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Global sales of combustion engine cars have peaked

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Re: Global sales of combustion engine cars have peaked

#311

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The Hyundai Ioniq 6 has a range of over 500 km, and typical 20-80% charging times are around 20 minutes. Where in Europe can you drive 350 km and not pass a single charger?

Where did I say there are no chargers? Charging on long trips increases the time of the journey by a lot. And many EU drivers don't have money for a new Ioniq 6.

This you?

Maybe the wealthy Benelux and Scandinavia have top EV charring infrastructure but a lot of central, eastern and southern Europe is lacking

Re: Global sales of combustion engine cars have peaked

#312
post #61

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I wish they were half as heavy with 1/4 the range. Lightest ones are still like 10kg+?

Yes, but 10-15 kg is still comparable to a regular bike or a heavy bag of groceries. I rode a 19 kg one (50 km range, street legal), carrying it up to the third floor at work wasn't a problem.

True if it's just point to point commuting to a place with safe storage. But then I can't take it by strapping it on my backpack and going to shops, etc where a bike would get stolen.

Re: Global sales of combustion engine cars have peaked

#313

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I can't tell whether you're trying to make an argument with this comment or what's the reason for pointing that out.

The point is peak oil as a concept has existed for a long time, and we have extended way past its deadline before. It relies on not having technological advancement for accessing more oil.

Not exactly: it relies on future sources of oil (unconventional oil) having lower EROI (Energy return on investment) than historical oil reserves (conventional oil). Technological advancements could conceivably increase the EROI of some unconventional sources, but they mainly seem to make new lower EROI sources available.

Re: Global sales of combustion engine cars have peaked

#314
post #295

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In the long run, society goes to 100% electric transportation due to global warming. Any analysis that treats this as a simple matter of consumer choice is going to miss the biggest driver of adoption. Maybe some alternate carbon-neutral fuel for combustion is possible, but all the ones we’ve tried so far have lost out to electric.

>In the long run, society goes to 100% electric transportation due to global warming. This is Western-centrism. In the long run 4 billion people do not go electric because poverty problem solving more important for them, then the global warming problem solving, and another 4 billion people do not consider global warming as a problem at all, the wormer - the better. And under this conditions what the remaining 2 billi…

In the long run, we go to 100% renewable electric everything, or civilization collapses and almost everyone dies. Of course, the latter case is probably the more likely one.

Re: Global sales of combustion engine cars have peaked

#315

"ice car engines peaked?" likely wrong there is no charging infrastructur, and no way to retrofit into housing on a mass scale that will deal with the threat of a whole apartment building parking garage going up in flames, resulting in mass casualties. So until there are non flamable solid state batteries at the right price point, electrificationof the transport grid will stall, while demand for mobility will continu…

> a whole apartment building parking garage going up in flames, resulting in mass casualties

Good thing ICE vehicles don't use any explosive components. Any evidence of these "mass casualty" events?

Re: Global sales of combustion engine cars have peaked

#316

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Right, but it's not apples to apples. And what about all those people driving ICE sedans?

What about them? 10 years ago the best-selling vehicle in the US was a sedan. Today it's a pickup truck. Nobody said boo about road damage. It's a made-up reason to hate on EVs.

Well if you scroll up to my original point re: gas tax paying for roads, it's not really the same thing.

Because trucks also used more gas. EVs don't.

Re: Global sales of combustion engine cars have peaked

#317

Earlier quoted context omitted.

those gasoline taxes currently pay for roads. and EVs put more strain on roads due to their increased weight.

EVs have heavier batteries and ICEs have heavier engines and drivetrains. Go compare two similar models at most brands and the curb weight will be within 50-100kg. Add in a full tank of gas to the ICE and the will likely weigh about the same.

I guess it's increased/comparable weight + lack of gas tax. There's definitely something thrown off by EVs and the suggestion to tax charging EVs specifically makes sense.

Re: Global sales of combustion engine cars have peaked

#318

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Many of those plugins will almost never use their combustion engine. Particularly in western Europe where most of these are selling, the average person doesn’t drive far enough per day to exhaust the battery. So it’s not just feel-good, it’s a real impact. That said, I don’t think that’s what this report is doing?

This contradicts your assertion: https://www.transportenvironment.org/articles/plug-hybrids-n...

Somewhat. They're still significantly more efficient than ICE vehicles. Regenerative braking adds 10-25% efficiency on it's own.

The study behind your article has this to say on the issue:

> The share of kilometers that PHEVs electrify results in a total of 15%–55% less tailpipe CO2 emissions compared to conventional cars. This is much lower than expected from type-approval values.

So certainly worse than indicated, but still better than alternatives.

https://theicct.org/publication/real-world-usage-of-plug-in-...

Re: Global sales of combustion engine cars have peaked

#319

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That chart used is very low information dense, reducing cars to "electric" and "non-electric", but that's an oversimplification. There's hybrids and plug-in hybrids like you said, hydrogen, pressured air (ok that one never took off), and of course different types of fuel like petrol, diesel and LPG.

I looked into building a compressed air remote controlled boat for fun, to use on a nearby lake where I was worried about putting batteries on something that might sink. It is monstrously inefficient. A scuba tank might power a vehicle for a half hour tops, though I forget the exact numbers. Scuba tanks are huge and heavy for small hobby vehicles. I'd love to pick it back up are there other options here?

>I'd love to pick it back up are there other options here?

Higher compression. Scuba is older tech and standardized around relatively low pressures. CNG runs above 3000psi. Paintball guns run air at 4-5000. Carbon fiber tanks are readily available for both as are compressors.

Re: Global sales of combustion engine cars have peaked

#320
post #302

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As the sibling comment says: Ability to resell EVs is a problem. But that's mostly because you can get a new car today (i.e. deliverable and everything) for the same price as an older EV and likely the new car is even better (larger battery, faster charging). That's unfortunate for first adopters and is a significant problem for adaption in lower-income circles (those typically buying second hand), but not a reason f…

> That's unfortunate for first adopters and is a significant problem for adaption in lower-income circles (those typically buying second hand), but not a reason for going back to gasoline cars. I'm not advocating (here at least) for a move back to combustion vehicles, I'm just noting what I have seen. I would say that unless there is a serious used EV market and that the poorer people are able to afford an EV, there…

> I would say that unless there is a serious used EV market and that the poorer people are able to afford an EV, there will forever be a resistance.

Agreed. And I didn't mean to imply, that there isn't a problem for "everyone gets electric". But that will fix itself with (probably) this year's new cars. So in 2-3 years there will be a fledgling 2nd hand market and in 10 it will be of similar volume as it is now (probably still a bit pricier, since there will be a non-car use for used car batteries)

> EVs are definitely not cheaper to construct, maintain or recycle end-of-life.

There I disagree. The EV price is (still) (mostly) the battery, which is _still_ coming down rapidly. I thought maintenance costs were already cheaper, but maybe not. And end-of-life is mostly a scale question, which will be fixed. Especially since we can reuse the batteries.

The same goes for energy cost and CO2 emissions. I think the EV construction numbers largely assume current (or even worst case) energy mixes, but yeah most of these comparison make at least one questionable assumption (like choosing low efficiency gas cars) and are therefore complicated. Still it's quite a fundamental property: EVs are more efficient and large combustion systems are more efficient. At least CO2-wise it will _always_ be more efficient to burn fuel in a large power plant and run an EV. And the electricity mix is significantly better than that^. Price-wise it's a more complicated story, but at least for Germany, we need to import the fuel anyways. So producing locally should work out better (both personally, where using your own solar is basically a tax break and system wide, where EVs provide a reasonably flexible dispatchable load, which has value)

I think the big question is the time scale here, but fundamentally: The biggest market in the world decided to go EV, that makes the position of any non-EV producer complicated to say the least. Everything downstream (second hand market, recycling, ...) hasn't had time to even develop yet.

^ Assuming we are not tearing down anything already installed..

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