during the pandemic. Charging added 15 minutes to the trip. Everybody has to eat/sleep/bathroom, and that can happen at the same time as charging.

I did trip from London, UK to Southern Italy, Brindisi in Enyaq. By Google maps it should take 2 days (24 hours of driving, so 12 hours in 2 drivers/day). Charging dragged it on 4 days and we were charging on Ionity/Enel. So your 15 minutes is some kind of a sick joke.

Re: Are electric cars too expensive to tempt motorists away from petrol vehicles?

#108

Post by thelastgallon »

Expensive only in EU and US. In China, VW has to sell cars for 16K, which are sold in EU/US for 35K - 45K. Legacy carmakers don't know how to make electric cars, rely on regulatory capture to keep prices high.

VW cut prices of ID.3 down to $16,500 in China, while in Europe the same vehicle starts at nearly $43,000: https://www.arenaev.com/volkswagen_cuts_id3_price_in_china__...

China reveals just how bad things are for Toyota, GM and VW: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3WBV9FQvuss

In US, there are good deals to be found. I have a Nissan Leaf on a 2 year lease at $99/month. In the past decade, there were so many who took advantage of $69 - $89/month lease + additional cash back from state/utility/air quality rebates. Folks could buy them from 6K - 10K at the end of the lease. These deals may not be around anymore, but there are leases always available under 300. I see 2023 Hyundai Ioniq 6 for $229 and several others under $300: https://insideevs.com/features/410039/best-electric-car-deal...

Re: Are electric cars too expensive to tempt motorists away from petrol vehicles?

#109

Post by badpun »

wazoox wrote: post #56
MilaM wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Rare earths are not a major component in car batteries. They are mostly used in the electric motors for the magnets and it's acutally quite easy to replace them. Mining of lithium, copper, nickel, will have to expand in the future. But it's nothing in comparison to the damage that is done with the extraction of oil and gas.

Yes, people afraid of rare earth and lithium mining should get some numbers right first: We extract 4 BILLION TONS of oil from the ground every year. In comparison, we extract a few million tons of lithium (and it's reusable / recyclable), and a few tens of thousand tons of rare earths. The FUD about mining is pure big oil propaganda, frankly.

Don’t you need to extract hundreds of millions of tons of lithium ore to get a couple of millions of tons of pure lithium? Not to mention the extensive chemical processing the ore must go through.

Re: Are electric cars too expensive to tempt motorists away from petrol vehicles?

#110

Post by longitudinal93 »

facialwipe wrote: post #99
the_snooze wrote: post #93

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Electric micromobility (e.g., e-bikes and scooters) probably makes more sense for more people right now. Keep an ICE vehicle for long-distance travel. But use your relatively cheap e-bike---that you can charge on a standard AC plug, even in an apartment---for short-distance chores and grocery runs. Of course, people who live in car-only suburbs need not apply.

Raining 300 days a year can really put a damper on things, too.

It's all about the gear
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