Electric Buses Are Hurting the Oil Industry • Hacker News Board

Re: Electric Buses Are Hurting the Oil Industry

#181

Post by nichtich » Wed, Apr 25, 2018, 9:39 AM UTC

I'm a bit surprised nobody has mentioned the fraud[1]. The reason electric bus becomes so popular in China recently is mainly because of government subsidies. Well that's the intended consequence and most people are OK with it.

What's problematic is that the subsidy is a fix amount for certain kind of vehicle. And it turns out bus is more efficient in terms of subsidy/cost ratio. And since the subsidy is a fixed amount, bus maker can cut a lot of corners and make a bare minimum of a bus which may cost even less than the subsidy. Now they can dump these buses to a local government basically free and bribe the operators to drive the buses once a while to receive the subsidy[2].

I mean I'm all for green buses. But if electric buses out-sale electric cars a lot, you have to wonder why. And one obvious reason is buses are mostly bought in large quantities by entities not very concerned about cost/profitability, ie local governments. So it is much easier for bus related fraud than cars facing mostly individual consumers.

[1] https://www.wsj.com/articles/china-fines-five-auto-makers-fo... [2] http://www.sixthtone.com/news/1001382/company-accused-of-run...

Re: Electric Buses Are Hurting the Oil Industry

#182

Post by icc97 » Wed, Apr 25, 2018, 9:40 AM UTC

stephengillie wrote: post #170

lenepp wrote: post #62

One interesting feature of articles like this that I don't really get is that they often leave out a huge huge quality of life benefit that electric vehicles bring: reduced urban machine noise.

The visceral excitement from the noise and vibration is a key part of auto marketing, and automakers are struggling to sell cars without it. Some people enjoy the attention they get from their loud, smelly cars - old Porsches, Harley Davidson motorcycles, and large trucks come to mind. Which is why some EVs play engine noises from internal speakers.

The engine noises I heard from the BMW i8 were ridiculous - not that they were bad but just because it seems so childish. It's like you're a 5-year-old sat on a chair making BROOM! BROOM! noises.

An example is on this YouTube video [0]. First you can hear the electric acceleration, then the driver then slows down and switches on the engine noise. It even simulates the noise of gear changes...

[0]: https://youtu.be/yerTSDJtJmM?t=6m29s

Re: Electric Buses Are Hurting the Oil Industry

#183

Post by jgtrosh » Wed, Apr 25, 2018, 9:41 AM UTC

arrrg wrote: post #117

craftyguy wrote: post #72

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> That is picking nits No, actually it's not. The source of electricity matters, and just because something doesn't directly emit pollutants does not mean its power is derived without emitting pollutants.

It’s a toxic argument, because in practice it’s used to absolve diesel or gas cars entirely. It‘s also a way of missing the forest for the trees. Gas cars can never be clean, electric cars are in fact cleaner from the get go and have the potential to be (nearly) entirely clean. Building a world where that is possible requires a large investment in infrastructure and that will only happen if there is a large scale swi…

You can't say they're cleaner from the get go. They could rely on such a different set of polutant products that you can't compare them in general. Also building one electric car when the production chain doesn't exist is obviously going to pollute much more than one has vehicle with its existing infrastructure. It's because we consider the industrial evolution and the usage lifetime that we can compare the two and EVs might be considered less pollutant (even though once again you're comparing very different kinds of pollution). It's not because they seem much better in theory that you should give the EV industry any favorable bias—they need to be held accountable even more than the existing industry because they will probably shape the future of the automotive industry.

Re: Electric Buses Are Hurting the Oil Industry

#184

Post by icc97 » Wed, Apr 25, 2018, 9:45 AM UTC

dver wrote: post #59

seanmcdirmid wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It really is about the same. Electric buses aren’t new of course (Seattle has had them forever), but the ability to use them with batteries and without overhead wires is the new thing. In the bus the battery is just much bigger (usually stored on top).

Might be better on the bottom. See this rollover during testing. https://insideevs.com/four-injured-electric-bus-rollover-inc... Disclosure< I work for Proterra and our packs are on the bottom.

Bottom seems like the natural place. Can I ask you how you solve the problem mentioned in the article of excess axel weight?

> Mr. Stoddart continued: “Provisions for rooftop battery packs are common across all North American and international bus manufacturers. In fact, heavy-duty transit buses built by other manufacturers with batteries located only under the floor (between the axles) have recently been tested at the FTA Altoona track and have exceeded front axle weight ratings, resulting in a significant limitation to the number of passengers that can be carried on board.”

Re: Electric Buses Are Hurting the Oil Industry

#185

Post by Arnt » Wed, Apr 25, 2018, 9:47 AM UTC

nickserv wrote: post #144

profalseidol wrote: post #111

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Perhaps the Oil companies control the US gov't. Or perhaps they're actually the same.

Interesting then to note that Norway, where the oil company is majority owned by the government, also has the largest per capita fleet of electric cars.

You're confusing two unrelated matters.

All of the oil companies pay the same 78% tax rate in .no. The state-owned one also pays its profits, but the profits are a rounding error compared to those 78%.

All the oil that's pumped from below the seafloor is sold. Selling more oil to domestic drivers wouldn't really increase the world's oil price, or state's tax revenue.

Re: Electric Buses Are Hurting the Oil Industry

#186

Post by walrus01 » Wed, Apr 25, 2018, 9:50 AM UTC

profalseidol wrote: post #111

danans wrote: post #21

It's a strange shift in affairs that China appears to have the greatest incentives (urban pollution, petroleum imports) today to advance clean transportation and energy while the US has stalled or moved backward, at least the Federal level. Western European countries, for whom fossil fuels don't seem to be an identity politics issue like in the US, are also making more progress in electrifying their transportation an…

Perhaps the Oil companies control the US gov't. Or perhaps they're actually the same.

The US federal government in general is a textbook case study in regulatory capture (recent new head of the EPA, the FCC, etc).

Re: Electric Buses Are Hurting the Oil Industry

#187

Post by scottdupoy » Wed, Apr 25, 2018, 10:00 AM UTC

nickserv wrote: post #144

profalseidol wrote: post #111

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Perhaps the Oil companies control the US gov't. Or perhaps they're actually the same.

Interesting then to note that Norway, where the oil company is majority owned by the government, also has the largest per capita fleet of electric cars.

Norway seems to be progressive and open-minded about this kind of thing. They have a massive sovereign wealth fund which has built up on the back of a successful national oil industry. However, last year they announced their intention to divest from oil and gas stocks. Whether or not this is to try and make the fund more environmentally and socially responsible, or if they genuinely believe that these are poor investment choices is an interesting question.

https://www.theguardian.com/business/2017/nov/16/oil-and-gas...

[edit: add link]

Re: Electric Buses Are Hurting the Oil Industry

#188

Post by c12 » Wed, Apr 25, 2018, 10:10 AM UTC

scottdupoy wrote: post #187

nickserv wrote: post #144

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Interesting then to note that Norway, where the oil company is majority owned by the government, also has the largest per capita fleet of electric cars.

Norway seems to be progressive and open-minded about this kind of thing. They have a massive sovereign wealth fund which has built up on the back of a successful national oil industry. However, last year they announced their intention to divest from oil and gas stocks. Whether or not this is to try and make the fund more environmentally and socially responsible, or if they genuinely believe that these are poor invest…

Don't they have some requirement by law to always look to the next 50 years or something rather than the usual politician outlook of "however long I am in office for, to benefit me the most."

I would imagine over the next 50 years oil and gas is going to be a worst investment than renewable simply because by then it will have largely run out?

Then again when companies such as BP are increasing their investments into renewable energy sources it makes sense to see Norway doing the same.

Re: Electric Buses Are Hurting the Oil Industry

#189

Post by rjsw » Wed, Apr 25, 2018, 10:20 AM UTC

freddie_mercury wrote: post #82

abakker wrote: post #67

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't know if it really proves anything and it might be OT from your point, but, the confounding variable is that in the US - especially outside of the major urban areas - everything is just very far away in terms of miles. Lacking a car, you can expect life to be very difficult. there are still plenty of places in the US where the range of a tesla might be a borderline problem week-to-week. (though probably not as…

The OP was talking about China. China is bigger than the continental US. I think the persistent myth about the US's size being some unique problem doesn't explain much. What's more, if you think of the EU as a comparison for the US, with the individual counties as analogues for US states, it seems to explain even less. Belgium and Massachusetts are the same size but over has much better transit options than the other…

Belgium needs good public transport because the population are really bad drivers.

Re: Electric Buses Are Hurting the Oil Industry

#190

Post by Shivetya » Wed, Apr 25, 2018, 10:34 AM UTC

I have been of the opinion that the US government should have not pushed EV adoption by subsidizing moving all school buses to EV. The reasons are many but most important is having children used to the idea of EV as a good means for local travel, not having all those diesel buses spewing fumes on to people while loading and unloading at schools, and finally keeping school systems from financial issues incurred by rising fuel costs.

This page gives the numbers of one of Georgia's largest school bus fleets. http://www.cobbk12.org/centraloffice/Transportation/

(numbers)

    875 Bus Drivers
    139 Bus Monitors
    886 Conventional Buses
    288 Special Needs Buses
    870 Routes per day
    37,530 Bus Stops per day
    68,673 Miles Traveled per day
    72,544 Students Transported each day