331–340 of 460 posts
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Yes, and standard chargers can be installed anywhere you can put a clothes dryer. You only need 120kW charging if you're going to be road-tripping. In the 2+ years I've owned an EV I've never had an issue, including doing 300mi+ in a single day about once a week. Heck, when I bought my current house I didn't need to do anything since the previous owner already had a NEMA 14-50 outlet for their welder.
Yeah it's all so simple until you realize that means every house running a clothes dryer all at the same time between 5pm and whatever time in the evening everyone is done charging. Los Angeles and parts of the Bay Area have had nearly annual brownouts for the last 20 years just from air conditioners during heat waves. How in the world do you expect that aging power grid (in the fifth/sixth largest economy no less...…
With off-peak rates and people having different schedules(I'm home at 4pm for instance) I don't see why everyone would be hammering the grid at 5pm.
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That's interesting. Cheap 15% efficient solar panel produces 0.75 kWh per square meter per day in "average US location" [1], whatever that is. Let's assume average parking space area is 10 square meters (it depends, but it's close [2]) - so that's 7.5 kWh per day. Average energy consumption of electric cars is 11-16 kWh/100 km [3], let's assume 10 kWh/100 km - that's 75 km range for a day of standing in sun. That's a…
Actually, why not just put the solar cells on the car and do away with the batteries Because you might squeeze 200W worth of panels up there at best. On a sunny day you’ll get about 4 extra miles at the end of your workday. And now you can’t drive home with the sunroof open on that sunny day.
Tesla Model 3 gets 310 miles on 75kwh so call it 4 miles per kwh that's 40-50 ish miles per day if you can stay in the sun.
Current records for solar panels well over 40%, so a fully solar powered car may actually be possible even if stupid expensive.
PS: Those solar challange cars are getting impressive. http://solarteameindhoven.itility.nl/ is a 4 seater doing 60+mph though far from street legal.
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> Sure. I'm talking about universal adoption because the article is ("take over the world") Once you reach a critical mass of users, taking over the world will be inevitable, even with some of the inconveniences. Finding a gas station, for example, will get harder for ICE drivers as EV vehicles take off (lots of gas stations will go out of business, so you'll have to drive longer to refill your car), auto shops capab…
I doubt many will go out of business. At least in the U.S. the stations themselves make maybe 2-3 cents a gallon profit, which likely doesn't even begin to cover operating costs. The vast majority of their income is from the convenience store items. All but the most poorly run will pay whatever is needed to install electric chargers and stay in the game.
For instance at the moment in the UK many supermarkets are putting mini stores in petrol stations.
However with electric charging taking longer, I can imagine that McDonalds might start buying up petrol stations.
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Yes, and standard chargers can be installed anywhere you can put a clothes dryer. You only need 120kW charging if you're going to be road-tripping. In the 2+ years I've owned an EV I've never had an issue, including doing 300mi+ in a single day about once a week. Heck, when I bought my current house I didn't need to do anything since the previous owner already had a NEMA 14-50 outlet for their welder.
> Heck, when I bought my current house I didn't need to do anything since the previous owner already had a NEMA 14-50 outlet for their welder. Let me guess you're countryside? Friend of mine has a relatively new house in Munich, biggest thing he has is a 3x16A CEE outlet.
I'd happily use public transportation instead if I could but the closest one to me(12 miles away) was the one that derailed yesterday.
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You know, it is funny that I have heard so many strange hypothetical against the future of electric cars that are contradicted by the current implementation of them. Its really strange.
Many Americans are really attached to the vision of hopping in their personal vehicle with no additional transaction friction and going on long road trips. EV charging infrastructure isn’t yet well suited to medium to long road trips, so some people discard the whole idea because they’re upset by suggesting a different distribution of friction in their lives. Whether the actual friction is big enough to matter is har…
How about: We need to shift from individual car ownership to more public transport? Sure it will be great if cars turn electric, but that does not solve issues like crowded streets etc. This would be partly addressed if cars were self driving and shared, i.e. would spend less time standing around unused. Nevertheless, I assume (=don't have data) that public transport would be much more efficient than electric cars in…
It's clear that buses are vastly more efficient in terms of moving large numbers of people around, and so ride sharing alone (even automated) will just continue to tie up traffic. At a point, uber and lyft will have to introduce buses in order to keep their single-use services attractive. But, as long as there is private ownership, we won't have wide adoption of public transportation. Everywhere in the world I have t…
Isn't this how e.g. state owned rail companies work already?
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> Sure. I'm talking about universal adoption because the article is ("take over the world") Once you reach a critical mass of users, taking over the world will be inevitable, even with some of the inconveniences. Finding a gas station, for example, will get harder for ICE drivers as EV vehicles take off (lots of gas stations will go out of business, so you'll have to drive longer to refill your car), auto shops capab…
> Once you reach a critical mass of users, taking over the world will be inevitable, even with some of the inconveniences. Finding a gas station, for example, will get harder for ICE drivers as EV vehicles take off (lots of gas stations will go out of business, so you'll have to drive longer to refill your car), auto shops capable of dealing with ICE will become more scarce and expensive, etc It feels like you are ma…
You think I’m letting that pass without pointing out that the fuel tanks are a sunk cost? Gas stations are really convenience stores, they don’t make money on fuel. The only difference will be that we pull up in an EV to get our Big Gulp. Gas or no, that real estate will still be used to sell you chips and lottery tickets.
In the Seattle area, I know of at least three shops that specialize in VW vans, a vehicle last sold in the U. S. over 25 years ago. Three, for a vehicle that wasn’t that popular in the U. S. when you could buy them new. Yeah, yeah, hippy-wannabes and nostalgia, but the fact remains that more than one shop stays in business working on ICE vehicles that are old enough to have been doing keg stands for four years.
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We've already forced people to cut down on their lifestyle choices in multiple markets in order to help them stop killing themselves and others. Smoking. Drunk driving. Trans fats. Seat belt laws. Driving was the 12th leading cause of death, and 7th in terms of number of years of life lost, in 2011. This is a major health concern in the US. Is it worth it to kill 36,000 people a year so that they can have the "freedo…
> Driving was the 12th leading cause of death, and 7th in terms of number of years of life lost, in 2011 Including buses, right? Or do they never crash? > Is it worth it to kill 36,000 people a year so that they can have the "freedom" of a particular "lifestyle"? Yes, because it comes with great utility as well. You could ask the same questions about smoking (in private), drinking alcohol, lack of exercise, flying in…
Oh, I forgot about all those buses constantly crashing. They account for 0.6% of all traffic accidents.
> Yes, because it comes with great utility as well.
A small portion of drivers need their vehicles for a utilitarian purpose. The vast majority use them simply as personal transportation. It's similar to guns. A very small amount of them are used for a utilitarian purpose, and the rest are owned for fun, yet they kill 33,000 every year. If ownership were limited only for utilitarian purpose, these numbers would go way, way down.
> You could ask the same questions about smoking (in private), drinking alcohol, lack of exercise, flying in airplanes etc. - are you going to forbid all of these?
Flying in airplanes? There is no significant health risk from airplanes. The rest are perfectly fine to do in private. The reasons why cars might be eliminated has nothing to do with private use - it has to do with its impact on the public.
> If you take away a market, you'll hamper progress.
An existing market does not necessarily result in progress. We (the US) had the largest auto market in the world for almost the entire history of automobiles, now second to China. We had not only the technology, but actual electric cars, 130 years ago.
Rough timeline:
The first crude electric car was introduced 185 years ago, around 1832. The first successful American electric car was introduced in 1891, with multiple makes and models produced in 1893.
By 1900, one third of all cars produced in the US were electric.
In 1908, the Model T gas-powered car was introduced, and in 1912, the electric starter. The practicality of this method ends the commercial viability of electric cars by 1920.
In 1966, Congress introduced a bill recommending electric cars to reduce air pollution. In the 70s, an oil crisis sparks massive consumer interest in electric vehicles.
In 1997, 30 years later, Toyota introduced the Prius, a hybrid. Within three years Honda, GM, Ford, Nissan, Chevy, and Toyota all produce ALL-electric vehicles.
Here we are, 20 years later, with a lot of hybrids, and one or two all-electric vehicles, pretty much all of which are too expensive or impractical for widespread adoption.
We have invented electric cars twice. Both times the market did not choose progress.
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The general prediction is for the total-cost-of-ownership to be lower in the next few years, and for the upfront price to be lower a few years after that. Governments and corporations are making plans based on those assumptions. I've not heard anyone credibly argue against it, though there may be quibbles about the exact timing. (And of course, there's geographical variation based on gas prices, government policy, av…
Yes i agree, it's all timing. My comment is in response to the current state of the EV market. > The general prediction is for the total-cost-of-ownership to be lower in the next few years, and for the upfront price to be lower a few years after that. I think upfront price is more important than most people think. The problem with the "total cost of ownership" argument is it ignores the fact that money now is worth f…