Californians Have Now Purchased Half a Million EVs (arstechnica.com) 335
According Veloz -- an electric car industry group -- electric vehicle sales in California hit a cumulative 512,717 since 2010. "Months of strong U.S. sales in 2018, preceded by a strong 2017, are starting to show a trend: electric vehicles are selling well, especially in places where there are strong monetary and non-monetary incentives to buy them," reports Ars Technica. From the report: "Overall, this year has seen exponential growth in electric car sales," Veloz wrote. "Electric cars accounted for 7.1 percent of California car sales in the first three quarters of the year, with fully electric, zero-emission car sales outpacing plug-in hybrid sales 4.1 percent to 3 percent respectively." Veloz's data tallies not just fully battery-electric vehicles but also plug-in hybrids as well as the much rarer fuel cell vehicles. The group gets its data (PDF) from the blogs InsideEVs and HybridCars.com as well as a market-research firm called Baum & Associates and estimates from the California Air Resources Board (CARB).
According to data from InsideEVs, the Tesla Model 3 was the top-selling electric vehicle model in the U.S. in November. In November alone, 18,650 of those vehicles were sold in the U.S. To its credit, Veloz's press release isn't too self-congratulatory. The group writes, "Veloz recognizes that, while electric car sales are increasing at a rapid clip, it is not happening fast enough to achieve the deep cuts in emissions that the state needs to achieve to protect people's health and curb negative impacts on the environment."
According to data from InsideEVs, the Tesla Model 3 was the top-selling electric vehicle model in the U.S. in November. In November alone, 18,650 of those vehicles were sold in the U.S. To its credit, Veloz's press release isn't too self-congratulatory. The group writes, "Veloz recognizes that, while electric car sales are increasing at a rapid clip, it is not happening fast enough to achieve the deep cuts in emissions that the state needs to achieve to protect people's health and curb negative impacts on the environment."
rate of adoption (Score:5, Informative)
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Should these trends hold then next decade electric cars will pretty much take over.
Obligatory XKCD [xkcd.com]
My specific objection is that there's not enough battery production for these trends to hold.
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Re: rate of adoption (Score:2)
Price still needs to come down. The monthly payments of the sticker price seem to come close to my mortgage costs for my home. Thats why places like California can do this faster. Their cost of living is so fucking rediculous that they dont even blink at throwing down $1200 for an iPhone X or Samsung phone. Thats like a month of not eating out. Miniscule houses there can cost $600,000. In fsct the city of SF recently declared low 6 figure salaries are eligible for housing subsidies. In other places 6 figure
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those are both rediculous amounts of money to pay for something that loses half its value in 3 years. And thats including the federal subsidy to buy it correct? My mortgage payment on a 3000sq ft home barely comes in above that. Even after the property taxes and homeowners insurance escrow portion is added in it comes in at just $1000. That's something that does not lose value over time. I am sure $638/mo doesn't sound like a lot in Kalifornia, but that would increase someone's monthly expenses by a huge m
Navie extrapolation (Score:2)
Just eyeballing the sales graph, it looks like adoption rate is about doubling every two years or so. Should these trends hold then next decade electric cars will pretty much take over.
Beware naive extrapolation. Electric cars are definitely not going to "take over" in just 10 years. It's going to take longer than that for the supply chain to develop to supply the batteries and power trains and to reconfigure the assembly lines even if the demand was there already which it definitely is not. Average age of a car on US roads is longer than a decade so it would take longer than that even if starting tomorrow we only sold electric cars. Not to mention there are issues with range and fast
Two Paths (Score:2)
Beware naive extrapolation. Electric cars are definitely not going to "take over" in just 10 years. It's going to take longer than that for the supply chain to develop to supply the batteries and power trains and to reconfigure the assembly lines
You are forgetting there is a whole other path - hydrogen cars. Between battery electric and hydrogen electric (which is ramping up now as well) the trend can for sure hold.
I'm not even sure the trend would be impossible to hold if you just considered Tesla alone..
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When there is a ceiling on the rate (e.g. 100%), geometrical progression is a very poor model.
EV sales percentage is not organic (Score:5, Interesting)
Every automaker has to sell this percentage of ZEVs. If they fail, they have to buy credits from an automaker who exceeded their quota. If they fail that, they are banned from selling cars in California. And since about a half dozen states representing nearly a third of the U.S. population automatically adopt CARB's guidelines, the automaker would be banned from selling cars to a third of the U.S.
No automaker wants to be cut off from a third of the U.S. market. So they will do whatever it takes to meet the mandated ZEV percentage for the year. If that means running crazy sales and incentives (VW offered a 3 year/30,000 mile lease on an eGolf for $49/mo $1500 down, or $79/mo zero down a few years back), then so be it. In other words, the sales numbers do not represent true market demand. The ZEV mandate means if not enough EVs are being sold to meet the quota, automakers will discount EV prices until it does. (This is also why the best EV deals are in California - only EVs sold or leased in California count towards the ZEV mandate.)
That said, real demand seems to be meeting or exceeding the mandated percentage the last couple years, since I haven't seen a repeat of the crazy year-end sales and incentives. But this isn't a metric you can reliably use to gauge real demand. As the mandated ZEV percentage gets higher, it becomes harder for automakers to subsidize their prices to meet the mandate if there's insufficient demand (the discount for each EV has to be amortized over fewer ICE vehicles). So if the mandated percentage outstrips demand by too much, it'll create a situation where it'll be cheaper for Californians to buy an ICE vehicle out-of-state and bring it in, rather than buy it in California. Thus skewing the official sales figures further from real demand.
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Meanwhile, in the real world, automakers can simply pay $5000 [findlaw.com] for each missing credit they didn't earn or buy. So for a 2,5% ZEV mandate, that's an average fine of $125 per vehicle. For earning no credits whatsoever. And there are lots of ways [ca.gov] to earn credits besides selling BEVs (although a given fraction
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That said, real demand seems to be meeting or exceeding the mandated percentage the last couple years, since I haven't seen a repeat of the crazy year-end sales and incentives.
Pretty soon BEV will be able to compete with ICEV on its own without any incentives. The general consensus is when the battery pack costs 100 $/kwh the electric drive train and ICE drive train will cost the same. Tesla claims it will reach that number end of this year. So converting from Elon time to real time, most likely middle of next year. Others are not far behind. When the price parity is achieved with ICE then it is a whole different ball game. Further electric drive trains still have lots of optimiz
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The way I see it, the subsidies are not really for the consumers, but for the manufacturers.
1) Manufacturers are going to be reluctant to make a product there's no clear market for
2) There can't be a market for a product that doesn't exist
3) Since there's no existing production the cost to produce them is high
4) High production cost, and therefore high sales cost, reduces market potential even more
This is where the subsidies come in; Lowering the cost to consumers (4) helps expand the market (2) to manufact
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It would have been better if the subsidy was for the first million BEV, who ever makes them, gets them.
Comment removed (Score:3, Interesting)
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There are an awful lot of people who doubt that California's high speed rail project will ever be completed. The original bond was for $10 billion, when the estimated cost at completion was $40 billion. The other $30 billion was supposed to have come from private investment, which has failed to materialize. Today the estimated cost to complete is $100 billion, and is expected to grow even more. More information here. [nytimes.com]
Red Sticker, wrong direction (Score:2)
The Red Sticker for the car pool lane went backwards.
Yellow sticker = hybrid (now not valid)
Green sticker = plugin hybrid and pure electric (not valid 2019)
White sticker = pure electric (not valid 2019)
Red sticker = new plugin hybrid and pure electric
So the red sticker pulls a hundred thousand EV's off the road, and replaces them with a mix of hybrids and new electric vehicles.
What exactly is the red sticker trying to encourage. Just new sales?
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You have the purpose of the new "red sticker" wrong. It is just a way to enforce an expiration date. New EVs get 3-4 years of carpool access. If you have a "white or green" sticker for a car you bought after 1/1/2017, you can get a red replacement.
After 12/31/2018, new cars will get yet another color good thru 12/31/2022. This is reported to be purple. Next year, another color will roll out.
The "red sticker" did have some glitches. If you were unlucky and got a car in 2016, you would only get 2-3 year
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>> So the red sticker pulls a hundred thousand EV's off the road,
> What? How does it do that?
Oops, meant out of the car pool. White stickers expire 2019.
>> What exactly is the red sticker trying to encourage. Just new sales?
> Of less polluting vehicles specifically.
Not necessarily.
If I replace my EV(white sticker) car with a Volt, Prius Prime, or Ford Fusion (red sticker),
then I am adding pollution.
Not just emissions, but in the overall environmental cost of manufacturing a new vehicle.
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If I replace my EV(white sticker) car with a Volt, Prius Prime, or Ford Fusion (red sticker),
then I am adding pollution.
It depends on how you use it. Meanwhile, as I discussed above, your EV doesn't stop being a car because you stop driving it. You sell it to someone else and it decreases their emissions, probably by more than yours increase if you go from EV to PHEV. In that case, you'll still be trying to do as many electric miles as possible.
Not just emissions, but in the overall environmental cost of manufacturing a new vehicle.
On average, this is a third or less of the lifecycle energy consumption of the vehicle. As long as around a third of a vehicle's lifespan passes, it's more efficient overall to replac
It is time to re-evaluate and change how... (Score:2)
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What should happen is your vehicle tabs should be based upon average mileage of all cars (around 15,000) times the fourth power of the weight of the vehicle (since road damage goes as the fourth power of weight [nvfnorden.org]), times the tax rate. Light vehicles pay very little, because they do very little road damage; heavy vehicles pay a lot because they do most of the damage to the road.
The curb weight of my 2015 Honda CTX700 motorcycle is 478 pounds; the curb weight of my wife's 2015 Mustang convertible Ecoboost is
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What would you suggest?
You want to pay proportionally by usage, so as to not unfairly hit low users, or encourage high users who will use what they can extra "because they've already paid".
You want to base that usage on not just pollution, but damage to the road. So doing it based on time would be daft (people would speed to cost themselves less). You'd have to do it on distance to be fair. You could set up tolls everywhere, but they are expensive to build and maintain and you'd have to maintain the road
Thanks Rei (Score:2)
ICE's are counted (Score:3)
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Cali (Score:2)
Sigh. (Score:2)
So, for every sale since 2010, they've sold as many EV's in California as are sold in a few days by any of the big-name vehicle manufacturers.
Even if you multiply that up by 50 states and then 200+ countries, they're still a drop in the ocean.
"Months of strong U.S. sales in 2018, preceded by a strong 2017, are starting to show a trend: electric vehicles are selling well,"
If that's "strong" and "selling well", then someone needs to go look at the numbers.
Let's see... (Score:2)
Half a million in eight years, 62500 cars a year... In a state that has 28 million registered vehicles. Less than one quarter of one percent.
It all puts me in mind of very primitive peoples... One, Two... Many!
Numbers count (I know, bad pun). Just because the number SEEMS large to the average mind, doesn't mean it really is in the larger scheme of things.
Everyone stand on ocean beach and spit. That will raise sea level!... In a million years.
Scooters and Skateboards? (Score:2)
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Good Job. . . now the bad news (Score:2)
California will be the test market for seeing how well a " driving " tax works vs the fuel tax that is in place today.
California has the highest taxes on fuel in the country coming in around ~70 cents / gallon when all taxes are accounted for.
California accounts for ~10% of total fuel usage in the Nation ( it's a big State with a lot of folks in it )
California uses about ~15B gallons of gas per year
Without having to do the math, as the number of vehicles on California roads using gasoline drops, so too does
What about infrastructure? (Score:2)
Tesla has their supercharger network but I don't see any equivalent from Chevrolet, Ford, Mercedes, Jaguar, BMW etc. If I buy an EV from anyone other than Tesla, the *only* places I can charge is:
- At home. Assuming I have the ability to hook up a Level 2 or 3 charger. Let's be honest, a Level 1 ch
Just wondering (Score:2)
Re:Cutting Emissions (Score:5, Informative)
Re: Cutting Emissions (Score:2)
Re:Cutting Emissions (Score:5, Informative)
Are there still people here who believe in this "long tailpipe" nonsense?
Start reading. [google.is] Or, if you just want a cheat sheet for the US: here [ucsusa.org] and here [shrinkthatfootprint.com].
Here's where the US grid has been heading [eia.gov]. Here's where it's going [nationaljournal.com]. So note that using, say, 2012 data above actually downplays the improvements of EVs vs. ICEs. Same story with the energy used in battery manufacture (which has been falling in almost direct correspondence to battery prices)
If I was wrong in my assumption that you're an American (most people who ask this question turn out to be), let me know where you're from and I'll give you data appropriate to your location. For example, major EU countries [transportenvironment.org].
re: Doesn't matter ..... (Score:5, Insightful)
The problem in America is, people still don't see EVs as cost-effective, practical alternatives to internal combustion engine vehicles in most cases!
That's something you can't fix by waving a one time tax credit at people, and really shouldn't attempt to do by mandating purchasing behaviors.
It's just the fact that EV technology still has to mature, like ALL technologies do. Your early adopters pay the premium prices that help fund mass-market viability.
(I can remember back in the early 1990's, paying over $1,200 for an internal CD burner drive. It was an HP 4020i, and only burned media at a 2x maximum speed. Now, you can buy these things off the shelf for about $25 and they record single or dual layer DVD as well as CD media at speeds of up to 52x! But back then, I had a real need for it and could justify that price. Most people couldn't.)
Electric cars still present some big challenges, like practically none of them existing yet that in a pickup truck or van format. If you need to make longer road trips, you barely have any viable options EXCEPT for Tesla, because they're the only one with a fast supercharging network that's built out well enough. (The GPS in the car automatically takes you to the nearest one when you won't make it to a destination otherwise, etc.) And we still barely even have any of America's gas stations on-board with adding EV charging at their locations! If American adopted EVs in any serious way, all of a sudden? There would be huge lines and people stuck waiting hours to recharge their vehicles, and cars with dead batteries stranded all over our roads.
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I have argued that by 2022/23, that the majority of new cars sold will be EVs. The reason is that more
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The larger difficulty is that quick charge stations are not available in all areas, so if you're making a longer trip you need to plan ahead on where you're going to stop to recharge along the way and fo
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Are there still people here who believe in this "long tailpipe" nonsense?
Even if they do, it's *still* a stupid point. I mean if you have the choice between spewing out pollutants exactly where people live or a long tail pipe, the latter is vastly preferable. Having long tailpipes in city centers is a very good idea and arguably more important than CO2 savings.
Re:Cutting Emissions (Score:5, Informative)
Re:Cutting Emissions (Score:5, Informative)
Indeed - modern combined cycle natural gas plants can exceed 60% efficiency (burning a cleaner fuel, at that). A typical (non-hybrid) gasoline car peaks at around 35% efficiency and averages 20-25% efficiency in normal driving.
Coal is such a red herring regardless, as it's been dying, keeps dying, and there's not realistically anything that's going to save it. The overwhelming majority of new power added in the developed world is solar, wind, and natural gas.
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You mean those coal mining jobs being bought by Trump aren't permanent?
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You mean those coal mining jobs being bought by Trump aren't permanent?
Even Trump can only push coal exports, not domestic use.
Coal isn't dead yet (unfortunately) (Score:2, Flamebait)
Coal is such a red herring regardless, as it's been dying, keeps dying, and there's not realistically anything that's going to save it.
Sadly I wouldn't be so fast to erect a tombstone on coal just yet. Several reasons:
1) Coal is incredibly abundant in the US (we are the Saudi Arabia of coal) and abundant supply tends to equal cheap
2) Never underestimate a strong political lobby regardless of the absurdity of their positions (see NRA)
3) Lots of idiot voters in the US who think money (regardless of source) is more important than breathable air and habitable climate
4) Solar and wind are coming on strong but aren't a slam dunk obvious economi
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Re:Cutting Emissions (Score:5, Insightful)
100% of petrol/gas cars are using dirty source.
Fewer than 100% of electrical power stations are using dirty sources.
Don't know, but the maths looooooooks like it might favour the electric cars there, your tilting off axiom.
Then there's scale efficiency. One generator creating an enormous amount of power is less wasteful than a million tiny generators creating insignificant power and wasting most of that in the form of heat.
Again, maths.
I am really beginning to think people should be required to be licensed in STEM subjects before being allowed to post on the Internet.
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Yup. Plus, of course, there are other good reasons to move exhaust emissions from vehicles to power plants. Moving particulate emissions out of city and town centres is the most obvious.
Re: Cutting Emissions (Score:2)
I had the same thought. Itâ(TM)s probably all my past experience working in power production and propulsion in the Navy thats making this seem like such a Duh! moment. Maybe its a lot less obvious to those that never had to study carnot engines and other theoreticals.
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100% of petrol/gas cars are using dirty source.
Fewer than 100% of electrical power stations are using dirty sources.
Furthermore, there are many grid power sources available that could never be used in small engines.
Re: Cutting Emissions (Score:2)
The same way hydrogen fuel can. Its a lot easier to scrub the exhaust of a fixed and stationary structure that has little need for weight balancing than a vehicle whose increase in weight serves to increase consumption. So even on a 1:1 ratio, power plant consumption of carbon emitting fuels can be done considerably âcleanerâ(TM) than car exhaust simply because it can add the mass to do this without a significant strain on efficiencies (cost factor ignored for sake of simpler explanation)
Coal fire
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If the electricity to charge electric vehicles comes from dirty sources, how are they cutting emissions?
The thing is, that electricity can come from non-dirty sources, and will more and more do. An ICE vehicle, however, will always pollute. The writing is in the wall for ICE vehicles.
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If the electricity to charge electric vehicles comes from dirty sources, how are they cutting emissions?
Even if all the power comes from, say, petroleum, one large plant emits a lot less pollutant per unit of energy produced than a small source, even when distribution costs are accounted for.
The worst coal pollution events in history occurred in places like the UK and Pennsylvania, in the days when every household had its own little coal fire smoking away. When the coal is burned in one gigawatt-sized plant, it can have baghouses and fluidized beds. That is why today's controversy over coal is not black city
Re:Cutting Emissions (Score:4, Insightful)
The sources are getting cleaner (in California). http://www.caiso.com/TodaysOut... [caiso.com]
The cool thing about EVs is that the cleaner the power sources get, the cleaner the car gets. Compare that to a 25mpg vehicle that will (at best) pollute at the same level throughout its workable lifespan regardless of changes to the electrical grid.
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Your maths is off.
Re:Good question. (Score:5, Informative)
The answer is that they're not,
Nope. The answer is that they are . ...or maybe you think internal combustion engines are a model of efficiency and that gasoline is made of unicorn tears and is carried to the gas stations by pixies riding on rainbows.
Re:Good question. (Score:4, Interesting)
People will switch to BEV because it saves them money pure and simple. In 2021, in just two years, BEV and ICEV will cost the same off the dealers' lot. And electric miles will be four times cheaper than gasoline miles. People will switch, emissions or no emissions, carbon or no carbon, climate change believer or not.
There are tons of *other* reasons than pollution to switch to BEV. Not sending money to Saudis, saving money, more convenient, better handling, ....
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And yes, Electric is cheaper, but, it also does not include road taxes, though it has plenty of its own taxes.
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Go on, do the math. And by that I mean the full chain, for both. Getting the fuel, transporting it, storing it, and so on, and so forth. It does happen that if you do that, the "green" suddenly isn't so green any longer.
[citation needed]
So the answer may go either way, depending, and if you start with fossil fuels to make electricity, you're already at a disadvantage.
[citation needed]
For one because you can't just dump some fuel in a tank, but have to store it using batteries full of rare earths mined from fossil fuel-guzzling China.
Rare earths aren't rare, the USA has been spinning its production of rare earths back up again since China has been a bitch about selling them, and it doesn't take much energy to collect them either. Further, only tiny quantities are used. You are literally wrong about everything.
Re:Good question. (Score:5, Insightful)
Go on, do the math. And by that I mean the full chain, for both. Getting the fuel, transporting it, storing it, and so on, and so forth. It does happen that if you do that, the "green" suddenly isn't so green any longer.
[citation needed]
This is all hard to follow, but I take it that AC is trying to say that the transport and storage of fuels to be used for EV somehow make them less green than the transport and storage of fuels, then burning them in vehicles designed to burn those fuels?
Well, if that is the case, we always have to remember that the electrics tend to get pretty good MPGe. the Nissan Leaf gets an equivalent 112 mpg https://www.autobytel.com/top-... [autobytel.com]
In addition, we can charge the EV via a home solar system, negating the transport and storage issue altogether. https://news.energysage.com/so... [energysage.com]
But the way I like to look at it is let us assume instead of the present situation, Electric cars are dominant.
So someone comes along with this idea that we should all convert to internal combustion engines with all of their complexity, and install a nationwide system of trains and trucks to deliver fuel to neighborhood refueling stations - to create an infrastructure of an immense amount of transport of flammable materials.
All this to replace plugging our vehicles into an electric outlet. All to replace a multiplicity of energy sources. Solar/wind/nuc/coal/hydro can produce the energy for EVs; with a very specific energy source of petrofuel - with a very minor ethanol component.
Whoever came up with that idea would be laughed out of town.
Yet we have people defending that very system as somehow superior.
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Many EVs are PURPOSELY designed to be POS like your ICE car. Tesla is forcing all of the car makers to design/build their cars to do what is possible. Tesla likes to say that they do not build slow cars, but that is all relative. In less than 10 years, Tesla's current cars will be average. But for now, comparing them to the POS that you drive, yeah, these are fast.
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Yes, it can.
The Leaf's performance is roughly equivalent to a recent 4-cyl Camry and quite a bit better up to ~40 mph
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Don't forget all the people stuck behind the leaf, running about 20% slower because the leaf WON'T move fast enough as they are trying to preserve their precious range.
TL,DR; Nissan Leaf is shit and causes more congestion, which causes higher emissions overall.
Wow, you're very full of shit. The Leaf is no muscle car but it's more than adequate for commuting
https://www.youtube.com/watch?... [youtube.com]
0-30 mph 3.0 s
0-60 mph 7.5s
0-87 mph 17.0s
That's quicker than a 2010 Camry LE as tested by Motor Trend and Toyota has been selling more of those monthly since 1990 than the Leaf has ever sold in a full year in the USA
2010 Toyota Camry LE tested on 2/17/10
2.5L I-4 and 6A with 169 hp/167 lb-ft
0-60 mph: 8.4 seconds
Quarter mile: 16.4 seconds @ 86.1 mph
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Your assertiond to the contrary require your own set of citations.
No, they do not, because his assertions are the ones that run contrary to well-established fact.
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Re:Subsidies (Score:5, Informative)
good point ... except that the oil industry receives between $10 billion and $40 billion in subsidies every year (depending on what you count as a "subsidy"), you stupid hypocritical dipshit.
Re:Subsidies (Score:5, Interesting)
Top five tradeins for a Tesla Model 3:
* BMW 3-Series
* Toyota Prius
* Nissan Leaf
* Honda Accord
* Honda Civic
Yep, that totally sounds like a profile of the rich! Why, just the other day I saw Bill Gates driving around in an old Civic....
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As someone who literally works in sustainable transportation, that list is pretty damning. It shows that the emissions reductions from Tesla Model 3 sales aren't what people tend to assume.
- There is zero emissions reduction going from a Nissan Leaf to a Tesla Model 3.
- Going from a Prius to a to a Tesla Model 3 provides minimal reduction particularly if the Tesla is being charged in, say, Carlsbad where a portion of the electricity comes from burning oil.
- Upgrades from the Accord or Civic provide bigger g
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*cough* [lmgtfy.com]
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That's actually a pretty interesting response. I don't think you've proved anything, since people who buy new cars are by definition not exactly on on struggle street.
So perhaps the demographic is 'people who have second, third or fourth cars that are worth trading in' buy a new subsidized replacement at an overall cost to the USA taxpayer of $4 billion .
If you don't regard them as rich, fine.
Fossil fuel subsidies (Score:3)
So the USA taxpayer has paid about $4 billion in subsidies so that rich people can have another new car. Woo Fucking Hoo. MAGA. (/. warning to snowflakes, there may be sarcasm).
You mean instead of the $20 billion [theguardian.com] we spend each year on direct fossil fuel subsidies? (never mind the indirect ones like lack of pollution controls which are MUCH larger costs) Globally fossil fuels are directly subsidized to the tune of about $5 TRILLION per year.
By your idiot logic NASA exists so rich people can joy ride in space. Maybe consider that there is a bigger picture goal to benefit us all that you have failed to comprehend. Sometimes subsidies actually do make sense because we all benefit
Subsidies for lung cancer (Score:2)
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Sorry mate, wrong door. Pointless diatribes is second on the left. (that's obMP, snowflake).
I confess i do not know how to run a trillion dollar economy. i don't know how to keep 100 million people working effectively and usefully and enjoyably.
BUT I AM PRETTY FUCKING CERTAIN THAT SUBSIDISING RICH PEOPLE'S SECOND THIRD OR FOURTH CARS IS NOT A SOLUTION TO A PROBLEM THAT MATTERS.
Re:Subsidies (Score:4, Insightful)
I bought a used EV for $12,000 that would likely have cost a lot more if the incentives weren't in place for the new models. The incentives also lower the cost of used EVs because why would would someone pay $24,000 for a used Nissan Leaf when you can get a new one for that after incentives?
I do think the way the incentives are currently structured should be changed, but I also think that they are helping to accomplish what they were intended to, - bring EVs into the main stream.
Re:Subsidies (Score:5, Informative)
Let's imagine that was true. It isn't, but let's pretend. We know that fossil fuels get $22 trillion in subsidies EACH YEAR.
Your number is absurd on it's face, so your subsequent reasoning is suspect as well. The United States Gross domestic product is $19 trillion per annum. Removing any subsidies, real or imagined, wouldn't generate $22 trillion dollars each year for the US treasury.
Beyond that, everyone who goes on about 'fossil fuel subsidies' conveniently neglects to mention those subsidies are the same expenses and deductions that every other business in the US gets. You're not complaining about special treatment, you're complaining that companies you don't like aren't subject to special expenses that grind them into the dust.
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You are aware that the US has fought wars to keep oil flowing, right? I'm not sure that, say, the manufacturers of American running shoes, have been the recipients of largesse on quite that scale.
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You are aware that the US has fought wars to keep oil flowing, right? I'm not sure that, say, the manufacturers of American running shoes, have been the recipients of largesse on quite that scale.
American running shoes are made out of... oil. They're wholly made of plastics.
Anyway, the cost of the wars probably pales compared to the cost of cleaning up the pollution that the oil industry is permitted to produce. All the spills they don't have to clean up properly, all the "fracking fluids" (aka refinery wastes) they are pumping into the ground, all the emissions from all their refineries. We literally cannot clean that stuff up any more than we can clean up the radioactive waste spread across the co
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Total US Department of Defense spending from 1996 to 2017 is about $11 trillion [wikipedia.org]. What you're saying is that if we assigned 100% of that spending to subsidies for big oil, we'd need to double it again to get to the claim of $22 trillion. Yeah - that makes zero sense.
As far as keeping oil flowing - check where that Middle East oil flows. Predominantly to Asia and the EU - not the US (which gets most of its imported oil from Canada, Mexico, and Venezuela - today and historically). If we've fought wars to k
Re: (Score:2, Insightful)
Re: Subsidies (Score:2)
JD knows the $22 trillion figure is a lie but he repeats it every chance he gets anyway. It's just stupid.
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Let's imagine that was true. It isn't, but let's pretend.
It is true. Current EV rebates in California are about $10,000 [electrek.co]. With half a million purchased, that's around $5 billion; if anything, the original estimate may be a bit low.
We know that fossil fuels get $22 trillion in subsidies EACH YEAR.
That's not true... Citation needed. That is greater than the GDP of the US, the EU, or China. That's pretty much a straight-out lie. So - yeah. Citation needed.
Now, want to tell me which of those numbers is the more significant?
A real $5 billion, or a fake $22 trillion? The real $5 billion. Additionally, the $5 billion is directed to those who can afford, on average, $60,000+ cars. So it's a gi
Re:Subsidies (Score:5, Insightful)
You must be a socialist. Why punish success?
Socialists want to protect people from the harm of being born to the wrong parents, not to punish people for being born to the right ones.
We one percenters are the ones paying 60% of the taxes collected by the government.
And deriving 90% of the benefit. Any asshole can see that this is unfairly biased towards the 1% if they are not willfully determined to miss it.
Stop envying us, get off your butt and work your ass off. You might make a tenth of what my grandpa left in the trust fund.
The most reliable predictor of wealth is the social status of one's parents. You didn't build that, and you don't deserve it.
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It really bugs me people who vigorously defended the tax cuts that went entirely to the one percent turn around and rail about rich people getting EV credits. They would also rail about budget busting deficits while at the same time voting for tax cuts.
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Sorry it is too subtle even to you. We are on the same side.
Sorry, it's so hard to tell any more because of all the terrible things that people actually believe.
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And deriving 90% of the benefit.
I see this a lot. I'd like to know - outside of targeted subsidies like this one - what program the Federal Government has that specifically helps only the rich, or excludes the poor, such that the rich make more out of it than they put into the system (a net benefit, instead of a reduction of loss).
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That's not how it works. It doesn't actually matter even slightly what the specific mechanisms are; the one-percenters owns over 90% of everything, pockets over 90% of the profit, but only pays 60% of the taxes that keep 100% of the system running. You don't need a napkin or even a matchbook to see that they are getting the best part of the deal. All most of us want is for them to pay their fair share, although I would also appreciate a reduction in hypocritical rhetoric.
However, a few things do come immedi
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Why punish success?
Who is advocating people who work hard and make money for their corporations make less money than people who don't work?
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New product adoption rates tend to track sigmoid curves ("S-curves").
While there's noise (such as changing tax / regulatory environments), EVs around the world have generally tracked S-curves quite well, with Norway having exceeded 50% on new sales.
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Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
Where are you getting this $22 Trillion/year number? Since that is larger than the entire GDP of the United States, I'd like to see your source. It seems unlikely to be true.
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Will you knock it off with this "$22 trillion a year in fossil fuel subsidies" bullshit? It only makes you look stupid. Total Federal revenue for 2019 is forecast to be $3.422 trillion, with a budget deficit of about $900 billion. Total US GDP is around $19 trillion. So enough of this nonsense.
Re: Coming Soon (Score:2)
Meters will be mandatory on all home chargers.
It's meters all the way down.
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