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Toyota has stepped up lobbying to preserve its investments in hybrids, hydrogen

arstechnica.com

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Re: Toyota has stepped up lobbying to preserve its investments in hybrids, hydrogen

#181

Post by Robotbeat »

mikepurvis wrote: post #86
ramesh31 wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>depending on your daily driving patterns This is the key point. Modern highly efficient turbocharged 4 cylinder ICE vehicles can be equally or more efficient than a hybrid in the right circumstances as well. But the vast majority of driving is city streets <45mph, where ICE can't even come close to BEV.

I feel like at least some of this depends on whether the ICE in a hybrid is coupled directly to the wheels or not. I believe in all current consumer vehicles it is, but there are other applications like hybrid trains and city buses where the engine is just running a generator at a constant RPM. Surely that kind of configuration would be the absolute best case scenario for ICE efficiency, and probably even for overall…

In a Chevy Volt, there’s a mechanism that mechanically attaches the motor to the wheels at speed above 35 mph for greater efficiency but below that it is a pure serial hybrid, disconnected from the wheel directly. But it rarely ever runs the engine. Pretty much only if you run out of charge.

Re: Toyota has stepped up lobbying to preserve its investments in hybrids, hydrogen

#182

Post by sangnoir »

b112 wrote: post #94
nicoburns wrote: post #92

Earlier quoted context omitted.

To be fair Toyota announced their new lineup of BEVs just last month, to be released next year. Toyota is late to the party, but they are on their way.

To be fairer, they were very early to the party too. They bet on electric, very early in the game and more than one kind too!

Toyota bet on Electric and Hydrogen, then proceeded to double-down on hydrogen. Then never really went all-in on electric and this sadly lost them their early lead.

Re: Toyota has stepped up lobbying to preserve its investments in hybrids, hydrogen

#183

Post by jrsj »

chipsa wrote: post #125
ramesh31 wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>The 2022 Bolt will have a starting price of $32k with a 65kWh battery, for example. That's still a totally different class of car buyers. A "starting price" of $32k means no one is walking out the door with one under $40k total upfront cost. When I can walk into a dealership and finance something like that at $25k total loan amount, that changes everything.

I literally bought a new Chevy Bolt in April for $22k total ($20k financed).

Is this including some kind of tax credit or subsidy or did you actually manage to get them to come down like $8k below MSRP??

Re: Toyota has stepped up lobbying to preserve its investments in hybrids, hydrogen

#184

Post by Robotbeat »

osigurdson wrote: post #93
ramesh31 wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>depending on your daily driving patterns This is the key point. Modern highly efficient turbocharged 4 cylinder ICE vehicles can be equally or more efficient than a hybrid in the right circumstances as well. But the vast majority of driving is city streets <45mph, where ICE can't even come close to BEV.

It seems that most driving in city streets by individuals is largely unnecessary: items can be delivered (by EV) instead of picked up and commuting can largely be electronic. Long term, it seems that the most important use case for the personal vehicle could end up being long distance travel.

Personal cars act as like a personal room on wheels. Peopl store stuff there and use it as a place to retreat to at work. “Personal vehicle as private space” is a super normie idea, but it’s weird how little play it gets in these conversations. It’s NOT replaced by rideshare or public transit.

Re: Toyota has stepped up lobbying to preserve its investments in hybrids, hydrogen

#185

Post by thinkling »

tsudounym wrote: post #112
BoorishBears wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The 2nd Gen Chevy Volt was the Model 3 we deserved, but couldn't appreciate. 40-50 miles EV range meant that most people would have an EV most of the time, and use gas only on one off trips. And while people 10 years behind on ICE advancements would immediately start yelling about dragging around a dead weight ICE all day, modern ICEs are incredibly light, efficient, and reliable in the type of application the Volt h…

The Nissan e-power series is better - the gas engine only powers the electric motor which gives you a full-EV experience when driving. Hybrids need to start distancing themselves from the Prius and promote the insane 0-60 times that EVs are capable of now.

That is what the Voltec drive train does. The gas engine only directly powers the wheels in some narrow range of conditions, and I challenge you to tell when. It feels 99% like a BEV driving experience.

Re: Toyota has stepped up lobbying to preserve its investments in hybrids, hydrogen

#186

Post by tomatocracy »

mikepurvis wrote: post #86
ramesh31 wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>depending on your daily driving patterns This is the key point. Modern highly efficient turbocharged 4 cylinder ICE vehicles can be equally or more efficient than a hybrid in the right circumstances as well. But the vast majority of driving is city streets <45mph, where ICE can't even come close to BEV.

I feel like at least some of this depends on whether the ICE in a hybrid is coupled directly to the wheels or not. I believe in all current consumer vehicles it is, but there are other applications like hybrid trains and city buses where the engine is just running a generator at a constant RPM. Surely that kind of configuration would be the absolute best case scenario for ICE efficiency, and probably even for overall…

There are some consumer BEVs with range extenders which work this way too eg the BMW i3. However they tend not to be marketed as PHEVs as such.

Re: Toyota has stepped up lobbying to preserve its investments in hybrids, hydrogen

#187

Post by robotnikman »

stuaxo wrote: post #121
winternett wrote: post #117

Earlier quoted context omitted.

3 major problems none of the EV evangelists are addressing about with EVs are 1. What happens to all the giant lithium batteries on these vehicles after they reach end of life? 2. How will people be able to evacuate a city or state in an emergency situation when charging/electric supply is not present (which is always likely to happen)? 3. Coal burning infrastructure is still inextricably involved in generating the p…

1. They will be recycled. 2. Never heard this one, what kind of apocalypse are you foreseeing ? 3. Centralised generation is easier to mitigate, and later replace with clean generation.

For #2, I think it might be valid for areas which experience hurricanes or other natural disasters.

Though, couldn't you charge your car with a gas generator in an emergency if you really needed to?

Re: Toyota has stepped up lobbying to preserve its investments in hybrids, hydrogen

#188

Post by Causality1 »

cmrdporcupine wrote: post #142
Causality1 wrote: post #87

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It would be nice if Toyota actually had any interest in plug in hybrids. Their only one, the Prius Prime, is more expensive than its competitors and offers less than half their range. What's the point of getting a PHEV if I still spend half my commute running on gasoline?

Exactly. GM showed with a Volt that a PHEV could be effectively a BEV 90% of the time and perform excellently even when falling back into ICE mode, but the Prime came out after the Volt and its drivetrain is inferior in every way to it. I understand the Prime is roomier and so on, but in terms of drivetrain it's woefully inferior. As a Volt and Mitsu Outlander PHEV owner I obviously have nothing against the PHEV conc…

My ideal vehicle would be a Volt made by Toyota. I have several mechanic friends and all have warned me against buying any GM vehicle, especially one with as complex a drive system as a Volt.

Re: Toyota has stepped up lobbying to preserve its investments in hybrids, hydrogen

#189

Post by nickik »

bildung wrote: post #21

The FUD accusations seem a bit hasty here. The linked Senate hearing doesn't seem to contain negative things about BEVs (it only criticizes the "narrow focus" on them), but instead opts for including hybrid and hydrogen, with the argument being that "recent data shows that plug-in hybrids can achieve nearly the same or better GHG reductions than BEVs depending on your daily driving patterns, the carbon in the electri…

Why are we giving them the benefit of the doubt? Toyota has been consistently and EV. They consistently lie about emissions of their hybrids. Their marketing is always spreading FUD about EVs.

Worst of all Toyota has been the leader against all kinds of environment laws all over the world.

Re: Toyota has stepped up lobbying to preserve its investments in hybrids, hydrogen

#190

Post by WorldMaker »

simonbarker87 wrote: post #148
WhompingWindows wrote: post #44

The Japanese car companies have done pretty poorly in the 2010's in supporting the energy transition. Toyota has been extremely slow to adapt after the Prius, which makes sense because of their ridiculously large volume of sales of basic, gas-efficient passenger vehicles. I give Toyota big props for the Prius, which was the original Green Vehicle 15-20 years ago, and still is a HUGE player in the efficiency space. II…

I know Americans like to hate Nissan but outside the US the Leaf was a pretty reasonable first stab at an electric car, before Tesla and is into its second rev now. It’s by no means the best one but given they were early to the market it’s a little unfair to blame all Japanese car makers.

Carlos Ghosn is an interesting character, and maybe not the best person, but some of the things he said to Nissan's board at the time about EVs were prophetic. He did give Nissan a leg up versus other Japanese brands. It is interesting to wonder if his original plan for Nissan America might have been the best call and Americans would have a very different view of Nissan had it happened. (Nissan America makes entirely different cars from every other division of the company. Ghosn's plan at one point was to rebrand the gas guzzler-focused Nissan America as [back to] Datsun, reintroduce Nissan in America as an EV brand and plan to eventually jettison New Datsun as soon as its profits dropped below a threshold that the board would allow it.)

It's unfair to blame all Japanese car makers, but it is definitely fair to blame all American brands of Japanese car makers (as the weird, highly profitable step-children that they are).

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