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They’re only skeptics about electrification when you’re talking about battery electric. If you start talking about the horse they’ve spent the last decade backi

They’re only skeptics about electrification when you’re talking about battery electric. If you start talking about the horse they’ve spent the last decade backing (HFC) they’ll change their tune. Toyota is just bitter they backed the wrong horse. Their blatant lies and lobbying have ensured I’ll never buy one of there cars again.

Spivak 4y ago
Company that backed technology A over technology B because they believed that technology B had fundamental issues stays consistent on their stance, people very angry for some reason, news at 11. Also this is just wrong, Toyota has right now on the market competitive battery electric cars. But Toyota is a mass-market budget car marker and so faces way different challenges than luxury automakers selling to the already affluent who own their homes, and live and work in areas dotted with superchargers. Toyota, Honda, and GMC are stuck with solving the problems for the 90% of car users. Personally, I expect that if you banned the sale of new ICE cars today or in the near future it will completely destroy the new car market and screw the used car market even more than it already is right now. I feel like people forget how little control the typical American has over their living situation. If you live in a cheap rental with street parking and need your car to commute to work you're just stuck waiting.
causi 4y ago
Yep. At least once a week I wish the Chevy Volt had been made by Toyota. I'd adore a PHEV that combined Toyota reliability with enough electric range to get through my whole commute. The Prius Prime is just sad with its 25 mile max EV range that drops to 17 at highway speeds.
- baldeagle 4y ago
  They (Toyota) did make the only successor to the Volt - the RAV4 Prime. I literally just made the upgrade and it delivers on the promises the Volt made.
  - ip26 4y ago
    Right, and they've built a whopping 25,000 of them. They build 400,000+ RAV4 annually, so while the product might be good, that doesn't look like a very serious attempt.
    - frumper 4y ago
      I almost bought one of those 25k Primes, but the dealer bundled it with $6k worth of heavily overpriced dealer accessories, $2k for some kind of A/C enhancement that gets you "2-6mpg more!" that sounded very much like snake oil and then added another $5k "market adjustment" line item. I bought a Model Y instead.
philliphaydon 4y ago
Doesn’t Toyota make the best hybrid cars right now?
- mywittyname 4y ago
  Yes. Well, they have a license sharing agreement with Ford. But their early patents have run out, so there's the possibility of other brands building effective hybrids now. Though Hyundai/KIA have made strides in the Big Ass Starter method of hybridization.
  - philliphaydon 4y ago
    I know nothing about cars. I was watching videos recently trying to understand hybrids because I’m considering buying one when I move back to NZ. It seems like you can save a bit of money with them (hybrids) It seems the older models before 2017 should be avoided and after 2018 they are really good. And currently Toyota get quite a lot of extra milage. I looked at Mazda and Honda and hybrid adds a lot of extra cost to those compared to Toyota. But bit worried about the original commenters comment that he would never buy Toyota again. Is there something wrong with them?
    - lostmsu 4y ago
      Honda is cheaper than Toyota though, at least in the US.
PaulDavisThe1st 4y ago
So you feel that the points raised by Toyota have no merit?
- deleted 4y ago
  [deleted]
- tonmoy 4y ago
  Their points are not insurmountable and apply even more strongly to HFC. However, Toyota is still lobbying and advertising heavily on HFC, so it is hard not to question the good faith behind their arguments
- Maarten88 4y ago
  Yes. The affordability issues do not seem to affect Chinese car manufacturers, who are producing EV cars that are quite economical without subsidies. EV's may introduce new challenges for the grid, but when a country is unable or unwilling to fix that then all those batteries could also present an opportunity to balance that same grid using software. The problem that they do not mention is that they have huge investments in engine manufacturing that are useless for EV's. EV's are much simpler technology, the only hard parts are batteries and software. Switching too fast will make their existing manufacturing capabilities worthless, and this is what is really threatening them. That is also making EV's "expensive" to build for them (but not for Tesla, or anyone building new factories). I think that anyone in a developed country buying an ICE car now is already throwing money out the window: a few years from now nobody will want it anymore, depreciation will be very high.
  - xyzzy_plugh 4y ago
    > anyone in a developed country buying an ICE car now is already throwing money out the window: a few years from now nobody will want it anymore, depreciation will be very high. Far from universally true. Many developed countries do not have widespread access to charging stations, especially in rural areas. I'd buy an electric truck if I could go camping and tow a boat for a weekend without refueling, but as far as I can tell that's not possible yet.
nojito 4y ago
HFC is more than likely going to win out in the end. The larger issue is that Hybrids were jumped over for no reason.
- tonmoy 4y ago
  HFC is unlikely to win over because of how inefficient it is if you consider carbon free sources of hydrogen. If you don’t consider carbon free sources then why not just stay with gasoline? Hybrids have not been “jumped over”. You’ll find plenty of hybrids in the market, more so than electric. However in the long run we’ll have to eventually more to zero carbon, and pure EVs are already starting to be as useful as hybrids.
- metalliqaz 4y ago
  I would love to hear your evidence for that opinion, because everything I've seen is that HFC is only likely to succeed in long haul trucking.
  - nojito 4y ago
    It's a chicken or the egg problem. Once the infrastructure gets built out, there's no reason not to use an HFC for any mode of transportation.
    - metalliqaz 4y ago
      I think compressed cryogenic H tanks are a reason.
      - nojito 4y ago
        Storage is a solved problem. The issue is transportation. With the US being as big as it is...it's a very unique challenge.
Swenrekcah 4y ago
I don’t understand why some BEV fans hate hydrogen so much and some hydrogen fans hate BEV so much. There are drawbacks to both and advantages to both. BEVs work well for small and city vehicles, hydrogen for large transport vehicles and off-road type stuff. Best of all, if we use two, three or four energy sources for our stuff instead of just one, that spreads the load on earth’s resources.
- tcfhgj 4y ago
  Hydrogen is often used to make arguments against battery cars and for hydrogen cars (not large transport vehicles, planes, industrial applications with no alternatives, etc.)
- ip26 4y ago
  The argument from hydrogen advocates often goes something like, don't bother doing BEV now because hydrogen is going to be so much better ten years from now. (Meanwhile, keep buying fossil fuel cars please) It's especially hard to swallow when that advocate is Toyota, largest fossil fuel carmaker in the world.
  - metalliqaz 4y ago
    Toyota is also the manufacturer of the Prius, which outnumbers any other hybrid or BEV model that I see in my day-to-day.
- danans 4y ago
  > I don’t understand why some BEV fans hate hydrogen so much and some hydrogen fans hate BEV so much. > BEVs work well for small and city vehicles, hydrogen for large transport vehicles and off-road type stuff. They don't "hate" each other's tech. The entire conversation has up until this point has centered exclusively on light duty passenger vehicles. In that segment it's been clear for a long time that BEVs are the better technology. If there are any resentments from BEV advocates it is due to the way hydrogen fuel cell tech has been used as a way to slow down the electrification of light duty passenger vehicles. Only recently has the conversation started about where hydrogen makes more sense (trucking, aviation, and perhaps most importantly, long duration renewable energy storage).
darkteflon 4y ago
Same. I’m a resident of Japan. The interests of carmakers have shaped national industrial and environmental policy here in ways that ensure we - and our kids - will be living with the byproducts of hydrocarbon combustion in our cities and homes for a long time yet - decades probably. Could not be more disgusted, would never buy one of their products. Their cancerous influence on US environmental policy is also well-documented. The silver lining is that refusing to cannibalize their own product lines will cost them big - and soon. I suspect they’ll end up as a case study for MBAs. “Toyota” for me is a byword for venality, cynical anti-social exploitation, regulatory capture and gerontocracy.
RickJWagner 4y ago
They may have bet wrongly, as it seems Honda may have as well. But I would not pledge to avoid Toyotas. Their quality is second to none, by a large margin.

Spivak 4y ago

Company that backed technology A over technology B because they believed that technology B had fundamental issues stays consistent on their stance, people very angry for some reason, news at 11. Also this is just wrong, Toyota has right now on the market competitive battery electric cars. But Toyota is a mass-market budget car marker and so faces way different challenges than luxury automakers selling to the already affluent who own their homes, and live and work in areas dotted with superchargers. Toyota, Honda, and GMC are stuck with solving the problems for the 90% of car users. Personally, I expect that if you banned the sale of new ICE cars today or in the near future it will completely destroy the new car market and screw the used car market even more than it already is right now. I feel like people forget how little control the typical American has over their living situation. If you live in a cheap rental with street parking and need your car to commute to work you're just stuck waiting.

causi 4y ago

Yep. At least once a week I wish the Chevy Volt had been made by Toyota. I'd adore a PHEV that combined Toyota reliability with enough electric range to get through my whole commute. The Prius Prime is just sad with its 25 mile max EV range that drops to 17 at highway speeds.

baldeagle 4y ago
They (Toyota) did make the only successor to the Volt - the RAV4 Prime. I literally just made the upgrade and it delivers on the promises the Volt made.
- ip26 4y ago
  Right, and they've built a whopping 25,000 of them. They build 400,000+ RAV4 annually, so while the product might be good, that doesn't look like a very serious attempt.
  - frumper 4y ago
    I almost bought one of those 25k Primes, but the dealer bundled it with $6k worth of heavily overpriced dealer accessories, $2k for some kind of A/C enhancement that gets you "2-6mpg more!" that sounded very much like snake oil and then added another $5k "market adjustment" line item. I bought a Model Y instead.

philliphaydon 4y ago

Doesn’t Toyota make the best hybrid cars right now?

mywittyname 4y ago
Yes. Well, they have a license sharing agreement with Ford. But their early patents have run out, so there's the possibility of other brands building effective hybrids now. Though Hyundai/KIA have made strides in the Big Ass Starter method of hybridization.
- philliphaydon 4y ago
  I know nothing about cars. I was watching videos recently trying to understand hybrids because I’m considering buying one when I move back to NZ. It seems like you can save a bit of money with them (hybrids) It seems the older models before 2017 should be avoided and after 2018 they are really good. And currently Toyota get quite a lot of extra milage. I looked at Mazda and Honda and hybrid adds a lot of extra cost to those compared to Toyota. But bit worried about the original commenters comment that he would never buy Toyota again. Is there something wrong with them?
  - lostmsu 4y ago
    Honda is cheaper than Toyota though, at least in the US.

PaulDavisThe1st 4y ago

So you feel that the points raised by Toyota have no merit?

deleted 4y ago
[deleted]
tonmoy 4y ago
Their points are not insurmountable and apply even more strongly to HFC. However, Toyota is still lobbying and advertising heavily on HFC, so it is hard not to question the good faith behind their arguments
Maarten88 4y ago
Yes. The affordability issues do not seem to affect Chinese car manufacturers, who are producing EV cars that are quite economical without subsidies. EV's may introduce new challenges for the grid, but when a country is unable or unwilling to fix that then all those batteries could also present an opportunity to balance that same grid using software. The problem that they do not mention is that they have huge investments in engine manufacturing that are useless for EV's. EV's are much simpler technology, the only hard parts are batteries and software. Switching too fast will make their existing manufacturing capabilities worthless, and this is what is really threatening them. That is also making EV's "expensive" to build for them (but not for Tesla, or anyone building new factories). I think that anyone in a developed country buying an ICE car now is already throwing money out the window: a few years from now nobody will want it anymore, depreciation will be very high.
- xyzzy_plugh 4y ago
  > anyone in a developed country buying an ICE car now is already throwing money out the window: a few years from now nobody will want it anymore, depreciation will be very high. Far from universally true. Many developed countries do not have widespread access to charging stations, especially in rural areas. I'd buy an electric truck if I could go camping and tow a boat for a weekend without refueling, but as far as I can tell that's not possible yet.

nojito 4y ago

HFC is more than likely going to win out in the end. The larger issue is that Hybrids were jumped over for no reason.

tonmoy 4y ago
HFC is unlikely to win over because of how inefficient it is if you consider carbon free sources of hydrogen. If you don’t consider carbon free sources then why not just stay with gasoline? Hybrids have not been “jumped over”. You’ll find plenty of hybrids in the market, more so than electric. However in the long run we’ll have to eventually more to zero carbon, and pure EVs are already starting to be as useful as hybrids.
metalliqaz 4y ago
I would love to hear your evidence for that opinion, because everything I've seen is that HFC is only likely to succeed in long haul trucking.
- nojito 4y ago
  It's a chicken or the egg problem. Once the infrastructure gets built out, there's no reason not to use an HFC for any mode of transportation.
  - metalliqaz 4y ago
    I think compressed cryogenic H tanks are a reason.
    - nojito 4y ago
      Storage is a solved problem. The issue is transportation. With the US being as big as it is...it's a very unique challenge.

Swenrekcah 4y ago

I don’t understand why some BEV fans hate hydrogen so much and some hydrogen fans hate BEV so much. There are drawbacks to both and advantages to both. BEVs work well for small and city vehicles, hydrogen for large transport vehicles and off-road type stuff. Best of all, if we use two, three or four energy sources for our stuff instead of just one, that spreads the load on earth’s resources.

tcfhgj 4y ago
Hydrogen is often used to make arguments against battery cars and for hydrogen cars (not large transport vehicles, planes, industrial applications with no alternatives, etc.)
ip26 4y ago
The argument from hydrogen advocates often goes something like, don't bother doing BEV now because hydrogen is going to be so much better ten years from now. (Meanwhile, keep buying fossil fuel cars please) It's especially hard to swallow when that advocate is Toyota, largest fossil fuel carmaker in the world.
- metalliqaz 4y ago
  Toyota is also the manufacturer of the Prius, which outnumbers any other hybrid or BEV model that I see in my day-to-day.
danans 4y ago
> I don’t understand why some BEV fans hate hydrogen so much and some hydrogen fans hate BEV so much. > BEVs work well for small and city vehicles, hydrogen for large transport vehicles and off-road type stuff. They don't "hate" each other's tech. The entire conversation has up until this point has centered exclusively on light duty passenger vehicles. In that segment it's been clear for a long time that BEVs are the better technology. If there are any resentments from BEV advocates it is due to the way hydrogen fuel cell tech has been used as a way to slow down the electrification of light duty passenger vehicles. Only recently has the conversation started about where hydrogen makes more sense (trucking, aviation, and perhaps most importantly, long duration renewable energy storage).

darkteflon 4y ago

Same. I’m a resident of Japan. The interests of carmakers have shaped national industrial and environmental policy here in ways that ensure we - and our kids - will be living with the byproducts of hydrocarbon combustion in our cities and homes for a long time yet - decades probably. Could not be more disgusted, would never buy one of their products. Their cancerous influence on US environmental policy is also well-documented. The silver lining is that refusing to cannibalize their own product lines will cost them big - and soon. I suspect they’ll end up as a case study for MBAs. “Toyota” for me is a byword for venality, cynical anti-social exploitation, regulatory capture and gerontocracy.

RickJWagner 4y ago

They may have bet wrongly, as it seems Honda may have as well. But I would not pledge to avoid Toyotas. Their quality is second to none, by a large margin.