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If you move over one country and look at The Netherlands, you’ll see a lot of the same things hold true there, yet Tesla (and other EVs) are wildly successful t

If you move over one country and look at The Netherlands, you’ll see a lot of the same things hold true there, yet Tesla (and other EVs) are wildly successful there. Key differences are EV tax breaks and excellent public charging infrastructure in a smaller, denser country making EV ownership practical and economic. The same people absolutely do drive EVs and use public transport, usually combined with some bicycle rides mixed in.

sandworm101 7y ago
>> a smaller, denser country making EV ownership practical and economic. Ya. I'm in Canada. The total opposite. Vast stretches of wilderness between cities. Bitter winter cold. Darkness. And in many area less than reliable grid power[1]. If we are listed countries by the practicality of electric vehicles, Canada, Russia, Australia and Mongolia are in leagues of their own. [1] We are having a windstorm in my area atm. Power has dropped out twice in the last few hours, only for a few minutes at a time, but at this time last year we lost power for three days. https://www.bchydro.com/power-outages/app/outage-map.html https://www.bchydro.com/power-outages/app/outage-map.html 250ish different outages means about 35,000 people are without grid power in BC at the moment.
- mymythisisthis 7y ago
  Downtown Toronto needs to ban cars. Sure trucks are needed all over rural Ontario, but not downtown.
  - deleted 7y ago
    [deleted]
  - sandworm101 7y ago
    I assume you mean SUVs, not the cargo-carrying semi trailers. Banning "trucks" is like banning assault rifles: you instantly get into a huge debate about what is and isn't an truck. Is it to be be size? Weight? (Teslas are heavy) Passenger capacity? Whatever definition you use, the results will not be what you want. It's like when london allowed electric vehicles to skip paying the congestion charge. They thought this was going to benefit the drivers of small electric cars. Then came all the electric sports/super cars. Now Jeremy Clarkson in his 200mph electric hypercar doesn't pay the tax while James May in a tiny fiat panda does.
    - mymythisisthis 7y ago
      A few rich electric super cars not paying the congestion charge is o.k., that helps to promote electric cars. A 4ft bar/toll gate across the road. Anything under 4ft gets to pass under, anything over 4ft has to pay. Yes, commercial cars would have to pay. Tired of walking around the city and not being able to anything because of large SUVs and trucks.
- micheljansen 7y ago
  You quoted only part of my argument: it’s the good charging infrastructure and tax incentives that make EVs so attractive in the Netherlands. However, I did not want to fail to mention that the Netherlands is a much smaller and denser country than Germany and this means it is much easier to put that kind of infrastructure in place.
- adrianN 7y ago
  Having a 85kWh battery in your garage would be very useful in areas that are prone to power outages.
  - amluto 7y ago
    That’s only true if the battery will export DC and you have an appropriate inverter setup. Tesla batteries won’t supply DC, at least not without hacking. And a big enough inverter to power your house is not that cheap. But yes, I agree in principle. On the bright side, there are CHAdeMO and CCS V2H and V2G (Vehicle to House/Grid) standards under development.
    - BubRoss 7y ago
      Why do you need to power your house on DC when your house runs on AC?
      - wffurr 7y ago
        You don't. You use a large central inverter to convert to AC for the house load. The problem with Teslas is that they won't supply power at all with the usual home charging setup.
- belval 7y ago
  This is such a weird take on Canada. Feel free to comment on the situation in BC but in Ontario and Quebec the population density is such that there are no "Vast stretches of wilderness" for the greater proportion of inhabitants and you can absolutely go from Toronto to Quebec City and find more than enough chargers if you battery is running low. The cold argument is true though. We have two EVs at home and both see their autonomy drop significantly during winter.
  - sandworm101 7y ago
    Try a mountain pass in winter. Ontario is flat. Even so, Ontario and BC are each more than 4x the size of the entire UK. Driving between major cities in canada is like driving across multiple countries in Europe.
vinay427 7y ago
Or a country in a different direction, Switzerland, where both trains and Teslas are more popular than in Germany despite the lack of many of those EV incentives, as far as I know.

sandworm101 7y ago

>> a smaller, denser country making EV ownership practical and economic. Ya. I'm in Canada. The total opposite. Vast stretches of wilderness between cities. Bitter winter cold. Darkness. And in many area less than reliable grid power[1]. If we are listed countries by the practicality of electric vehicles, Canada, Russia, Australia and Mongolia are in leagues of their own. [1] We are having a windstorm in my area atm. Power has dropped out twice in the last few hours, only for a few minutes at a time, but at this time last year we lost power for three days. https://www.bchydro.com/power-outages/app/outage-map.html https://www.bchydro.com/power-outages/app/outage-map.html 250ish different outages means about 35,000 people are without grid power in BC at the moment.

mymythisisthis 7y ago
Downtown Toronto needs to ban cars. Sure trucks are needed all over rural Ontario, but not downtown.
- deleted 7y ago
  [deleted]
- sandworm101 7y ago
  I assume you mean SUVs, not the cargo-carrying semi trailers. Banning "trucks" is like banning assault rifles: you instantly get into a huge debate about what is and isn't an truck. Is it to be be size? Weight? (Teslas are heavy) Passenger capacity? Whatever definition you use, the results will not be what you want. It's like when london allowed electric vehicles to skip paying the congestion charge. They thought this was going to benefit the drivers of small electric cars. Then came all the electric sports/super cars. Now Jeremy Clarkson in his 200mph electric hypercar doesn't pay the tax while James May in a tiny fiat panda does.
  - mymythisisthis 7y ago
    A few rich electric super cars not paying the congestion charge is o.k., that helps to promote electric cars. A 4ft bar/toll gate across the road. Anything under 4ft gets to pass under, anything over 4ft has to pay. Yes, commercial cars would have to pay. Tired of walking around the city and not being able to anything because of large SUVs and trucks.
micheljansen 7y ago
You quoted only part of my argument: it’s the good charging infrastructure and tax incentives that make EVs so attractive in the Netherlands. However, I did not want to fail to mention that the Netherlands is a much smaller and denser country than Germany and this means it is much easier to put that kind of infrastructure in place.
adrianN 7y ago
Having a 85kWh battery in your garage would be very useful in areas that are prone to power outages.
- amluto 7y ago
  That’s only true if the battery will export DC and you have an appropriate inverter setup. Tesla batteries won’t supply DC, at least not without hacking. And a big enough inverter to power your house is not that cheap. But yes, I agree in principle. On the bright side, there are CHAdeMO and CCS V2H and V2G (Vehicle to House/Grid) standards under development.
  - BubRoss 7y ago
    Why do you need to power your house on DC when your house runs on AC?
    - wffurr 7y ago
      You don't. You use a large central inverter to convert to AC for the house load. The problem with Teslas is that they won't supply power at all with the usual home charging setup.
belval 7y ago
This is such a weird take on Canada. Feel free to comment on the situation in BC but in Ontario and Quebec the population density is such that there are no "Vast stretches of wilderness" for the greater proportion of inhabitants and you can absolutely go from Toronto to Quebec City and find more than enough chargers if you battery is running low. The cold argument is true though. We have two EVs at home and both see their autonomy drop significantly during winter.
- sandworm101 7y ago
  Try a mountain pass in winter. Ontario is flat. Even so, Ontario and BC are each more than 4x the size of the entire UK. Driving between major cities in canada is like driving across multiple countries in Europe.

vinay427 7y ago

Or a country in a different direction, Switzerland, where both trains and Teslas are more popular than in Germany despite the lack of many of those EV incentives, as far as I know.