Fewer people are buying electric cars in the US • Hacker News Board

Re: Fewer people are buying electric cars in the US

#141

Post by stjohnswarts » Thu, Jan 04, 2024, 4:39 AM UTC

avgDev wrote: post #18

TexanFeller wrote: post #15

I want an EV to be more reliable and save me more money in the long run. EVs start out ~10k more than the Corolla most people should buying. They then compromise the long term reliability and maintenance cost with high tech gee whiz features. I’d sooner have manual roll up windows than touch screen controlled air vents. When you integrate sensors and software controls into every little thing, we know those things wil…

That is one of the issues for me. Plus, the only viable EV now for me is Tesla, but they keep making silly decisions and are just an odd automaker. By silly decisions I mean things like removal of turn signal stalk, removal of parking sensors, lack of a gauge in field of view(y, 3), etc. I love ability to buy online. I hate the lack of an online parts catalog where I can purchase OEM parts. This is a big issue for me…

Tesla is the only one I'll buy until any car can use the tesla charger network, others simply aren't very well kept up.

Re: Fewer people are buying electric cars in the US

#142

Post by paxys » Thu, Jan 04, 2024, 4:42 AM UTC

iknowstuff wrote: post #43

Dumbass "journalists" with the usual clickbait. Explicitly MORE people are buying EVs: > Sure, sales of EVs keep going up — a record 300,000 cars sold in the US in the third quarter of 2023 were electric The only thing they're seeing is "but the pace of adoption has markedly slowed" -- no shit, have you seen the interest rates and price diffs? And which manufacturer grew the most? Oh that's right the only all-EV one.…

Business Insider is blogspam. Pretty much anyone can sign up to write, and their primary goal is to get clicks not win Pulitzers. And they are immensely successful at it considering how consistently they show up on places like HN despite having no content of value. Forbes is in the same bucket.

Re: Fewer people are buying electric cars in the US

#143

Post by kridsdale1 » Thu, Jan 04, 2024, 4:42 AM UTC

JamisonM wrote: post #124

iknowstuff wrote: post #43

Dumbass "journalists" with the usual clickbait. Explicitly MORE people are buying EVs: > Sure, sales of EVs keep going up — a record 300,000 cars sold in the US in the third quarter of 2023 were electric The only thing they're seeing is "but the pace of adoption has markedly slowed" -- no shit, have you seen the interest rates and price diffs? And which manufacturer grew the most? Oh that's right the only all-EV one.…

Running the headline "Fewer people are buying electric cars" and then conceding that EV sales are rising at the start of the 3rd paragraph is embarrassing for the author Paris Marx and I hope he feels ashamed.

He’s probably just looking at his royalty cheque.

Re: Fewer people are buying electric cars in the US

#144

Post by mc32 » Thu, Jan 04, 2024, 4:43 AM UTC

rappatic wrote: post #58

The article talks about range concerns as if they're simply incorrect or ill-founded: > Niedermeyer said that while an electric car can meet most people's driving needs, it struggles with edge cases like road trips because of the need to recharge. Since Americans have been promised a one-to-one substitute for their gas cars, this seems like a failure; an EV should be able to do everything a gas car can. This idea per…

I think at this time for your average Joe and Jane their best bet right now is a plug-in hybrid.

It takes care of the short trips and the long trips too, also more affordable.

Re: Fewer people are buying electric cars in the US

#145

Post by AlexandrB » Thu, Jan 04, 2024, 4:43 AM UTC

charcircuit wrote: post #53

femto wrote: post #45

Why don't electric cars use replaceable battery modules with a standard form factor? Advantages would include: 1) It allows the battery to be easily replaced as the car gets older. 2) With a suitable generic form factor, it would allow batteries to be upgraded as technology changes. 3) It would allow people to only populate enough battery slots for their daily needs. Communing to work: you only need to insert a few b…

I am not sure there are many people who want to swap out batteries when they weigh over 1000 pounds. Inserting a battery would require something to help carry and insert it which makes it have enormous user friction which makes it a non starter for most people. Not many people even want to swap out phone batteries despite those batteries being easy to carry.

People also don't want to swap their own engines or transmissions, but shops will gladly do it for you. I don't think that the need for specialized equipment is a good counter-argument - plenty of car repair tasks require specialized tools.

Re: Fewer people are buying electric cars in the US

#146

Post by foolfoolz » Thu, Jan 04, 2024, 4:44 AM UTC

lukas099 wrote: post #75

rappatic wrote: post #58

The article talks about range concerns as if they're simply incorrect or ill-founded: > Niedermeyer said that while an electric car can meet most people's driving needs, it struggles with edge cases like road trips because of the need to recharge. Since Americans have been promised a one-to-one substitute for their gas cars, this seems like a failure; an EV should be able to do everything a gas car can. This idea per…

People focus too much on edge cases when making life decisions, imo. > We need a dining room for when we have parties (has a party once every 2 years; room sits empty 99% of the time) > We need a guest bedroom (guests could stay at the hotel down the street) > I need a pickup truck (driver is an accountant who maybe picks up a couple bags of mulch from Lowes twice a year) I'm glad I live in a prosperous society where…

day to day monotony is boring

those edge cases may be some of the most memorable and impactful days of the year

being able to have those times is always going to outweigh canceling them out. even if it makes more sense day to day

Re: Fewer people are buying electric cars in the US

#147

Post by qwerpy » Thu, Jan 04, 2024, 4:45 AM UTC

mindaslab wrote: post #110

I don't know about the USA, I live in India, and people just want electric bikes and cars.

I live in the USA, in a suburb with many Chinese and Indians. Many drive Teslas. In contrast, Americans have a weird complex with Tesla/Elon and the other EVs aren’t very competitive yet, so we have this funny situation where the otherwise environmentally conscious high-income Seattle folk insist on buying ICE Subarus.

Re: Fewer people are buying electric cars in the US

#148

Post by dcsommer » Thu, Jan 04, 2024, 4:45 AM UTC

iknowstuff wrote: post #43

Dumbass "journalists" with the usual clickbait. Explicitly MORE people are buying EVs: > Sure, sales of EVs keep going up — a record 300,000 cars sold in the US in the third quarter of 2023 were electric The only thing they're seeing is "but the pace of adoption has markedly slowed" -- no shit, have you seen the interest rates and price diffs? And which manufacturer grew the most? Oh that's right the only all-EV one.…

The point of the article is that rising EV sales, even at 87% in Norway (which yields only 20% EVs on the road), is not enough to fix the environmental problems of car driving. TFA talks about the need to end the car-size arms-race and the need for viable alternatives to car transportation as necessary for actually addressing the issues EV tax incentives are meant to tackle.

Agreed the title is useless, but I found the analysis insightful.

Re: Fewer people are buying electric cars in the US

#149

Post by mvdtnz » Thu, Jan 04, 2024, 4:47 AM UTC

lukas099 wrote: post #75

rappatic wrote: post #58

The article talks about range concerns as if they're simply incorrect or ill-founded: > Niedermeyer said that while an electric car can meet most people's driving needs, it struggles with edge cases like road trips because of the need to recharge. Since Americans have been promised a one-to-one substitute for their gas cars, this seems like a failure; an EV should be able to do everything a gas car can. This idea per…

People focus too much on edge cases when making life decisions, imo. > We need a dining room for when we have parties (has a party once every 2 years; room sits empty 99% of the time) > We need a guest bedroom (guests could stay at the hotel down the street) > I need a pickup truck (driver is an accountant who maybe picks up a couple bags of mulch from Lowes twice a year) I'm glad I live in a prosperous society where…

The edge cases are the important cases though. Those parties I throw are the highlight of my year. My parents staying here with me is important to me, I wouldn't have it any other way. Yeah I have a desk job but that landscaping work I do in my weekend is one of my favourite hobbies.

I refuse to live my life as if these things aren't important to me. I refuse to average my entire life style down to my median day. My median day is boring.

Re: Fewer people are buying electric cars in the US

#150

Post by karaterobot » Thu, Jan 04, 2024, 4:49 AM UTC

> Drivers saw the vehicles around them getting bigger, so they wanted bigger cars to make themselves feel safer. Automakers argued that this was proof that people wanted only big cars, so they cut small models and made existing vehicles bigger, which made people with smaller cars feel less safe — you get the picture.

This statement (that drivers buy bigger cars to protect themselves from big cars they see on the road) is unsourced, and seems ridiculous to me. I found some surveys where people cite safety as a factor in purchases of SUVs, but that says nothing about whether an "XXL" SUV is (or is even assumed to be) safer than an "XL" SUV. It especially does not attribute causation: whether or not people are buying larger and larger vehicles reactively, and in an endless feedback loop. That last part sounds like somebody's personal theory.