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Hertz orders 100k Teslas

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Re: Hertz orders 100k Teslas

#461
post #441
post #434

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is interesting. You're claiming that the FSD money they collect isn't recognized yet? Can I ask you what leads to you thinking that? I'm sure it's in one of their financial disclosures, but you may be able to narrow it down for me.

There were statements made when they recognized parts of the FSD money.

I'm sure they were. I don't disbelieve you. I just don't quite get what to search for (or where) to find out how that policy works and what percentage of income they've already recognized.

Re: Hertz orders 100k Teslas

#462

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Zooming out to a global level, geopolitics becomes important to consider as well. As soon as renewables are able to change the power dynamics between eg Russia and Ukraine (Ukraine is dependant on Russia for oil for heating in the winter) things get very interesting indeed. We are still decades away from that imo.

Oh yes! We won't care about the middle east, so none of that bizarre cowtowing to the Saudi king that the US Presidents always do (I think largely to get on the post-term massive slush money that flows from the Saudis to former presidents, which I have no direct knowledge up, but seems obvious) The Navy will lose a huge reason for its existence: securing the seas for supertankers. There are so many countries we won't…

The incredible thing is a calcified Russian system with access to way too many nukes collapsed within our lifetimes and the West adequately prevented nuclear disaster. We ended up with the current farce of a government as a byproduct, unfortunately.

Re: Hertz orders 100k Teslas

#463
post #337

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We are so dependent on fossil fuels that I'm slightly more sceptical. Over 90% of global energy is created with fossil fuels. We often get fooled about the electricity sector which is something like 1/3 renewables. But electricity is only 30% of fossil fuel consumption. Even if the share of electricity increases to 40% because of ev's and we produce 80% with renewables, we still have ~70% that requires fossil fuel pr…

Zooming out to a global level, geopolitics becomes important to consider as well. As soon as renewables are able to change the power dynamics between eg Russia and Ukraine (Ukraine is dependant on Russia for oil for heating in the winter) things get very interesting indeed. We are still decades away from that imo.

Surely Ukraine just needs to allow EDF to build few nuclear power stations on long term agreements to end their dependence on Russian heating oil?

Re: Hertz orders 100k Teslas

#464

Earlier quoted context omitted.

- People realize what a game changer it is to charge your car overnight and start every day with a full tank of "gas". It's a tiny detail, but a car that can only go 100 miles before needing to refill the gas tank is annoying. A car that starts every day with a 100 miles of range is terribly (for the oil companies) convenient.

That one is complicated a bit by housing situation - but if, if , cities and freeholders get serious about ensuring every possible parking spot (including unmarked ones) has a convenient electrical outlet nearby, that would be a game changer. In a sense, this would be much cheaper and more convenient than supercharger stations - but what it trades in infrastructure saving, it costs in getting myriad of land owners an…

I don't worry about a lot of the NIMBY with self-charging. It'll be like bike lanes, once people discover they increase property values, or at least keep them from sinking, it will be a done deal.

Re: Hertz orders 100k Teslas

#465

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I might be a bit crazy, but you just mentioned a slate of companies that absolutely have no future at their current scale. Sure this won't happen overnight... But my theory with petroleum is that it has so many HUGE economies of scale built into its production that a demand collapse will send it into a rapid tailspin. A small version of this happened in the Dakotas when the Saudis started dumping oil to get it under…

I think that’s definitely true for some of these, and I wouldn’t be as surprised by TSLA having a higher market cap then all of these companies. It’s the combined bit that’s weird. I think ExxonMobil would position itself more as an “energy company” than an “oil company” for instance, and I doubt it will just roll over and die.

I'd agree, but what's the oil company play for relevance? I believe algal biofuels are a failure. Even plastics are under assault, so they can't retreat to materials. Nukes are too far from their backyard. All their carbon capture is pump-into-the-ground and pray/lie to the regulators.

Honestly though, I think this is what they have going for themselves:

- a large amount of smart, if unprincipled, engineers.

- a huge apparatus for government lobbying

- maybe a lot of capital, or at least some window to invest in switchover?

- generator knowhow (turbines, etc)

- global logistics systems

The government lobbying is the key. If there is one industry that could get LFTR/NextGenNuclear off the ground it would be the oil/gas people. The legacy nuclear industry has no ability or desire to produce a nuclear power gen solution that is competitive not only with current day alt energy, but the alt energy that will be in ten years.

I'm the guy that tells every pro-nuclear post on HN that its infeasible to chase whatever gee-whiz design is being discussed because of the ten year lead time and that storage/wind/solar are still on nonlinear cost improvement curves.

But the oil/gas industry DOES have the political juice to chase that at the multiple levels of federal/state/local/military/civilian that it would require to get a cost-effective small-scale nuclear reactor solution like a LFTR/MSR.

But that really is a pipe dream. That would require foresight from the executives, and executives in fading industries almost always just ride the companies into irrelevance, and most importantly for the executives, retirement/pension, and of course huge out-the-door "retention bonuses" in the dying days.

Re: Hertz orders 100k Teslas

#466

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I might be a bit crazy, but you just mentioned a slate of companies that absolutely have no future at their current scale. Sure this won't happen overnight... But my theory with petroleum is that it has so many HUGE economies of scale built into its production that a demand collapse will send it into a rapid tailspin. A small version of this happened in the Dakotas when the Saudis started dumping oil to get it under…

I think that’s definitely true for some of these, and I wouldn’t be as surprised by TSLA having a higher market cap then all of these companies. It’s the combined bit that’s weird. I think ExxonMobil would position itself more as an “energy company” than an “oil company” for instance, and I doubt it will just roll over and die.

Exactly what Total did: they rebranded themselves few months ago as TotalEnergies...

Re: Hertz orders 100k Teslas

#467
post #461
post #441

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There were statements made when they recognized parts of the FSD money.

I'm sure they were. I don't disbelieve you. I just don't quite get what to search for (or where) to find out how that policy works and what percentage of income they've already recognized.

Here is one link I found: https://www.tesmanian.com/blogs/tesmanian-blog/tesla-autopil...

Re: Hertz orders 100k Teslas

#468

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think that’s definitely true for some of these, and I wouldn’t be as surprised by TSLA having a higher market cap then all of these companies. It’s the combined bit that’s weird. I think ExxonMobil would position itself more as an “energy company” than an “oil company” for instance, and I doubt it will just roll over and die.

I'd agree, but what's the oil company play for relevance? I believe algal biofuels are a failure. Even plastics are under assault, so they can't retreat to materials. Nukes are too far from their backyard. All their carbon capture is pump-into-the-ground and pray/lie to the regulators. Honestly though, I think this is what they have going for themselves: - a large amount of smart, if unprincipled, engineers. - a huge…

Turbines, nuclear, fusion, renewables is the play for relevance. That and squeeze every last drop out of the last century of fossil fuels. Many won't survive, but some of them will pivot in time/have enough burn to pivot later than they should have.

Re: Hertz orders 100k Teslas

#469
post #454

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What part of their market cap is unrealized tech dreams and what part is substance, in the traditional value investor sense, in your opinion?

Tesla price to revenue is 20x - a pretty normal for a tech company.

Tech companies generally sell software or ad space with near-zero marginal costs. Tesla does not.

Re: Hertz orders 100k Teslas

#470
post #168

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is correct. You coast by feathering the accelerator.

This seems insane to me. "Do nothing and the car coasts" versus "balance this pin and the car coasts" is such a massive dichotomy shift that it seems like poor design. It's a car, not a helicopter.

You're massively overestimating the level of effort needed to hold the accelerator steady. The software seems to understand your intent and will help keep the speed relatively steady. Its not like making a millimeter adjustment of the pedal adjusts your speed by 20mph. It took me only a few minutes to get used to it. I'm able to keep a far more even average speed in my electric car than I am my ICE car, as now when I start getting off the gas it actually starts to slow down instead of coasting meaning I'm exerting more control in one motion instead of having to make two motions to achieve the same effect. I'm also usually smoother at slowing down in an electric with heavy regen. I never have to switch between accelerator, not pressing any pedals, to braking. Its just smoothly getting on the accelerator, holding it when I'm at the speed I want, and then slowly getting off the accelerator when I'm wanting to slow or stop. Then once the car stops I take my foot off the pedal and the car holds itself in place.

You're still thinking of pressing the accelerator as "open the throttle on the carburetor this much". On modern cars these days, pressing the accelerator is really more like "I'd like to go this fast", especially in electric cars. Its a vastly different experience.

I don't think I've actually touched my brake pedal in the last 2,000mi in my electric car, and I drive almost exclusively city driving on it.

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