EVs

[AutobahnSHO]

EVs are too heavy for guardrails.

But this doesn't make sense to me, I've seen guardrails stop semi trucks and they're 10-20x heavier?

https://finance.yahoo.com/news/preliminary-test-crashes-indicate-nations-150021349.html

[CaminoRacer]

Yeah if it's a problem for EVs then any heavy duty work truck or larger is also in trouble. Surprising they would only design stuff for 5,000 lbs

[r0tor]

EVs are too heavy for guardrails.

But this doesn't make sense to me, I've seen guardrails stop semi trucks and they're 10-20x heavier?

https://finance.yahoo.com/news/preliminary-test-crashes-indicate-nations-150021349.html

The seemingly leading cause of traffic deaths around here is either vehicles crossing unguarded medians or blowing through median guardrails and going into oncoming traffic.

Thankfully on the highway I take to work they are installing concrete barriers and removing the guardrails.  I've also seen a cable system installed which seems pretty capable

[AutobahnSHO]

The seemingly leading cause of traffic deaths around here is either vehicles crossing unguarded medians or blowing through median guardrails and going into oncoming traffic.

Thankfully on the highway I take to work they are installing concrete barriers and removing the guardrails.  I've also seen a cable system installed which seems pretty capable

Yeah I've seen the cables stop fully loaded semi trucks

[Morris Minor]

We have those low-tension cable arrestors in GA, and they work well. They do not have them in TN, where the 23-year-old son of my wife's cousin was killed by someone crossing an open grass median on an interstate. Untold grief & pain.

[ChrisV]

Why is everyone trying to convince each other one way or the other?  Just let the market decide

Because the market gave us sweatshops, unsafe working conditions and pollution like crazy. Consumers are short sighted and big business simply wants to make money for shareholders and will cut corners at every chance. The market gives us many things to kill ourselves and others with, as it has no conscience. So we regulate and nudge it. Funny how you love the 'market" when it gives you cheap gas because demand drops, but you complain that no one is doing anything about the gas prices when they are high due to rising demand off the back of the pandemic's drop in oil production. Supply and demand. It's the market, stupid.

I'll never understand these EV evangelicals.  The Bolt and Lightning forums are filled with non-sense like "how do we convince these morons that EVs are better?!"  It's the most idiotic tribalism you can imagine.

Because when they were first introduced, oil lobbyists, and people like Rush Limbaugh made all the worst statements about them and their owners you can imagine. Most of that side of the aisle constantly spews misinformation and BS. It's not hard to decide that the anti-EV people are simply morons.

The "market" has made us fight wars over oil. We went into Iraq twice because Iraq threatened the flow of oil (that was the real reason). What was the cost of those operations and the subsequent occupation? We are 'close' friends with Saudi Arabia a nation with which we share no common values, because of oil. We protect and police the middle east and its waterways to ensure the flow of oil. We involve ourselves across the planet in the affairs of other nations, and protect global trade lanes, so that the oil may flow. And out soldiers have dies over it. Then add in the oil spills, the disasters (BP Horizon, Exxon Valdez, etc). While we frack massive amounts of oil now, what is the long-term impact to the environment and water tables? I am fine with that when there was no alternative, but we now have an alternative. Refining oil uses almost as much electricity as EVs in total. It's cleaner and more efficient just to use it in an EV.

The true costs of ICE are massive, and include blood and lives, not just carbon and pollution. By comparison, the materials in batteries are recyclable, batteries can be used in 1st and 2nd applications giving them operational life of a decade or more even now, and then they can be recycled. We can get our power from domestic sources, and from the sky. Yes some existing mines are in terrible places, but we can try cleaning them up, and ensuring new mining is done better. We can almost start anew with the supply chains for BEVs and do it better. the worst of the materials, Cobalt, is not even being used in the newest battery chemistries (anything with LFP batteries uses none). Yet it's used extensively in the refining of gasoline and diesel to get the sulfur out. Anti-EV people claim they don't want EVs because they "care about child slave labor in the Congo," then go right on using gasoline and cell phones, wearing blue jeans, and using cobalt coated drills and saw blades.

Oil is the blood of economies...but if we have the ability to seriously cut our need for it, and possibly eliminate military operations and disasters - do it. Petroleum will always be valuable for plastics, fertilizer and others things, but if we can dramatically cut our needs for it by removing most transportation on the demand side (most, not all) perhaps we can stop having to police the world. What I love most about EVs is the potential for energy independence in conjunction with renewables/fission/fusion/etc.

[ChrisV]

Nobody is buying an EV that isn't Telsa. Beyond the sales collapse, no automaker is making money on these EVs, even if WtP were to buy them.

Sales of Teslas are slightly off, but other sales are growing. Records were set last year in the US, with ~50% increase year after year and climbing. With new models coming available and prices dripping, that trend is slated to increase.

https://www.coxautoinc.com/market-insights/q3-2023-ev-sales/

https://www.coxautoinc.com/market-insights/q4-2023-ev-sales/

[ChrisV]

He can't comprehend that BEVs are not the answer inside a city where you can't charge the damn things and they will discharge themselves eventually with limited use...

Not quite true on either count. Europe is putting in a LOT of street side chargers in urban areas:



 

And it takes a long time for a modern EV battery to discharge by itself without use. Hell, even in non thermally managed applications like my Makita power tools, they can sit unused for months and still be ready for use.

[r0tor]

Not quite true on either count. Europe is putting in a LOT of street side chargers in urban areas:



 

And it takes a long time for a modern EV battery to discharge by itself without use. Hell, even in non thermally managed applications like my Makita power tools, they can sit unused for months and still be ready for use.

A) not in Italy, not widespread, and then best you will do is low level charge rates.

B). Your Makita power tool doesn't actively keep the battery pack up to temperature

[Morris Minor]

The anti-EV FUD is unprecedented in its scale. Established interests have brought the big guns to bear: legacy auto, unions, oil companies, dealers. If you own a Jiffy Lube franchise, you are not happy seeing Teslas & Kia EVs tooling around.

[MrH]

Because the market gave us sweatshops, unsafe working conditions and pollution like crazy. Consumers are short sighted and big business simply wants to make money for shareholders and will cut corners at every chance. The market gives us many things to kill ourselves and others with, as it has no conscience. So we regulate and nudge it. Funny how you love the 'market" when it gives you cheap gas because demand drops, but you complain that no one is doing anything about the gas prices when they are high due to rising demand off the back of the pandemic's drop in oil production. Supply and demand. It's the market, stupid.

Because when they were first introduced, oil lobbyists, and people like Rush Limbaugh made all the worst statements about them and their owners you can imagine. Most of that side of the aisle constantly spews misinformation and BS. It's not hard to decide that the anti-EV people are simply morons.

The "market" has made us fight wars over oil. We went into Iraq twice because Iraq threatened the flow of oil (that was the real reason). What was the cost of those operations and the subsequent occupation? We are 'close' friends with Saudi Arabia a nation with which we share no common values, because of oil. We protect and police the middle east and its waterways to ensure the flow of oil. We involve ourselves across the planet in the affairs of other nations, and protect global trade lanes, so that the oil may flow. And out soldiers have dies over it. Then add in the oil spills, the disasters (BP Horizon, Exxon Valdez, etc). While we frack massive amounts of oil now, what is the long-term impact to the environment and water tables? I am fine with that when there was no alternative, but we now have an alternative. Refining oil uses almost as much electricity as EVs in total. It's cleaner and more efficient just to use it in an EV.

The true costs of ICE are massive, and include blood and lives, not just carbon and pollution. By comparison, the materials in batteries are recyclable, batteries can be used in 1st and 2nd applications giving them operational life of a decade or more even now, and then they can be recycled. We can get our power from domestic sources, and from the sky. Yes some existing mines are in terrible places, but we can try cleaning them up, and ensuring new mining is done better. We can almost start anew with the supply chains for BEVs and do it better. the worst of the materials, Cobalt, is not even being used in the newest battery chemistries (anything with LFP batteries uses none). Yet it's used extensively in the refining of gasoline and diesel to get the sulfur out. Anti-EV people claim they don't want EVs because they "care about child slave labor in the Congo," then go right on using gasoline and cell phones, wearing blue jeans, and using cobalt coated drills and saw blades.

Oil is the blood of economies...but if we have the ability to seriously cut our need for it, and possibly eliminate military operations and disasters - do it. Petroleum will always be valuable for plastics, fertilizer and others things, but if we can dramatically cut our needs for it by removing most transportation on the demand side (most, not all) perhaps we can stop having to police the world. What I love most about EVs is the potential for energy independence in conjunction with renewables/fission/fusion/etc.

What a truly unhinged post. 

[veeman]

I love my Kia EV6 but I think it's ludicrous the mandates some of the U.S. states (notably California) and several countries (notably several Western European countries) have made requiring 100% all new personal cars to be EV. For example I believe in California their current mandate requires that by 2035. So as they hopelessly fail, and will have to walk back these mandates, I personally think they are deserving (the people who back these mandates) of getting mercilessly mocked for being naive, stupid, and incompetent.

I personally take great pleasure of mocking, by text, my two brother in laws for betting me that 50% of all new personal cars purchased in the U.S. by 2030 will be EV. Every few weeks, by text, I mock them as it dawns on them they will lose the bet because, while EV sales are rising and have increased market share, the rate of rise is significantly less than what they believed would be the case by now and what the future predicts. They believed very erroneously that the national public charging grid would be a lot more robust by now than what it currently is, that GM and Ford would have a lot more EV sales by now, and that short range trucking would be making a swift transition to EV by now. A few months ago I texted them that I am altering the bet from 50% to 33% because I want it to be at least a challenge and I enjoy mocking them and I find it difficult to mock people who are losing so badly. The bet, by the way, is for a $100 cheese and fruit platter.

I agree there are widespread benefits of transitioning from ICE to EV for global climate change, a cleaner environment, and greater independence from oil. My close friend who does some financial investment in Chinese companies says that China has recognized this a long time ago and hence their state mandated transitioning from ICE to EV. China has no oil and has to import it. 

When my brother in laws made the bet with me around 5 years ago they both worked and lived mostly in suburbia. I worked in NYC. I told them, as I walked from the parking garage to my work and looked up at the rows of tall apartment buildings surrounding me, there is 0% chance 50% of these people living in high rises in NYC will be able to have an EV by 2030. Zero percent chance. There's little existing infrastructure to support it, little national will, and most importantly little money available to support the massive spending required to implement it. What works in Norway and Iceland does not by extension work over here. You need a lot of available money, low population density, and a national will to implement these changes in the rapid time frames the people making these mandates, in places like California, have done. And I enjoy mocking them for their naivety, stupidity, and incompetence.   

[giant_mtb]

I would surmise that the unrealistic regulations/goals that certain governments are trying to make and eventually attempt to enforce is why people (including myself and 95% of people I know where I live) think it's total nonsense.  As somebody said earlier in this thread, "let the market decide." Those that wanna have EVs...go for it, the market has you covered. But fuck the government trying to force it on everybody, especially when it's not viable for many for so many reasons.

Which sucks, because in 20-30 years I'll have to be driving an F450 commercial truck because it'll be exempt from some bullshit EV mandate for passenger vehicles.

[AutobahnSHO]

Which sucks, because in 20-30 years I'll have to be driving an F450 commercial truck because it'll be exempt from some bullshit EV mandate for passenger vehicles.

This is unfortunately so very very possible....

[Morris Minor]

I have nothing new or interesting to say on this, other than, I simply don't know. One certainty is that we are terrible at making predictions. 
I hope the 'SPIN is still around in 2035 so we can look back & see what held true and what didn't. 

[r0tor]

So it appears in one corner you have Tesla lowering prices to squeeze the competition... And then the other corner Porsche who goes "yea, f that" and increases prices by $10k

https://www.caranddriver.com/news/a46660270/2025-porsche-taycan-price/

[Laconian]

Electric charging + Buc-ee's. Perfect match. People have time to kill and the store gives them a good place to do it. WAY too much concrete but it's crazy that this concept hasn't caught on in EV-dense regions.

[SJ_GTI]

Electric charging + Buc-ee's. Perfect match. People have time to kill and the store gives them a good place to do it. WAY too much concrete but it's crazy that this concept hasn't caught on in EV-dense regions.

I am surprised Wawa hasn't done this in the PA/NJ/MD region yet. I assumed this is something they would have jumped on years ago. For a long time they were just a convenience store/deli type chain, but they got into the Gas business because they saw the people could fill up their car and get their coffee/lunch/stuff while they were there. Their gas is almost always the cheapest (supposedly) because their profit is in the stores, the gas is just there it increase foot traffic. Getting into EV charging seemed like the natural next step, but at least where I live (South Jersey) they still haven't done it.

[Morris Minor]

Electric charging + Buc-ee's. Perfect match. People have time to kill and the store gives them a good place to do it. WAY too much concrete but it's crazy that this concept hasn't caught on in EV-dense regions.

This place is crying out for mega square footage of photovoltaic panels on the canopies & roof.
Agreed,this is the sort of venue that public chargers will thrive in. Much better than broken EVGos in distant & scary corners of mall parking lots.

(We were at that Buc-ee's two Christmases ago, on the recommendation of our friends ("Oh ya gotta go to a Buc-ee's it's an institution here") and it was an absolute nightmare: jam packed, no free gas pumps, ridiculous lines for the bathrooms.)

[r0tor]

There had to be one hell of a nearby electrical infrastructure to support that

[giant_mtb]

There had to be one hell of a nearby electrical infrastructure to support that

When they installed those Tesla units, they also happened to quietly install a row of industrial diesel-powered generators on the opposite side of the building/parking lot out of sight...

[r0tor]

When they installed those Tesla units, they also happened to quietly install a row of industrial diesel-powered generators on the opposite side of the building/parking lot out of sight...

... wouldn't be the first and with a shit ton of underground fuel storage tanks....

[giant_mtb]

... wouldn't be the first and with a shit ton of underground fuel storage tanks....

Exactly!

[r0tor]

Exactly!

More I think about this ...

300KW charges x 48 chargers is 15MW... That is a small town worth of capacity

[AutobahnSHO]

More I think about this ...

300KW charges x 48 chargers is 15MW... That is a small town worth of capacity

That's bonkers. Army used 5k, 10k, and 15k generators. Last one could run a LOT of computers, screens, etc.... in a command tent.

[r0tor]

That's bonkers. Army used 5k, 10k, and 15k generators. Last one could run a LOT of computers, screens, etc.... in a command tent.

Were the 10 and 15 MW small has turbines? The biggest diesel I've seen was 5MW and that was a 16 cylinder monster

[AutobahnSHO]

Were the 10 and 15 MW small has turbines? The biggest diesel I've seen was 5MW and that was a 16 cylinder monster

Kilowatts.

[CaminoRacer]

The Amazon warehouse near my old place has around 150 chargers for their Rivian vans. But I assume they're Level 2, maybe 11kw each.

[Morris Minor]

Picking up on the points @veeman makes above, here's a gentle and considered rant by my favorite automotive YouTuber. It's in the context of the UK & EU, but the unintended outcomes caused by their ill-considered legislation are something else: mega-powerful massively inefficient SUVs with two-year shelf lives are not going to save the planet. Also his point about not being able to tell whether or not a used BEV's battery has been fucked by a lifetime of 100% DC rapid charging.

Worth a watch IMO, distills a lot a lot of the stuff we discuss on this board.

[afty]

Got to sit in an EV9 recently and it's a very nice car.  I would strongly consider one to replace our Sorento.  The third-row is pretty usable which would be nice for us as our kids enter their teen years.