121–130 of 218 posts
Earlier quoted context omitted.
>Perhaps add another dollar or two to the gasoline tax? If only, the gas tax is waaaaaaaaaay too low.
Thats kind of what happens when you don't ever adjust it in 50 years and it's a fixed dollar amount.
Sadly this sort of mandate leads to a very inefficient application of money to reducing pollution. After that $14,000 "subsidy" the 500e still a $32,500 car, which will appeal primarily to people who are likely replacing an already efficient late model vehicle for a tiny net carbon savings. That same $14,000 applied to the base model 500 Pop would make the price about $3,000(!) and you'd have buyers replacing old clu…
I agree the existing system isn't very economically efficient but ISTM that you're assuming rather than demonstrating the efficiencies that would result from your alternative scheme.
I wonder about the infrastructure change required for electric vehicles. The bay area relies extremely heavily on on-street parking. If everything is to go electric, will there be charging stations every 15 feet along every sidewalk?
In the not very distant future cars will drive themselves to a charging center and parking needs will be greatly reduced.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
By that argument, you lose energy when gasoline evaporates during transportation. In both cases (electricity and gasoline) loss is marginal and can be mitigated by striking a balance between centralization and transport/power line distance.
I wouldn't call it marginal (it's about 7% for the eletrical grid). See https://www.nema.org/Products/Documents/TDEnergyEff.pdf
The California Air Resources Board and the EPA have achieved quite a lot. Los Angeles air was barely breathable in the 1970s. Now, there's very little smog. Look at 1960s pictures of Los Angeles, Cleveland, Pittsburgh, New York. That was once considered impossible. Now, it's mostly done. The only thing keeping electric cars from taking over is battery cost. Performance and range have already been fixed. Once battery…
I've never understood how Los Angelenos can be satisfied with their air quality. So many people are like you, and say that it is a solved problem.
But the air is still horrible in LA [1,2]. It is extremely smoggy most days. Even on the coast, say in Santa Monica, the air is at best about the same as in San Jose.
[1] http://www.stateoftheair.org/2015/states/california/los-ange... [2] http://www.stateoftheair.org/2015/city-rankings/most-pollute...
Emergency situations and natural disasters, where are the discussions? Real life has the two and yet there is no real life discussion of what one should do with a pure electric car. Snow storm his the Midwest and nocks out the power. You need to get someone to the hospital or you work at a hospital how does one get the electricity to ready their vehicle? Electrical core for cars yes but pure electric cars for real wo…
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Sure but then every analysis is flawed because everything has some kind of externality that's hard to measure and account for. How much fuel is burned to make the cells? How much pollution happens to mine the rare earths for the cells and the motors? It's super easy to poke holes in both sides of the argument because building a car is so damn complicated whether it's an ICE or electric.
I didn't downvote you but I really don't think it's hard to measure and account for the externalities in fossil fuels. 1. Calculate the dollar amount per pound of CO2 released that pays for enough tree planting or subsidizes enough renewables to offset the emissions. 2. Apply it as a tax to all fossil fuels and imports from countries without a comparable tax scheme.
For example, right now most steel is made in electric furnaces which can be powered by coal, nuclear, gas, oil, solar, hydro, etc. What's the right tax for imported steel then?
Let me now make a list of a bunch of other things that are in a similar category: aluminum, most other metals, rubber, plastics, glass, etc.
Machines that are used to process raw materials may themselves be made of raw materials which are sourced in various ways. And those machines may be powered by dirty fossil fuels or clean renewables. Which means that components -- as opposed to raw materials -- are also going to be very difficult to properly classify and tax.
The same for subsystems and full assemblies and entire products.
It's a lot more complicated than "do some math and then apply a tax"
Sadly this sort of mandate leads to a very inefficient application of money to reducing pollution. After that $14,000 "subsidy" the 500e still a $32,500 car, which will appeal primarily to people who are likely replacing an already efficient late model vehicle for a tiny net carbon savings. That same $14,000 applied to the base model 500 Pop would make the price about $3,000(!) and you'd have buyers replacing old clu…
Maybe, but you're making a bunch of assumptions here - people might well replace an old clunker with a small compact for only $3000, but you can't take that for granted. People who don't own a car already might enter the market at this price (adding to pollution and congestion) or those who have efficient cars might replace them with an equally efficient but much cheaper car and and simply pocket the savings, for no…
I imagine that the women in that picture is supposed to look like she's taking in a breath of fresh air, but she looks incredibly smug.
The California Air Resources Board and the EPA have achieved quite a lot. Los Angeles air was barely breathable in the 1970s. Now, there's very little smog. Look at 1960s pictures of Los Angeles, Cleveland, Pittsburgh, New York. That was once considered impossible. Now, it's mostly done. The only thing keeping electric cars from taking over is battery cost. Performance and range have already been fixed. Once battery…
> The California Air Resources Board and the EPA have achieved quite a lot. Los Angeles air was barely breathable in the 1970s. Now, there's very little smog. Look at 1960s pictures of Los Angeles, Cleveland, Pittsburgh, New York. That was once considered impossible. Now, it's mostly done. I've never understood how Los Angelenos can be satisfied with their air quality. So many people are like you, and say that it is…