Calling the Prologue "Honda's EV" feels like a huge stretch. The Prologue was a rebadged GM vehicle that served strictly as a compliance car for meeting CAFE standards. Now that the CAFE standards have been rendered toothless, there's no longer a need for that deal.
>Now that the CAFE standards have been rendered toothless Can you elaborate on this? I'd love to have a cheap small truck like they used to make, but CAFE largely killed those.
Cheap small trucks were killed by the chicken tax, not CAFE.
I assume you are coming from a US perspective, because smaller economical EVs are available in europe and dominate in asia. America car companies have managed to make a 50k+ truck the average new car purchase. They aren’t going to kill that golden calf voluntarily. Instead they have managed to lock out the competition. Why Musk elected to build another truck instead of the promised model 2 is beyond me. Besides, with…
Don't forget maintenance costs in the TCO calculation too. Transmissions, fuel pumps, timing belts, radiators (mostly), fuel injectors, emissions systems, etc are all out of the picture in an EV. Servicing those things may be infrequent but is often extremely expensive.
I think this is the biggest thing that non-EV owners do not understand. Or perhaps they do but not the full scope because money is spent little by little over the years. the oil changes, brakes, belts, starters, alternators, whatevers… I have 2014 Tesla S and I literally spent practically nothing for 11 years. I had to put in a new modem, replaced 12V battery twice and that’s about it. Still on original brakes (102k miles) because with regenerative breaking I hardly ever use the brakes, I mean there is just nothing to spend your money on (I even called Tesla in the beginning of my ownership and was like “do I need to being the car in for something” to be met with “is something wrong with the car? no? why are you calling us then??!” :) ). I will never own a non-EV car again and neither will my kid or anyone in my family
I'm convinced that the Japanese government is terrified of EVs because all the small and medium-sized businesses which support the Japanese auto industry will be absolutely gutted when vehicles contain drastically fewer parts. That, and Japan is deeply screwed if they go all-in on EVs and then China decides they shouldn't be allowed access to any more rare earths.
But isn't Japan deeply screwed if they can't drastically cut their dependence on oil imports?
I'm convinced that the Japanese government is terrified of EVs because all the small and medium-sized businesses which support the Japanese auto industry will be absolutely gutted when vehicles contain drastically fewer parts. That, and Japan is deeply screwed if they go all-in on EVs and then China decides they shouldn't be allowed access to any more rare earths.
> China decides they shouldn't be allowed access to any more rare earths This is a common misunderstanding. There are plenty of alternative locations to mine rare earth minerals, particularly Australia. China cornered the market because it's a high pollution low margin business. If geopolitical concerns cut off access to Chinese sources, alternatives will be developed.
Mining isn't the only bottleneck with rare earths. There also the processing, which is an industry China has monopolized through sustained investments over decades. They have also improved processing efficiency through investments in technology. It's going to take a while for anyone else to catch up.
I'm convinced that the Japanese government is terrified of EVs because all the small and medium-sized businesses which support the Japanese auto industry will be absolutely gutted when vehicles contain drastically fewer parts. That, and Japan is deeply screwed if they go all-in on EVs and then China decides they shouldn't be allowed access to any more rare earths.
Japan is the only other country besides China and Korea that produces magnets of high quality (higher in fact than the Chinese), they just don't do the volume. But there is absolutely no doubt that they could scale up if they wanted to.
They're just more expensive, but not even that much.
I'm convinced that the Japanese government is terrified of EVs because all the small and medium-sized businesses which support the Japanese auto industry will be absolutely gutted when vehicles contain drastically fewer parts. That, and Japan is deeply screwed if they go all-in on EVs and then China decides they shouldn't be allowed access to any more rare earths.
> China decides they shouldn't be allowed access to any more rare earths This is a common misunderstanding. There are plenty of alternative locations to mine rare earth minerals, particularly Australia. China cornered the market because it's a high pollution low margin business. If geopolitical concerns cut off access to Chinese sources, alternatives will be developed.
Japan is also particularly well positioned because China had used rare earths against them first in 2014. Since then they've created basically a strategic rare earths reserve and done research on how to build some components without them. It's not an absolute solution but between this and future development in friendlier nations, I don't think the rare earth risk is as acute for Japanese automakers.
I do think the original point about lower complexity vehicles being a threat to the suppliers has some merits though. Germany faces a very similar dilemma and made similar decisions.
Honda is an engine company at its heart. It makes very reliable, long lived engines. They refine technology not really invent it (maybe invented VTEC). The transition to EV will be very gradual, I don’t even think we have enough rare earth metals and electrical grid capacity to go even twice as fast in adoption? Honda is waiting for the standards and technology to settle out and become commodity technology, then they…
> I don’t even think we have enough rare earth metals and electrical grid capacity to go even twice as fast in adoption
I also have some concerns about our grid, but not from EVs. AI is already consuming more 5% of the grid, more than twice that of EVs (~2%), and is growing far faster. I've seen estimates as high as 17% of the grid by 2030. Most EVs are also charged in off-peak hours when there's plenty of capacity.
> Consumers, mostly those who buy EVs from the likes of Tesla, Rivian, and BYD, have grown accustomed to the frequent updates, slick infotainment software, and advanced driver-assistance systems.
Guess which three items out of that list I do not want.
If it doesn't have a screen or a network connection it can't do either of those things. I'm very eagerly awaiting the Slate truck for exactly this reason. A cheap barebones EV meant for hauling stuff and people locally. The thing can't even do OTA updates without you connecting your phone to the car's bluetooth.