Denmark to ban petrol and diesel car sales by 2030 • Hacker News Board

Re: Denmark to ban petrol and diesel car sales by 2030

#121

Post by vidarh » Wed, Oct 03, 2018, 4:45 PM UTC

PopeDotNinja wrote: post #26

I went to Denmark last year and spent two weeks driving all over the countryside, and likely would have been difficult to reach with an electric car. Many of the places I visited would not have been accessible via public transit. I'm curious how future generations will reach remote places as we move away from fossil fuels. BTW, I loved Denmark :)

Difficult why? It's a tiny country.

Skagen (Northernmost tip) to Flensburg in Germany is ~402km. Skagen to Copenhagen (East) is 410km. The longest reasonable point to point journey in Denmark is in the 550km or so range (e.g. Skagen to Lolland), though you can certainly end up with longer journeys if you pick more convoluted routes for sight-seeing and end up having to charge, this will not be a typical journey for most people. And most of the population is located within a much smaller part of the country.

And this is with 12 years to expand charging networks and for vehicles to increase range before a ban on new petrol/diesel car sales, and in other words many more years before everyone will be forced to use an electric.

Re: Denmark to ban petrol and diesel car sales by 2030

#122

Post by ben_w » Wed, Oct 03, 2018, 4:45 PM UTC

apcragg wrote: post #109

ben_w wrote: post #89

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Worldwide, transport energy use is about 150% total electricity use — 30PWh/y vs. 20PWh/y. I’m not saying we can’t upgrade production (I’m actually significantly more optimistic than the best case IAE estimates), but it’s not as trivial as just installing some new wires and transformers.

I'm curious, is that only non-point-to-point personal transportation or does it include all forms (e.g. ocean shipping, rail, public transport)?

That’s very good point, looking at my source the answer appears to be “everything”. I will try to remember that in future.

However, my point is only that we will need non trivial increases in electricity production, rather than any specific number. That point still stands.

Re: Denmark to ban petrol and diesel car sales by 2030

#123

Post by rcMgD2BwE72F » Wed, Oct 03, 2018, 4:45 PM UTC

ben_w wrote: post #89

rcMgD2BwE72F wrote: post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That doesn't cost much (far less than a gas equivalent) and can be installed alongside highways within weeks. If people purchase EV _en masse_, they'll have charging stations everywhere. There's no egg/chicken problem here.

Worldwide, transport energy use is about 150% total electricity use — 30PWh/y vs. 20PWh/y. I’m not saying we can’t upgrade production (I’m actually significantly more optimistic than the best case IAE estimates), but it’s not as trivial as just installing some new wires and transformers.

You could have a solar farm and some batteries close to each stations. It's not trivial but it isn't a bottleneck either.

Re: Denmark to ban petrol and diesel car sales by 2030

#124

Post by anticensor » Wed, Oct 03, 2018, 4:46 PM UTC

stephengillie wrote: post #42

dsfyu404ed wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This. Think of the battery and electric motor in a hybrid like a caching system that makes the power-train able to use energy a lot more efficiently.

It's like a solid state version of a giant flywheel under the car. Bonus in that there's no extra angular momentum.

Electric motor needs to be large enough to absorbe the momentum of travel, though. You saved momentum storage but not size.

Re: Denmark to ban petrol and diesel car sales by 2030

#125

Post by mattlondon » Wed, Oct 03, 2018, 4:46 PM UTC

gambiting wrote: post #61

tedeh wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Enforcing it is going to be quite simple. The "DMV" or equivalent will have a very hard time explaining why they are still giving out license plates for new vehicles that are not electric if the ban is made law.

As I explained elsewhere - hybrids are exempt. And all current manufacturers can make all of their models into some extremely mild hybrids just to get around the ban. So expect to see a lot of models with 1bhp electric motors just to classify as hybrids coming out soon. And cars made before the ban will obviously be still allowed, so there's no issues there.

People still need to buy the cars. Just like Dieselgate has killed diesel, people will vote with their wallets if manufacturers start trying to pull the wool over customers' eyes.

Also obviously a 1bhp hybrid would get awful fuel economy figures compared to a real hybrid. If you are a manufacturer and you go to all that bother to build a hybrid, why bother doing a 1bhp motor instead of a 30bhp motor? Whats the point? Just to "get around" the law? Why not just put a proper motor in and make a better, more competitive product? I doubt the cost of a 1bhp motor is much less than a 30bhp in the grand scheme of things needed to build a hybrid car (e.g. batteries)

Re: Denmark to ban petrol and diesel car sales by 2030

#126

Post by tomp » Wed, Oct 03, 2018, 4:46 PM UTC

Annatar wrote: post #108

tomp wrote: post #66

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> that hasn't stopped it from getting 50mpg ratings Is this the "50mpg under ideal laboratory conditions driven by an AI" or "as driven in a real city/highway by a human"?

I get 49 MPG in mixed mode driving on a Euro III emissions compliant diesel every day. Newer diesels are even more efficient. And I don't spare the accelerator either.

Right, but it's diesel... you never know what else you're exhausting into the environment.

Re: Denmark to ban petrol and diesel car sales by 2030

#127

Post by tialaramex » Wed, Oct 03, 2018, 4:47 PM UTC

ben_w wrote: post #89

rcMgD2BwE72F wrote: post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That doesn't cost much (far less than a gas equivalent) and can be installed alongside highways within weeks. If people purchase EV _en masse_, they'll have charging stations everywhere. There's no egg/chicken problem here.

Worldwide, transport energy use is about 150% total electricity use — 30PWh/y vs. 20PWh/y. I’m not saying we can’t upgrade production (I’m actually significantly more optimistic than the best case IAE estimates), but it’s not as trivial as just installing some new wires and transformers.

Yeah, so, the first thing to know about that is ICE is ludicrously inefficient. Spinning all that metal at variable speed with tiny explosions is, unsurprisingly, not the best way to turn high density fuels into energy. The thing ICE had on its side is the energy density, on other metrics it's a bad deal (hence why free charging for EVs is affordable)

So if you have 400MW of ICE cars you don't need 400MW of electricity to replace that, something more like 80-100MW is more like it IIRC. The infrastructure build cost isn't zero, but it's much less than this 150% metric suggests.

Re: Denmark to ban petrol and diesel car sales by 2030

#128

Post by IB885588 » Wed, Oct 03, 2018, 4:47 PM UTC

IB885588 wrote: post #120

eanzenberg wrote: post #99

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Unfortunately, production of cars (and consumerism in general) is extremely bad for carbon emissions and for the environment. Carbon emissions from the production of 1 car generally rival the lifetime emissions from the tailpipe [1]. If you have no choice but to replace an old car for new then sure, get a more efficient one. If you're replacing cars every 3 years like an average westerner, given the age of cars I see…

All the Life cycle analysis I've seen (don't have the sources handy) have shown that the vast majority of an ICE's car's impact is from the fuel that is burned and not from production, usually around 80% driving and less than 20% production.

If you look at page 29 of this LCA by Audi, you can see that they show an ICE car's impact at about 20% manufacturing, 80% usage, and around 1% recycling at the end of life:

https://www.audi.com/content/dam/com/EN/corporate-responsibi...

Re: Denmark to ban petrol and diesel car sales by 2030

#129

Post by s0rce » Wed, Oct 03, 2018, 4:47 PM UTC

mrguyorama wrote: post #73

As an idealist I'm glad to see the world transition away from fossil fuels in any capacity. As a "Car Guy" however, there is a small sadness that I won't really get to experience much of the internal combustion engine. I feel like I was born a decade too late and a lot too poor. Similar to some techies who feel the missed the early internet.

While few people still use horses for transportation there are many people who still have horses as a hobby and they are readily available with many places to take them. I suspect internal combustion cars will remain in a similiar hobby niche. There will be mechanics, race tracks, drag strips, etc for a while.

Re: Denmark to ban petrol and diesel car sales by 2030

#130

Post by jillesvangurp » Wed, Oct 03, 2018, 4:47 PM UTC

I'm guessing economies of scale will finish the job somewhere over the next decade already. If you operating any kind of vehicles commercially, eliminating fuel cost should be high on your agenda. Whether it is taxi's, buses, police vehicles, delivery vehicles, etc. For that kind of market what matters is the total cost of ownership. This is why many taxis were early adopters of hybrids. As soon as they become affordable enough, they'll be going full electric.

Currently battery cost and production volumes are the main limitation. As that improves, the market will gobble up whatever is being produced. This just puts the pressure on a bit more. 2030 is not even that ambitious.