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15 Jul 2017, 21:36 (Ref:3751530) | #26 | ||
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http://www.nextgreencar.com/car-tax/fuel-duty/ Nominally, using today's technology, the battery life for a Lithium battery is expected to be around 1000 charge cycles. It may be more. There is a chance that in some situations it may be less. Performance is very likely to degrade with time and number of charges but that may not be an issue here - nominally range would decline slowly Using your Leaf figures (the Renault Zoe may do slightly better) 100 miles max per charge and 1000 charge cycles gives a useful life of 100k miles. At that point one, presumably, scraps the car if the battery fails since replacements or exchanges for alternatives, if they exist, may not be cost effective ... but then things might change that would defer scrapping for another few years. Somehow I doubt it in the absence of retrofit autonomous capability. Maybe fit a roll cage and go racing? That said at the typical mileage that today's Leaf buyers might undertake the car could be over 20 years old by then .... Batteries offer less benefits in colder climates and in colder weather although one can offset that by following the Norwegian model one assumes. They are also somewhat challenged in hot climates, thus perhaps less desirable at any price south of the Pyrenees - which is a bit ironic given Spain's efforts with both wind and solar. How that might effect deployment in, say, most of Africa might also be an interesting question. If Nigeria takes on Shell's oil business as Shell pulls out and then transitions into a renewables company there may be strong resistance to going electric - even if at the same time solar panels have become so cheap and effective that they become a significant social changer in most of Africa where there is little or no existing infrastructure to oust. Solar and batteries - but how to keep the batteries cool? I recently read suggestions that no additional capacity is required to produce electricity for EVs since transitioning from ICE means the electricity consumption of refining plant reduces and with altered consumption in distribution, pretty much balances out the demand. That may have some truth for countries with a lot of refining capability or excessive distribution costs. However, seeking some numbers it became obvious that the bulk of refining energy is likely to come from internal sources (they are, after all, refining oil and making fuels, etc. ). Large scale distribution of liquid fuels and gas is already piped in many places so in most of Europe the costs are reasonably controlled and probably on a par with building and maintaining an electricity grid. Fast charging of a lot of EVs would almost certainly involve significant changes to the local distribution grids. The National Grid predicts around 30% increase in demand for the electricity grid to achieve (from memory) circa 50% penetration of the transport demands. I can't recall if that included commercial and buses. I would anticipate that most Governments and many car manufacturers are, at the moment, keen to see a rapid transition to electric powered vehicles. I therefore expect we will see legislation that reduced the advantages or convenience that fossil fuels appear to offer. First they will come for diesel, as we have seen. That will reduce the range advantage. They can then make it more costly to run refuelling stations so that they become even fewer and further apart than they are now. If they keep throughput capacity down they will start to match "recharging" times. Equality for all, business for the coffee shop. I wonder if people might start to value the battery swapping concept at a premium price? |
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16 Jul 2017, 09:31 (Ref:3751600) | #27 | ||
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It's a common misconception that green energy isn't taxed properly and is heavily subsidized. In reality, electricity is taxed no matter what generates it, and oil and gas subsidies outweigh green energy subsidies about 10 fold. -------------- In terms of grid usage, it takes significantly more energy to refine petrol, transport it to the petrol stations and then support the infrastructure than it does to charge an electric car. You are at a net gain in electricity if everyone moved to an electric car. The grid needs to adapt to how and when it distributes the energy, but you actually use less. Again, we keep getting told to look at the bigger picture, and when you do, you realise you're actually cutting out a lot of energy intensive processes in this. Battery lifespan is also reported incorrectly. Current Teslas are reporting around 80-90% retention of battery range after 100,000 miles. So if your Tesla was originally doing 300 miles on a charge, after 100,00 miles it's still doing 240 - 270 miles. That's better retention than most ICE cars will get. This shows that in general, the car will outlast a normal ICE car. There are exceptions to that of course, some VW TDIs will still be here when the sun collapses. The all those 1.4L Ford Fiestas? Mine has done 120,000 miles, and it's on its last legs. You can say "oh well the battery might fail". Yes, but equally my co-worker bought a second hand Mercedes in really good condition, 40k miles. Timing chain broke after a week and the entire car was scrapped. These things happen with ICE cars too - so why do we pretend it's exclusive to electric cars? It's almost like we're looking for excuses to hate them. So if the car battery is outlasting the car, it's probably gone on through 4-5 owners similar to an ICE car. It's done its job and had a good life. Whilst battery cooling is a problem, currently battery technology is well within its temperature limits. The panasonics in a Tesla could actually do 600 miles on a charge. They're just limited to avoid overheating problems. What do we do when an ICE car is getting scrapped? Take it to the scrapyard and destroy it. What do we do when an electric car is getting scrapped? Presumably we set the local nursery on fire and fuel it with burning babies. I mean it's so absolutely impossible to use batteries again, and dispose of them, the world is going to end when we use electric cars right? Or we could do what Toyota does and repurpose them for a longer life. Electric car batteries are extremely useful even when they do not have enough performance to run a vehicle (which is VERY energy heavy). There are still plenty of uses for them, especially as backups and daytime storage systems. Electric cars will not save the world and are not perfect at absolutely everything. But they are a significant improvement in many ways. |
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16 Jul 2017, 11:01 (Ref:3751626) | #28 | ||
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You are the man, Akrapovic!
I spent a couple of years listening to my Tesla owning friend, who spends a lot of time in the USA (and has been to the factory several times), and then decided most of the arguments I could think of for not owning an electric car had been answered. To me, it's a bit like buying a new phone or computer- if you keep waiting for the next level of technology, you'll never get one...... The re-cycling of 'used' batteries for storage, emergency or otherwise, is great and I'm sure will be increasingly adopted as the batteries become available. At the moment the USA is probably the only country where it can happen, due to their early adoption of hybrid and electric cars. As an aside, Tesla will be announcing an electric HGV before too long, and Mitsubushi already have a small Canter truck with up to 60 mile range. Can't wait to see a full sized artic with pure electric tractor! |
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16 Jul 2017, 11:29 (Ref:3751652) | #29 | ||
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Been looking at small campervans recently - there's a company selling an Electric campervan based on a Nissan E/NV 200 van.
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16 Jul 2017, 12:00 (Ref:3751671) | #30 | ||
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This is all well and good, but some of the most polluting transporters are ships and aircraft. And neither of those categories are ever (well, not in our lifetimes, anyway) likely to be powered by anything else than fossil based fuels.
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16 Jul 2017, 12:24 (Ref:3751689) | #31 | |
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A recent scientific study in Sweden , [ most of the battery minerals are mined in that area ] , has shown that, just to produce a Tesla sized battery , produces as much emissions as driving a petrol or diesel car for 8 years .
And as the life of the batteries is not much more than that , overall electric cars produce more emissions than a petrol/ diesel car . Even without the buying subsidy , electric cars are very expensive , & the value drops enormously meaning that in a few years they are worth nothing . https://www.google.co.uk/url?sa=t&rc...QWZnT-nMjKnIyA Both Glasses guide here & Kelleys in the US have the value dropping like a stone . And less than 25% of buyers would buy another . So , no good if you drive a lot of miles , very very expensive overall , & not as green as the propaganda wants you to believe . PS . The electric truck claimed by Tesla needs 20 ton batteries to do 400 miles , & costs about twice as much as normal .So half the payload for twice the price , that will work really well ?????? |
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16 Jul 2017, 12:38 (Ref:3751697) | #32 | ||
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Certainly not easy to make an electric Airbus or Boeing, I would think!
Ships use really poor grade fuel- I know ferry companies like P&O etc have to pay a pollution fine, which they just pass on to us, of course..... Talking of which- I wonder if any ferry company will introduce charging points on their boats? They already supply power to run fridge trailers. At the moment EVs are able to charge at Eurotunnel Folkestone but nothing at the ferry ports..... |
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16 Jul 2017, 12:45 (Ref:3751700) | #33 | |
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I'll make a proper reply after the WEC race and I've written my report. But it is amusing that I haven't even mentioned emissions and pollution and that's now what the discussion has become. People are so absolutely determined to hate electric cars that they'll ignore all the good points and tell you ships are bad.
Tesla Gigafactory that produces all the Tesla batteries is carbon neutral and solar powered. Tesla vehicles also hold their value incredibly well. Depreciation happens to petrol vehicles too. 97% of tesla owners said they would buy another. If you make good electric cars, people will buy them. |
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16 Jul 2017, 12:59 (Ref:3751714) | #34 | ||
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The BMW 'i' assembly plant is also carbon neutral. The raw carbon fibre for i3 & i7 bodies is produced using hydro-electric. Many of the interior trim parts are produced from recycled material....
Statistics can be manipulated to prove anything. If you hate, you hate! |
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16 Jul 2017, 13:05 (Ref:3751718) | #35 | |
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Also note: I'm not a green nut. That's why I didn't talk about co2. It doesn't really bother me as much as it should. I'm a huge petrol lover. I want a Bentley with a silly engine. But all of this shifting around and dodging the arguments, then ignoring facts is just nonsense. Electric cars are coming and as much as I love petrol engines, it is not a sustainable situation and I don't see the downside to finding a solution to this problem.
All vehicles, with the exception to rockets, can be electric driven. Rockets are the exception because there's no way around Newton's third law. |
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16 Jul 2017, 13:11 (Ref:3751720) | #36 | ||
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Oil Companies par far higher rates of tax , [ & much more of it ] , than just about any other business . Some countries whole economy is based on revenue from oil . And in the UK the public pays more in tax on road fuels than any other item . But still the greenies come out with the ridiculous lie that fossil fuels are subsidised . |
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16 Jul 2017, 13:13 (Ref:3751722) | #37 | |
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i'm concerned about the extra strain on the uk power grid considering we don't have much room for power use growth as it is and there doesn't seem to be much ambition from the govt to do anything about it.
but from a personal perspective, electric cars can't cover my really long journey in one hit habits, so i can't consider them for now. however i can fully see the merit and if i was rich i'd be all over a tesla even if they do look a bit like a jag |
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16 Jul 2017, 13:21 (Ref:3751728) | #38 | ||
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If everybody was to stop using petrol cars and start using electric overnight, the grid would have less overall strain on it. It would see a different peaks and troughs pattern though. Charging overnight might be higher but that could also balance out the problems we have with peaks during the day and needing to shutdown energy production at times. But even if there was extra strain, that's no reason not to progress. Progression should never stop because governments are lazy. When electric cars take off, improvments will be made to the grid. Once an electric car can do 300 miles on a charge and recharge in 30 minutes, that's the magic number for extended long journeys. And Teslas can do that. Teslas are currently expensive but the Model 3 is $35k, and the Model Y is rumoured to be cheaper. At that point, suddenly it is viable. And those days are coming within a decade. |
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16 Jul 2017, 13:41 (Ref:3751740) | #39 | |||
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When I'm racing, it's means using the truck or van and trailer. For other life, an EV fits perfectly. Yes, I'd also love a Tesla, but when the time comes to change there will be many other interesting options, I'm sure! |
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16 Jul 2017, 13:46 (Ref:3751742) | #40 | |
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But Mike, that's silly. You could just build your own oil refinery and oil and gas platform and get cheap fuel that way. Having your own power supply is silly, not sustainable and too expensive!
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16 Jul 2017, 13:52 (Ref:3751746) | #41 | |||
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16 Jul 2017, 13:54 (Ref:3751749) | #42 | |
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They recently took the top sides off the Brent Delta. Not sure where it went but I considered putting it in the field out back and getting a black and decker drill out.
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16 Jul 2017, 13:59 (Ref:3751755) | #43 | |||
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As to the comments about certain production facilities being "carbon neutral", this doesn't necessarily mean that the production of the raw materials, and the transport of them, is carbon neutral. And there often comes a point at which increasing production necessitates using power from traditional sources. I personally know of one manufacturer that for over a hundred years had produced all their electricity from their own water recourses, but had to move and join the national grid when their production reached a certain level. By the way, I am not a greenie. back in the 60s and 70s I argued against the drive towards using recycled paper for packaging, because it requires far more power to produce a tonne of recycled paper than it would to produce a tonne of plastic. And they wouldn't need to use all the noxious substances that are needed to recycle the stuff that goes into recycled paper. |
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16 Jul 2017, 14:09 (Ref:3751758) | #44 | ||
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This comes up a lot when discussing electric cars. This stance that if they are not the answer to absolutely everything single problem, and not gods gift to clean energy, the motoring world, and starving children in Africa, then it isn't worth doing. Yet they are a significant improvement in pretty much every area and are progressing at a rate that the car industry has never seem in its entire history, and people still argue against them. Notice how we've moved to discussing climate, despite the Pro electric car posters not even bringing it up. |
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16 Jul 2017, 17:10 (Ref:3751923) | #45 | ||
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Balls of steel (knob of butter) They're Asking For Larkins. ( Proper beer) not you're Eurofizz crap. Hace más calor en España. Me han conocido a hablar un montón cojones! Send any cheques and cash to PO box 1 Lagos Nigeria Africa ! |
16 Jul 2017, 17:35 (Ref:3751933) | #46 | |
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16 Jul 2017, 17:52 (Ref:3751943) | #47 | ||
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Balls of steel (knob of butter) They're Asking For Larkins. ( Proper beer) not you're Eurofizz crap. Hace más calor en España. Me han conocido a hablar un montón cojones! Send any cheques and cash to PO box 1 Lagos Nigeria Africa ! |
16 Jul 2017, 18:08 (Ref:3751947) | #48 | ||
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How do you make an Alfa Romeo 4C faster? Tow it behind a Tesla. Fastest milk float in the world. But don't take that video as gospel! There's plenty more evidence worth watching. https://www.youtube.com/results?sear...esla+drag+race But lets not let facts, figures and a ludicrous amount of power get in the way of a good old fashioned "LOL ELECTRIC CARS" comment eh. |
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16 Jul 2017, 19:52 (Ref:3751975) | #49 | ||
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Even my skinny tyred little electric hatch gets to 60 in just over 7 secs. Great fun when a non believer pulls alongside at traffic lights.... A Zoe is quite a lot heavier but still no slouch. Leaf is not in the same league, I'm afraid.
The Tesla Model S P100D is the fastest accelerating road car to 60mph Motor Trend Magazine have ever tested. (If you want honest unbiased info on EVs, read a US mag.) It is also 5th in the 0-100-0 league table! To do a 2.3 secs to 60mph start, the driver has to go into 'ludicrous' mode in settings, and the display then asks if they want to continue. The answers are- 'No, I want my mammy', or 'Yes, bring it on!'. |
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16 Jul 2017, 20:14 (Ref:3751988) | #50 | |
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Ok, lets have some fun.
Nissan claim the leaf can do 150 miles, but that's in ideal conditions! It'll never do that! Probably quite true that the manufacturers are overestimating the range of the vehicles. But then again, Nissan also claim that the Pular 1.5 diesel gets 78mpg. Real world reports are bringing it in at 55mpg. Car manufacturers have historically overestimated the range a car can do, no matter what the fuel source. This is not limited to electric cars. Electric cars just have no range at all Tesla (and we're going to be talking about them a lot in this post) haver a graph showing the range of the Model S. The one represented is the 85kWh version. I drive around 80 miles a day, of which around 70 is on a dual carriageway. I consider myself a fairly heavy user, but the urban part of my journey takes my average speed over a typical daily journey down to 44mph. Using that graph, my average journey data would get me a range of 350 miles. You could maybe knock that down to 320-330 for less than ideal conditions. Note that Telsa is very open about the conditions it was tested in too. There's no place to charge them! Well you can charge them at your house, which is something that you cannot do at your home with a petrol car unless you have your own oil refinery. If you own one of them, then a private jet is probably your mode of transport. But ok, not everyone can charge at their own home, and destination charging is important. In 2011, there was approximately 1500 chargers in the UK. In 2016, there was 12,000. That's a growth of over 10,000 in 5 years. There are 8000 petrol stations in the UK, which means there are 1.5 times the number of charging areas than petrol stations. Unfortunately what there is not data for is the number of filling nozzles in the UK, which would be more relevant. Obviously there is significantly more of those. However it does give you a good representation of how many electric charging stations there are. Every time you see a petrol station, there is 1.5 chargers for that station. Ok, maybe better to thing of 2 petrol stations = 3 electric chargers, so we're not picturing half chargers. That means there is currently plenty of places to charge them, you just don't know where they are because you don't need them. The number of these chargers is growing rapidly and shows no sign of slow down. These cars are expensive! £100k for a Tesla is insane! They are expensive. Too expensive. Nobody thinks everyone should or could move to an electric car tomorrow. However they've went from insanely expensive, down to £30k Volvos and $35k Tesla Model 3s in just a handful of years. With that rate of progression, you'll be able to afford one in a few years. When automobiles first came onto the scene, they were far too expensive for normal people to afford. But same could be said for TVs, computers, mobile phones....and houses. Now look at us. The Model Y is set to lower prices further. UK Streets are too crowded. You can't just pull charging leads out your house! No you can't. But what if lamp posts had chargers in them? They already have electricity. That's what LA and SF are doing, and it's working. You just need to think of how to improve the rest of the world. They get free road tax. How will the government pay for roads? So do a lot of small diesel and petrol cars. Road taxes haven't paid for roads for decades, so they'll get paid for the same way they currently do. Road taxes are about encouraging consumers and manufacturers to take certain routes with new products. Once electric cars form the bulk of vehicles on the road, the taxes will be changed to reflect that. Perhaps based on vehicle cost, perhaps a flat rate. Who knows? But tax bands change constantly - the same arguments were made when 'clean' diesels were popular, and now look how it's changed. What if you break down with a flat battery! Then you call the AA. The wonderful thing is that with a flat battery, you just plug it in and it's back to health. What if you break down with no fuel? You call the AA...and put fuel in it. That's not a break down, that's just running out of energy, and the solution is the same both times. You can't carry spare charge! They have a buffer built into the estimated millage, but you're right, you can't carry a pack of duracells in the boot to charge it if you run out. But how many people REALLY carry a jerry can of petrol...just in case? Really? Governments are just trying to be "green" to get votes!" Governments are always trying to get votes. But how DARE governments try to protect the health of residents. We should return to the Industrial Revolution where there was no such air quality issues. Batteries lose charge too easily. It'll reduce in range massively Tesla Model S and X owners are currently finding that the initial drop off from a new battery, the degredation levels out. On average, Teslas lose 5-10% of their potential maximum charge after 200k miles. So your 360 mile battery will be down to around 330 miles. This means your battery will outlast the miles put on the majority of petrol driven cars, with the odd exception of a few VW TDIs, since they'll be here after the sun has consumed the Earth. When a battery fails, you'll have to scrap the whole car! Probably not, as batteries can be swapped. But when your timing chain fails, you'll be binning the engine in your car too. And it's a comparable price to swapping a battery for an engine. Better not buy any petrol cars! They might fail! The charging time is too long It wasn't long ago that the charge time was basically overnight. You had to charge the car for the best part of 12 hours for any decent return. Again, the Tesla Model S can do a 50% charge (so 160sh miles) in 20 minutes. 40 minutes to 80%, 75 minutes to 100%. Whilst this is a very expensive car...see above. This tech is coming, and it'll be here soon. Electric cars are slow! Silly milk floats LOL. Google Tesla drag race. True fact: You can speed up a supercar by towing it behind a Tesla SUV. Electric cars are using electricity which is bad for the environment On the assumption that an electric car is charged using electricity generated from 100% oil and gas power plants, you still get a significant boost in efficiency. A petrol engine tends to be between 20-30% efficient, with the rest lost to heat and sound. Toyota were very proud of a unit they managed to get 38% from. Diesel engines tend to run around 40%. A natural gas generator runs at 60% efficiency. So even just from the generators themselves, you've increased efficiency by 20%. And then you take into account refining of fuel, energy for supporting the infrastructure, transportation of the fuel, etc. Then take into account that not all energy sources are hydrocarbon, and it becomes a bigger saving. Electric cars put a strain on the grid Refining a gallon of petrol takes 6kWh. An electric car will drive 25 miles on that. However the 6kWh doesn't take into account the energy required to refine the diesel for transportation, or the energy for powering the infrastructure. When all is taken into account, if we all moved to electric cars, then the strain on the grid would be loosened by the lack of petrol production. Renewable enegy is a hoax. It only exists due to government subsidies. Government subsidies for oil and gas out number renewable energy by 10:1. If you're anti-subsidies then that's fine - but be honest about it. Your petrol is about to get a LOT more expensive if you take those away. Producing batteries is a lot of CO2. That's bad And producing current ICE cars isn't? The Gigafactory will be carbon neutral, and produce as much energy as it uses, taking no strain on the grid. Ships and lorries use more fuel and are worse for the environment than cars True. But that isn't a good argument for not using an electric car is it? Should we just not use good things and stop all improvement because another industry is worse? What kind of logic is that? And ships and lorries will be moving to electric soon enough (Tesla have actually announced a semi truck) for the same reasons cars will. All modes of transport can be electrically powered with enough development. The one exception is rockets, or any vehicle which leaves the earths atmosphere - because there just isn't any way around Newtons third law. You must own an electric car, why else would you like them? I drive a 1.4L Ford Fiesta. I don't own an electric car, I just don't want to deny facts, physics and technology progression. An electric car currently would not fit into my life - but I'm not going to make uninformed arguments about them, when they clearly are advantageous and will continue to make leaps and gains. But I like my petrol engine! I like mine too. It might only be a 1.4L Ford engine, but changing gear is satisfying. I like it. I'd like it better if it was a 6L V8 in a Bentley, but hey, we can't all afford one. But just because I love my petrol engine, doesn't mean that it's better than electric. Just because you like something, doesn't make it better. But liking something IS a good enough reason to buy it. If you REALLY want a petrol car, then buy a petrol car, and be honest about why you did it. There's no shame in that. If I could afford it, I'd buy an Aston...and I'd admit I want the noise. So electric cars are perfect? No, far from it. They do have problems. They are expensive, they aren't made from 100% biodegradable eco crops, grown in fair trade countries. But the problems with electric cars also exist in petrol cars. So lets be fair with this. Should I blow up my petrol car and buy a Leaf tomorrow? Probably not. They aren't for everyone. They can be expensive and may not fit your life right now. But that doesn't mean the technology is bad - it means the technology is YOUNG. And that's fine, because all technology is young in its early days. It will mature, it will get there, and within a decade or so, electric cars will be the majority of new cars sold. But SUVs aren't for everyone - I'm not going to go and start a thread and say they're awful just because it doesn't fit my life. I'm not determined to push an agenda against everything that doesn't suit my life, but when it comes to electric cars, people seem very determined to tell you just how bad they are because it doesn't fit them right this very second. Any more info? If you've not already made up your mind, and have decided that maybe electric cars aren't going to club baby seals to death and smother your children in their sleep, then have a watch of the Elon Musk TED Talks. You might discover it's just about making a better future by getting good engineers to do good work. https://www.ted.com/talks/elon_musk_...ing_and_boring https://www.ted.com/talks/elon_musk_...acex_solarcity There's also a bit of space talk in there for anyone with a passing interest in space travel. First video there is 2017, whilst the second video is 2013, so there is some inconsistencies as there's a 4 year gap between the videos and a lot of development was done. I've probably missed a lot in this, but it's a Sunday night and I've just done a couple of WEC race reports, I need a break. Edit: So is this Elon Musk guy declaring himself the savior of the world? “The value of beauty and inspiration is very much underrated, no question,” Musk says, “But I want to be clear: I’m not trying to be anyone’s savior. I’m just trying to think about the future and not be sad.” Last edited by Akrapovic; 16 Jul 2017 at 20:36. |
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