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The EV Transition Is Harder Than Anyone Thinks

• jleyank 4y ago
  They have to deal with the metal/battery recycling problem otherwise they have to make a fleet of batteries every n years and deal with staggering landfills. Uneven distribution of raw materials in such a case will cause tensions.
  • paulryanrogers 4y ago
    Compared to the externalities of fossil fuels I suspect these challenges are easier to solve.
    • smt88 4y ago
      Whether or not they're easier to solve, we haven't spent that much time trying to solve them yet. Compare that to fossil fuels, which have had billions of dollars of research poured into them. We know what the cheapest forms of harm reduction are for fossil fuels, and they're not cheap enough even for the budgets of multiple nations.
      • thoughtstheseus 4y ago
        Lots of players are active in the battery recycling space. Tesla’s former CTO, J. B. Straubel, departed to start redwood materials in 2017 as one example. Until recently it has not been much of a problem. I suspect hybrids will be the interim solutions until we get to scale with battery recycling.
        • 2muchcoffeeman 4y ago
          Is not just cars. Consider the disposable vaping pen. Those things need to be banned.
          • smt88 4y ago
            Unless I'm misunderstanding the units here, a Tesla Model 3 has a battery that holds 230 Ah, whereas a vape pen is closer to 280 mAh. So each electric car is going to have somewhere in range of 1,000 disposable vape pens. That doesn't change the fact that disposable vape pens should be banned, but it's an interesting data point in the recycling discussion.
        • jleyank 4y ago
          They will probably be the interim solution until the charger and power networks are up and going. Some of us have longer-haul driving in our repertoire, and carrying a charger beats the wait for (limited) charging stations. Or, perhaps, when the people we visit lack charging. It's also (still) bloody hard to carry a bucket of electrons to get a stuck car going - we'll need portable power units to clear, say, highway mass fender-benders.
          • maxerickson 4y ago
            Yes, but it's a matter of making them more than anything else. The F150 can charge other vehicles: https://media.ford.com/content/fordmedia/fna/us/en/news/2021/12/21/vehicle-to-vehicle-charging.html https://media.ford.com/content/fordmedia/fna/us/en/news/2021... Throw a bus battery or a generator on a trailer and as long as the vehicles aren't too damaged to operate you can make quick enough progress clearing things out.
    • tshaddox 4y ago
      Depends what you mean by "easier to solve." It's certainly not easier than not solving the externalities of fossil fuels, which is what we're currently doing. If we somehow mandated that fossil fuel externalities were solved (internalized), then perhaps we would find that solving the externalities of alternative energy sources would indeed by easier/cheaper.
      • Me1000 4y ago
        You're probably right, but that ship has long sailed, I fear. In order to solve for the externalities you've got to get broad buy-in, and people are already hesitant to spend money on a small device that captures participates and emissions at the source, to say nothing of a carbon-tax. So you're stuck with a political problem. On the other hand there is already a market for recycling of metals and batteries. So you've basically avoided the political problem entirely buy just telling people "you'll get X dollars back when you recycle your car's battery". Just practically speaking, a person has got to do something with their old battery, might as well get a few bucks.
      • paulryanrogers 4y ago
        > It's certainly not easier than not solving the externalities of fossil fuels Sorry if I was imprecise. I meant dealing with the externalities of fossil fuels, even if 'dealing' turns out to be "change nothing and see what happens".
    • code_biologist 4y ago
      The point is that one of the externalities of EV materials production is CO2 emissions. Mining and processing the materials is incredibly fossil fuel intensive. By the time you have enough materials for a meaningful percentage of the world driving with EVs our CO2 footprint will be significantly worse than if we had focused on hybrid vehicles with small batteries.
      • paulryanrogers 4y ago
        Don't let perfect be the enemy of the good. A fossil fuel vehicle too takes a lot of non-renewables to get it ready to drive. Yet it also needs even more to keep it moving. And changing all their motors to electric is more work than replacing fewer power plants.
        • recyclelater 4y ago
          You’ve got the perfect wrong. The good is plug-in hybrid with 40 miles range and 1/8th the battery. 8 built for every electric car. Solves 90% of personal transportation needs with electric alone. The fox on full electric is criminal imho.
  • alfor 4y ago
    It will be a large problem 20 years later ... in 2043 But there is already companies that do it now, used batteries are basically very high grade ore, well worth to recycle. But there is also a good change that we will have better chemistry in the next 20 years. I think it’s a net positive, with for sure some challenges along the way, meanwhile gas cars still work and will for a long time.
  • tzs 4y ago
    Assuming that everyone in the world got an EV with a 100 ft^3 battery pack, and every 5 years that battery pack was replaced with a new battery pack and the old one was sent to a landfill, and that peak population will be 10 billion people, 72 battery landfills that are 20 miles x 20 miles x 50 feet deep would be enough to last 200 years. We will need to eventually figured out something better than disposing of batteries in landfills, but we have a long long time to figure that out.
  • thinkcontext 4y ago
    Many batteries will be reused before being recycled. After their useful life for transportation they still have most of their charge capacity, so they can be used for grid storage. This is handy because it will allow used EVs to retain more value than otherwise.
  • jandrese 4y ago
    Battery recycling is already ramping up. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Jim1nksFKTI https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Jim1nksFKTI
  • theshrike79 4y ago
    We can recycle EV batteries up top 95% efficiency _today_. And very very few of those even get recycled, because there's a huge 3rd party aftermarket for "expired" EV batteries. There's also a whole industry of people who fix individual cells inside bigger batteries when the official instruction is to scrap it and get a new one for $$$$.
    • wnkrshm 4y ago
      What are the byproducts of the recycling? We can recycle gold-alloys 100% but there are cyano-compounds in the river after that.
      • theshrike79 4y ago
        The tech is so new that most companies are pretty quiet on their actual methodology and what percentages they can recover. Competitive advantage and all. Reuse/refurbishing will still be the biggest use for EV batteries for the 2020's in my opinion.
• havblue 4y ago
  "EVs will/will not create more pollution than they eliminate." I'm just skeptical about the heavy push for passenger EVs: while they're a small fraction of the carbon emissions pie in the world, they manage to be what we spend the most time talking about. It just seems like getting new cars has the added benefit of us buying shiny new stuff without concentrating on the heavy lifting. (Or disrupting industries that would lower gdp)
  • _hypx 4y ago
    [flagged]
    • barbazoo 4y ago
      > EDIT: People don’t like to hear the truth. Do you have a source to back up your claim that that's the truth?
      • _hypx 4y ago
        A bunch of people immediately downvoted within a few minutes of posting that. I guess I struck a nerve.
    • PaulDavisThe1st 4y ago
      I do not like the typical conservative line of "there isn't one size that fits everywhere, which is why the [government one size larger than we can control with money and connections] should not create mandates" However, having moved from Philadelphia to rural New Mexico 4 years ago, I have to admit that I can see the point. E-bikes and mass transit are not effective solutions for the rural west. Doesn't mean they are not great ideas, but you're not going to solve transportation in the rural west with that sort of thing. In metro areas though, absolutely.
      • _hypx 4y ago
        Most EV sales happen in urban centers, not rural areas. Not to mention that battery cars doesn't really solve the problem for rural areas too, due to limited range, less charging infrastructure and much higher cost.
• lxe 4y ago
  I'm betting many of the policymakers understand as much about EVs, the power grid, and global supply chains, as they do about TikTok.
• uncletaco 4y ago
  I don't think I'll be buying an EV for at least another 10-15 years. I usually buy used and considering the best is yet to come with EVs and it will likely be in someone's hands for a few years before it's thrown on a lot for something I'd be willing to pay I'm just not seeing one for me in the near future. I'm also not looking forward to a future where buying a used car entails having to sign up for a monthly butt heater subscription.
  • anonkogudhyfhhf 4y ago
    Problem is it's not just EVs that are adding the subscription and everything software cars. All cars are going in that direction
    • uncletaco 4y ago
      Well I guess I'm gonna buy a Volvo and try to maintain it for the next 2 million miles.
  • ttt3ts 4y ago
    Don't worry the butt warmer will have failed long ago in your 15 year old EV Typed while sitting in my 20 year old pickup truck whos manual windows still work but not most of the electronics :P
    • Tagbert 4y ago
      But does the passenger door swing open on left turns like my father’s pickup? That was exciting the first time that happened.
      • ttt3ts 4y ago
        Lol, not quite that jank yet. Maybe in another few years.
• seydor 4y ago
  One would say it was ill-thought. Remote working is reducing the need for having any car, and its utilization. People who are eco-conscious may rather choose to refurb an old car they use sparingly rather than buy a few new tons of common and rare metals. And most cities in europe are ill-suited for cars that need regular charging. All this infrastructure was for 26% of CO2 (before remote work).
• Animats 4y ago
  The infrastructure is harder than the vehicles. New power plants take longer to get built than new vehicles. Electric vehicles offer opportunity for innovation, but they don't have to be innovative. The zooming Teslas and Mach-E Mustangs get the attention. But that's not where the volume is. The electric Ford Transit is just a Ford Transit with electric drive. It's boring, but useful. Commercial vehicles which make many stops, from Amazon to the U.S. Postal Service, are rapidly going electric. The real question is, when do electric vehicles become cheaper than IC vehicles. Last year, the same vehicle in electric seems to cost about US $10,000 more. This year, the Ford E-transit is about $5000 more than the IC version. It's harder to tell for passenger vehicles, because manufacturers are treating "electric" as a premium option and dumping in all the high-markup stuff such as leather seats. At some point somebody will come out with something comparable to the Toyota Corolla at a comparable price. BYD already has, but they don't sell in the US. Then electric sales will take over.
  • smitty1e 4y ago
    I'm less inimical to the idea of an electric car than I am all of the Orwellian control mechanisms that will come with it. Contra all of the Really Smart People who seem to view the rest of humanity as livestock, a huge swath of people don't care to be bossed around and treated like livestock by those who are (a) too full of themselves and (b) demonstrably incorrect on pretty much every issue. Get stuffed, global elite, and leave my diesel vehicle alone.
    • rfrey 4y ago
      One really has to stretch to equate the change of prime movers in an automobile to a global conspiracy to destroy free will. What could the conspirators do with an electric vehicle that they couldn't do with a Hummer?
      • prottog 4y ago
        As it stands, I think every EV in the US market currently has some kind of built-in data connections to allow integrating with the manufacturer's mobile app. So not about the prime mover, but it just so happens that the current generation of EVs are more connected to the hivemind, if you will. Of course, a number of ICE cars are also that way. I, for one, cannot wait for the day that somebody brings the Toyota Corolla of EVs to the market; something under $25k MSRP with nothing fancy. I don't need OTA updates or the ability to turn the AC on from my phone.
• tokipin 4y ago
  These articles always miss the most important point. People are buying EVs because they're better. That's the whole point of Tesla making attractive vehicles, aesthetically and functionally. That market pull allows for an S-curve in the technology, since it reduces market risk for investing in each increase in scale. This is a completely different scenario than what the article suggests, which is that EVs are some kind of medicine for climate change that society is trying to have discipline about. Not so. It's a life or death situation for the auto industry, they don't have a choice. They either join the race or die. This makes most concerns about the transition irrelevant. For example, laws banning gasoline cars by 2035 are as useful as laws banning flip phones by 2015 would have been.
  • CodeWriter23 4y ago
    Sure, don’t believe a scientific organization like the IEEE.
    • sbaiddn 4y ago
      They're not a scientific organization. They're the professional association for two specific types of engineer, electrical and electronic.
      • CodeWriter23 4y ago
        Engineers are scientists.
        • sbaiddn 4y ago
          No. They're two different disciplines. There can and is an intersection but the goals of science and engineering are fundamentally different.
  • logifail 4y ago
    > People are buying EVs because they're better This is only true for people with a certain amount of spare money to pay the extra, since EVs are more expensive to purchase. "The new EVs cost an average of $65,041 in November [2022], according to Kelley Blue Book, while gas cars averaged $48,681 that month"[0] [0] https://www.businessinsider.com/electric-vehicles-prices-expensive-cheaper-automakers-batteries-lithium-supply-demand-2022-12 https://www.businessinsider.com/electric-vehicles-prices-exp...
• 0xbadcafebee 4y ago
  Those of us who understand how EVs work have been saying this for years. I think we all hope everything magically gets solved simultaneously to make all the deadlines work. I expect most of us know it probably won't actually work, but we also don't want anything to stop us trying, so we just... keep moving forward. I think we also hope nobody tells the consumers that they're in for at least a decade or more where everything is terrible, or they might not buy the cars; none of this works if they don't buy the cars. Based on USGov estimates, we need to increase lithium access by 2.5x every year for 18 years. We need something like 10x the grid capacity to serve the new power demands (and that's not considering that, for example, most green energy supply fluctuates). Land still has to be acquired to build out all the new infrastructure. Supply lines need to be increased and made robust enough to build all the cars without more delays. Skilled workers need to be added to service the new industry demands. And then we have to hope somehow that all the industry EVs are replacing get new jobs and don't depress the economy, hurting EV sales/investment. Oh, and probably at least half of all new EV infra funding is based on robust credit markets.
  • qaq 4y ago
    Where is that 10X coming from ? Americans drive 14,109,317,259 km per day which would be 2821 GWh vs 11616 GWh total daily consumption. Considering you are charging mostly at night I have no clue where you are getting 10X from. For the price of COVID response you could've outfitted every US household with 20K solar setup a few times over.
    • oittaa 4y ago
      > Where is that 10X coming from ? He is lying like every other oil shill in this thread. I'm quite surprised how many of them always come out every time an EV or other clean energy related article is posted. There's an interesting video from "Climate Town" explaining how these troll accounts work: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FOi05zDO4yw https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FOi05zDO4yw
      • mikewarot 4y ago
        >like every other oil shill in this thread. I could likewise assume every pro-EV person is a member of a cult, or an Elon fanboy. Let's not do that.
• karaterobot 4y ago
  I'm shopping for a car now. I want to buy an EV in principle, but there aren't any specific EVs I want to buy. I'm a highly motivated buyer, completely sold on the benefits, but there just isn't anything that meets my requirements. So for all intents and purposes I'm tallied in the same column as someone who thinks EVs will destroy the power grid and ruin the auto industry.
  • MobileVet 4y ago
    Outside of range… what requirements are you not able to fill? There are a ton of vehicles in the US now at a variety of price points and trim levels. I am honestly curious what you are looking for that you can’t find
    • freetime2 4y ago
      I'm not the parent, but feel the same way. My requirements are basically a minivan (lots of space for family + cargo and definitely appreciate the sliding doors), all-wheel drive, and costs under $50K. I'm not in any rush to buy a new car though, so hopefully by the time I am looking for my next car there will be some EV options available. The VW ID Buzz looks interesting, but not available in our market and I'm skeptical that the three-row, AWD version will priced under $50k if/when it is released here. On the other end of the spectrum we have an ultra-compact "kei" car that cost under $20,000, also AWD. Nissan has released the Sakura EV which gets close on price (after incentives), but still no AWD option. We will probably be replacing this car soon, and sadly it doesn't look we will be replacing it with an EV. But at 47 mpg for a standard ICE engine, and we also don't put that many miles on it, I also don't feel too guilty about it.
      • qwerpy 4y ago
        We have similar requirements but compromised on different criteria: - Active family of 4 that likes to go on road trips. Need to be able to haul bikes, gear, etc. - AWD required for the occasional ice/snow on the hill I live on - Cost <=$125K. <=$100K preferred - EV Except that I absolutely refused to compromise on the "EV" part after driving a Model 3 for a few years. Would have loved a electric minivan if one existed. We evaluated Model Y, Model X, Rivian S. Ended up going with a 7 seater Y with a tow hitch. It has been great but a little cramped with 2 car seats, and the third row is unusable for tall people (all the adults in the extended family are tall). I have a preorder for a cybertruck which may be nearly perfect. Huge cargo, fits 6 people. Ridiculous range if that hasn't changed from announcement specs.
• elihu 4y ago
  The transition to luxury EVs is hard. The transition to EVs is less hard. Things get easier if you throw out some of the requirements that we didn't need in the first place. For instance, we don't need cobalt to make batteries. LFP cells are fine, though they may need extra insulation and heating/cooling systems in cold weather. We don't need copper for the main power cables. Aluminum is fine as long as you can properly engineer the connectors. For that matter, we don't need copper for the motor windings either. Aluminum could work there too, it's just that the motor will tend to be physically larger and less powerful. We don't need rare earths for permanent magnets, though again this means a bulkier and less powerful motor (unless you go with induction, but induction motors aren't as efficient as permanent magnet motors). We don't need cars with 300 mile range batteries. We /do/ need cars to be able to make long trips in a timely fashion, but that can be addressed by increasing charge station availability or (what would be much better) electrifying our major highways so that vehicles don't even need to stop to recharge. If the average car has "only" 100 miles of range rather than 200 miles, that translates to being able to make a lot more cars with the same amount of batteries, and the cars can be a lot lighter. Most people buying Rivians and Lightnings and electric Hummers are wasting resources that could have gone towards building three or four boring sedans or minivans. Some people really do need trucks for what they do, but we could adopt policies that discourage truck ownership rather than encourage it (e.g. CDL requirement for vehicles with more than a certain power/weight, get rid of the chicken tax to improve availability of smaller trucks, add visibility regulations to prohibit comically tall grills).
  • zamnos 4y ago
    Honestly even sedans and minivans are big when you consider that the majority of trips are taken by one person, the driver. EV Smartcars and Fiat 500's should be where it's at. And yet they don't even exist. The electric Fiat 500 was discontinued. So as much as I agree with you, the market has spoken, and, well, we're wrong. The transition to luxury EVs is easier than the people's EV, because luxury car buyers spend more money on their cars. This means you can spend more money on the pieces that comprise the car, on super efficient motors and high capacity batteries using rare materials, and position yourself at the upper end of the segment. Those customer will scarecly blink at the idea that they need to spend $50k to rewire the neighborhood power distro point to add 600 amps so they, and 9 of their neighbors, can have 60 amp circuit with 48 amp chargers on them, and then be able to swallow a $7k charger install to rewire their whole garage as well. Meanwhile, an apartment dwelling people's EV owner might not even have an assigned spot in the shared complex carports, never mind afford a couple hundred to install hardware to get an at home charger in a shared garage becase only half of Americans can even afford an emergency $500 bill. People buy cars based on what they want, and only secondarily based on what they can afford (otherwise auto financing wouldn't be a thing). Selling a small functional EV? Well, just ask Nissan how well the Leaf is doing and compare that to Tesla's sales numbers.
• graphe 4y ago
  It's pretty easy to game the system in terms of an EV. Get the credit for the EV, install a fossil fuel charger/range extender in the back and you have a hybrid that can do range and charges on fossil fuels. It's not as green but it is isn't as disruptive to the system.
  • barbazoo 4y ago
    Does any of that exist? Sure you could put a generator in your trunk but without making structural changes to the car that wouldn't really work.
    • timbit42 4y ago
      This is essentially what the Chevy Volt was. It ran as an EV until the battery ran out and then the engine kicked on to keep the battery charged.
      • barbazoo 4y ago
        But presumably what parent was implying is that you could get a pure EV (I'm assuming here it needs to be an EV, not a plug-in hybrid or a hybrid to get the subsidy) and add a generator to it.
        • timbit42 4y ago
          Yes, I understood that.
  • htag 4y ago
    The fact that this is rare indicates it's not a good value.
• d--b 4y ago
  Someone enlighten me please. I’ve been wondering why we don’t concentrate on sodium batteries instead of lithium for EVs. They’re heavier but is that really a problem? Today’s cars are heavy as hell, there must be ways to make lighter vehicles that balance the weight of sodium, no? The main barrier in EV adoption is the price difference, which, if I understand correctly comes mainly from the battery. Take all the heavy/expensive crap out of modern cars, use sodium batteries instead of lithium and you have yourself a winner, right? That all seems like obvious choices to me. Where am I wrong?
  • csours 4y ago
    > I’ve been wondering why we don’t concentrate on sodium batteries instead of lithium for EVs. They’re heavier but is that really a problem? Sodium batteries suitable for EVs don't really exist yet. > Today’s cars are heavy as hell, there must be ways to make lighter vehicles that balance the weight of sodium, no? You can make them slower, smaller, and shorter range. You can add lightness with things like aluminum and composites, but those are rather expensive. No you really can't remove enough weight and maintain the same form factor and user experience. Batteries have been consistently coming down in price. This is the one thing that capitalism is good at, I feel quite sure that batteries will continue to come down in price. There are still huge advances being made every day in the lab; wait 5 years or so and those upgrades will be in commercial production. If a sodium chemistry can prove itself to be the best, it will be used. Research institutions and industry are trying multiple parallel tracks
  • thinkcontext 4y ago
    Several Chinese manufacturers are introducing GWh scale sodium battery lines that should begin production this year or next. Some plan to use them in tandem with lithium batteries
  • _hypx 4y ago
    Sodium-ion batteries still don't exist yet. And even if they do, they will be much lower energy density than li-ion. EVs will get heavier, not lighter.
    • 4y ago
• travisporter 4y ago
  I wish there is a dumb car with an ev powertrain and nothing else. No screen, telemetry, autopilot nothing.
  • polpo 4y ago
    You're exactly describing the base model Nissan Leaf before the 2018 models. And base models of the 2018 and later Leaf are still relatively spartan.
  • bartvk 4y ago
    The current crop of electric motorcycles are like that.
• kevin_thibedeau 4y ago
  It's essentially impossible to upgrade existing residential neighborhoods to 200A service at every home. Nobody's going to pay for that infrastructure. This alone is going to limit the scale of adoption. Never mind the millions who will never have access to a dedicated charging station.
  • polpo 4y ago
    Our house has 100A service and we use a 30A car charger and have never popped our main breaker. On a hot day when the AC is likely to run, I'll hit the button on my car charger to delay charging to the middle of the night when we won't be running the electric dryer or stove.
  • dymk 4y ago
    You don’t even need 200 amp service for the 50 amp chargers that most EVs come with
    • twblalock 4y ago
      Depends on what else is in your house. What you need is enough headroom in your panel to pass inspection. That's generally more than you really "need" at any given time, but good luck convincing the inspector that you will be fine because you won't charge your EV and use your dryer at the same time. Most homes were built with enough headroom to power all the appliances that were present when the home was built, and that may not be enough if you add a 50-amp car charger. This is often the case for older homes that had air conditioning installed at a later date -- there goes your headroom! As a homeowner trying to own an EV this sucks, but as a home buyer this is good -- people should be able to have confidence that electrical systems can handle the load the appliances in the home are capable of drawing, and it's not unusual for people with families to do laundry, cook, and charge their cars at the same time.
      • timbit42 4y ago
        You can get circuits to shut off or reduce the car charging until enough headroom is available to charge the car.
• BrentOzar 4y ago
  I'm in the midst of trying to get an electric car charger installed in my garage. Don't shoot the messenger. I live in Las Vegas, in a 25-year-old subdivision. The homes' 200-amp panels don't have enough spare capacity to add a charger. (3 old less-efficient HVAC units, pool pumps, hot tub, electric oven, clothes dryer, etc.) So to add a charger, I have to get my home's service raised to 400 amps. That wouldn't be a big deal, except... the neighborhood's transformers are already over capacity, too. A few of the homes already added 400-amp service so they could add Tesla chargers, and there's no capacity left in the neighborhood. Nevada Energy is willing to add a new transformer in the neighborhood - but they want to charge me $20,000, plus the costs of trenching the new 400-amp line from the transformer to my house, plus the new panel, plus the charger. It's looking like a $40,000 installation. Or... I could just put solar on the roof, build a separate isolated 200-amp panel powered by solar, and charge the car from that. (Plus move over the pool pumps, hot tub, etc while I'm at it.) That isn't free, either, but at least it'd cut my electric bills long term instead of adding to 'em. I don't know how many homes & neighborhoods are in this situation, but I was surprised that a 25-year old neighborhood is having this problem.
  • hnburnsy 4y ago
    Share the dryer outlet with a Y splitter, $50. Just saved you $39,950. You will charge at 20-22 miles per hour, which is plenty.
    • modeless 4y ago
      A passive Y splitter is not a good idea, but you can get active ones with a switch that only lets one thing run at a time, which works just fine for EV charging.
      • schiffern 4y ago
        $250 or thereabouts, currently on sale. Boom we saved him $39,750. https://splitvolt.com/collections/all/products/splitvolt-nema-14-30-splitter-switch https://splitvolt.com/collections/all/products/splitvolt-nem...
• Mizoguchi 4y ago
  If they real purpose of both manufactures and consumers of EVs was to combate climate change, then a much easier, cheaper, and better solution would be for everyone to discourage driving and promote public transportation and telecommuting. That would not only reduce emissions much more effectively, but the money saved in maintaining expensive and unnecessary infrastructure like thousands of miles of highways and bridges could be invested in maintaining and expanding public transportation and in bringing, fast, reliable and inexpensive internet access to every household so more people can telecommute to work/school. But cars look nice and they are fun to drive.
  • ttiurani 4y ago
    Exactly. Electrification of single-occupancy vehicles – which, let's face it, is what the overwhelming majority of the EV business is really about – is not ecological. When you take into account environmental stress in general[0], and don't tunnel vision just on CO2[1], it should be immediately obvious to everyone that stopping the climate and ecological breakdown needs much more imagination than just replacing a car with another car. [0] https://goodlife.leeds.ac.uk/national-trends/country-trends/#USA https://goodlife.leeds.ac.uk/national-trends/country-trends/... [1] https://www.insnet.org/carbon-tunnel-vision-or-inter-connected-response/ https://www.insnet.org/carbon-tunnel-vision-or-inter-connect...
• _ea1k 4y ago
  Articles like this are music to a Tesla exec's ears. :)
• ConanRus 4y ago
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• pier25 4y ago
  The article mentions an ebook. Anyone has a link?
• voidfunc 4y ago
  I still haven't quite figured out how all the people that street park because they don't have driveways or garages or even a place directly out front of their house are supposed to use EVs. Cities are not building the infrastructure to support that at all.
  • qdog 4y ago
    New apartment buildings are adding EV spaces, but on-street parkers either have to find a charger and take time, or regularly park somewhere with a charger (like at work). The city could start adding chargers pretty easily at like street lamps, but haven't seen any indication of that so far. I've found that the big city is not particularly friendly for either gas or electric if you don't have a fixed place to park, the chargers are generally slow and Tesla has great coverage outside the city (at least where I've been), but poor support inside the city. There is going to have to be some infrastructure upgrade at some point.
    • erik_seaberg 4y ago
      https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=33418206 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=33418206 depicted a public charger for street parking. We’re going to need millions of those, but I haven’t seen any yet.
    • Ekaros 4y ago
      EV spaces... But realistically you want EV charging on every spot and reasonably infra and cabling to support some fraction of them working at same time. Shuffling your car around and waiting for shared facility possibly misused just doesn't seem like good fun to me.
      • qdog 4y ago
        The places I looked at had some EV dedicated parking spaces and then shared EV charging. Just like gas cars you don't need to charge every day, they will probably add more chargers as more people get EV cars. But yeah, it is pretty inconvenient for a lot of people at the moment, I have a home charger in my garage, but traveling to a city is more challenging. Range has been no problem, super chargers are fast, but then you have to find a charger in a garage or something where it usually charges money to park and if it's not a Tesla charger usually doesn't charge very fast, it gets expensive quickly. Reminder we are constantly moving in the 'better EV support' direction, whereas I have seen a gas station removed recently and a neighborhood protest about building a new one. On the other hand, I have now stayed at hotels where the valet tops off the car, so I didn't even have to stop to charge at all on trips < max range.
• perryizgr8 4y ago
  It's actually very easy. As soon as electric cars are better for the customer, people will automatically start buying them. As soon as that happens, manufacturers will ramp up production to meet demand. Transition over.
• cryptoegorophy 4y ago
  I’ve been driving EV for quite a while, if you have your own garage it is a no Brainer because you essentially have a “pump” at home. It’s like you don’t go to a gas station to charge your phone. Charge at night, same here. It is just so much better overall with next to nothing maintenance.
• causality0 4y ago
  I'll never get why PHEVs never caught on. They're no more complex than a hybrid and combine the best aspects of both ICE and BEV vehicles. They require no charging infrastructure, and need only a fraction the battery weight of a BEV.
  • danans 4y ago
    > I'll never get why PHEVs never caught on. I think they haven't caught on because at this point, most people who buy EVs have another gasoline-fueled car, or are pure EV enthusiasts. Plugin hybrids are great for 1 car households whose daily drives are within the battery range, but want easy refueling on long trips. But 1 car households are rare in the US. They are also more expensive than their non-plugin versions (at least they were before the IRA tax credits went into effect).
• jjtheblunt 4y ago
  > The EV transition is harder.. I drove exclusively pure electric (bmw i3) for 7+ years and it was far easier a transition than i ever imagined. Like 10x easier. These titles with such FUD assertions prioritize drama and attention seeking over facts from years of data. edit: these articles overlook that a huge percentage of daily around town driving recharges easily on the existing grid at 110v, but the articles tend to presume everyone need charge a depleted long range battery, daily, which is patently false.
  • freetime2 4y ago
    You seem to be speaking to your personal experience of transitioning to an EV, whereas the article is concerned with the scale of changes needed to transition the entire automotive industry to EVs in the 15 year timeframe that policymakers are targetting.
    • jjtheblunt 4y ago
      Yes, and thank you, because I should add (should have added) that i charged at 110 volts and the power draw is negligible on the grid, for most days. the interesting and oft overlooked reality is that EV use, and charging on the existing grid, is beyond adequate for a huge percentage of daily driver purposes.
• Guthur 4y ago
  It's all a scam. None of it lines up with touted aims. The cost in so called green house gases to mine, refine and transport the materials will far dwarf whatever is saved of 7% or so of CO2 that comes from personal transport (including buses). And on top of that electricity generation is likely to be coming from hydro carbons of one form or another anyway. This is all to impoverish the many to enrich a few. Be under no illusion this process has been repeated ad infinitum through out our history. All systems of control are thoroughly captured and you'll walk willingly towards it as many continue to listen to these worm tongues.
  • theshrike79 4y ago
    The materials need to be mined and refined _once_. Then they're in the reuse/recycle -loop forever. Oil we pump out of the ground (mine), refine and transport in a constant stream and then we literally burn it into dust. GOTO10. More people have been "impoverished" by oil spill damage than ever will be because of battery mineral mining or electricity generation.
• coldtea 4y ago
  No shit! It's as hard as many have repeatedly said, it's only the techno-optimist crowd that got it wrong. It ain't gonna happen in any of the promised "deadlines" by EU and others. And if there's a prolonged recession all bets are off.
  • coldtea 4y ago
    And in case it's not obvious already, same goes for all the "Mars mission" targets by Musk and others (regarding, "SpaceX's 1st crewed Mars mission could launch as early as 2024, Elon Musk says"). Of course nothing will happen (even at 2026, 2029 dates, beyond this "as early as" date), those are PR announcements. But if somebody said than in HN a few years ago at the height of the Musk-hype they'd be laughed off.
• anovikov 4y ago
  The chart is so completely confusing, i totally can't read it however much i try... They could do better.
• textread 4y ago
  The tinkerer in me loves to own a vehicle I can easily service myself. Electric vehicles, in their current form, can easily electrocute an amateur DIY mechanic to death. I love older purely mechanical vehicles. Their simplicity means that I can fix most things with duct tape or a piece of metal wire.
• marsven_422 4y ago
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• spokeonawheel 4y ago
  Its because EVs are HIGH cost with LOW range. Also, EV minivan club, party of 1
• elif 4y ago
  I think it's bizarre to make the claim that EV users generally should be encouraged to charge during the day instead of night using the argument that California, at some times, has a surplus of solar energy it is unable to utilize. There is no attempt to argue that any states other than California have a solar surplus, no cure for the rolling blackouts they do occur during the peak hours in California, or any analysis about how many electric cars would eliminate that California surplus. It's such a niche of a niche perspective.. I'm pretty sure there's good reason why my utility provider sells me energy at $0.01 overnight and $0.17 during the day.
• lynx23 4y ago
  "Anyone" already knows the EV transition isn't that easy. It is basically only lobbyists, politicians and journalists who seem to life in a world divorced from reality. Esp. journalists, who are fighting on the forefront of peope-manipulation. Journalism seems to be dominated by wishful thinking and political dogfights. Gone are the days when a journalist actually reported about what is going on, not what they would like to see.....
• oittaa 4y ago
  Wow, I didn't expect this many oil shills in this thread.
• ben_w 4y ago
  The fear of collapsing the energy grid is why I think it would be a good idea to put solar cells on electric cars, even though that's not a great place to put solar panels if all else was equal.
  • lm28469 4y ago
    You're going to get like 5 miles a day in best case scenario
    • ben_w 4y ago
      5-10 for normal sized cars, yes. I hear the average miles driven is only about 12 per day, so it's still significant. Or it would be if people didn't generally prefer to park in shade on sunny days. But as cars are a big energy sink, even 1 mile/day is still potentially very useful.
    • timbit42 4y ago
      The Aptera can get up to 40 miles per day from its built-in solar panels in California sunshine. A lot less in London, England. It can get that much because it's twice as efficient as a Tesla Model 3. Aptera: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mpiH-Y-HOvE https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mpiH-Y-HOvE
• crownosey 4y ago
  the transition to gasoline was hard too but it was forced through as a way for Pacific/Standard Oil to make a killing (of people who's land they were digging up)
• mikewarot 4y ago
  >given the sheer tonnage of lithium, cobalt, and other raw materials needed for EV batteries, that figure is overly optimistic, suggests the mineral market analysis company Benchmark Mineral Intelligence, unless nearly 300 new mines and supporting refineries open by then. This is the real show stopper. We lack the supply chains necessary to replace all the cars with electric models. This simple fact should give rise to other questions about the practicality of mass conversion to electric vehicles. --- As for me, if the supply chains got fixed. I've got the cheapest house in town, with 100 amp 240 volt service. Without spending 10% the cost of the house to get a bigger utility panel, the NEMA 6-50 240 volt / 50 amp breaker option seems barely doable, so in theory I could charge a car overnight at +30 miles range/hour.[1] [1] https://www.tesla.com/support/home-charging-installation/mobile-connector https://www.tesla.com/support/home-charging-installation/mob...
  • timbit42 4y ago
    This is why we should be focused on PHEVs, not BEVs. PHEVs use 1/10th the batteries, batteries cost 1/10th, take 1/10th the energy and time to charge, but provide electric driving for 90% of trips. If we build 10 PHEVs with the batteries it would take to build one BEV, instead of saving 100% of one vehicle's fuel usage, we could build 10 PHEVs and save 10 x 90% = 900% fuel usage.
    • mikewarot 4y ago
      What is a phev?
      • timbit42 4y ago
        BEV = Battery Electric Vehicle (eg. Chevy Bolt) HEV = Hybrid Electric Vehicle (eg. Toyota Prius) PHEV = Plug-in Hybrid Electric Vehicle (eg. Toyota Prius Prime) ICEV = Internal Combustion Engine Vehicle (eg. Ford Model T)
• Slava_Propanei 4y ago
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• panda888888 4y ago
  This also misses the point that EVs are cheaper over time. There is currently a slightly higher upfront cost, but there are no oil changes, less break wear due to regenerative breaking, no transmission to service, no spark plugs, no timing belt, no engine air filter, etc. In my experience with an EV, all you need to do is rotate the tires and add window washer fluid. That's it!
• ifdefdebug 4y ago
  Besides climate, there is one point about EV/ICE that never gets discussed: for decades now, we are polluting our environment with ICE emissions, in some places to unbearable levels. Why is this still allowed? I would have expected to make it mandatory to require an electric engine to every new car since hybrid technology became available, if not for anything else but having those cars capable of doing at least the urban stop-and-go without the stink. Looks like we became so used to poison each other's breathing air that we don't even question it any more, we think it's some kind of inherited right we have. But guess what - I am also not supposed to throw the content of my potty out of the window anymore - nowadays that's not only unacceptable behavior, but outright forbidden. Because better technology became available to solve the problem.
  • perlgeek 4y ago
    In Germany we have city zones where only vehicles with certain emission standards are allowed to enter (usually the downtown areas with most population and traffic). Seems like it would be possible to use this model to further restrict to only in EVs, which would also provide some incentives for more EV adoption.
    • Symbiote 4y ago
      There are a few places that have already done this, usually only for delivery vehicles. I think part of Paris is one example.
• ZeroGravitas 4y ago
  I can still remember when EVs were physically impossible, and then when they were possible but worse than ICE for the planet, then when they were only toys for rich playboys and on and on. So I'm surprised by the headline claiming everyone thinks this is going to be super easy. The big question is what sets him apart from all the naysayers saying many of the same things that he's apparently never noticed during his in depth investigation of the matter.
  • perlgeek 4y ago
    Policy makers who push towards EV adoption and the necessary infrastructure changes basically have to present it as somewhat easy to do, otherwise everybody will object with "it's too hard, let's not waste any money on it". That doesn't mean they actually believe it's easy.
• goodpoint 4y ago
  555 comments and nobody pointed out that cars are unsustainable anyways. The world desperately needs to move towards public transportation now.
• ulfw 4y ago
  I for one can't wait for the new 2024 Mini EV. With double the range of the current model and on a dedicated EV platform it'll be the perfect little car. I can't be bothered with an SUV as a single person.
• qikInNdOutReply 4y ago
  For 90 years, the whole of humanity poored all resources into IC. They got so good, they can go to the moon and back without more then basic maintenance. We are maybe 10 years into mass market adoption and still have internal resistance to research investments in all major IC companys. So we are not even near the part, were the break throughs happen and far away from the moment the whole affair plateaus out. We also go against the most entrenched resource industry if ever there was one. Half of the middle east and russia, all dependent on this technology failing. But somewhere, in some cooperate battery lab, there sits someone, who will deal it a lethal blow. And as ECs push ICs into the uneconomical lethal zone, the resistance to it will fade.
• AndyMcConachie 4y ago
  The only transition that matters is to mass transit. I transitioned away from a car by moving into a dense urban environment. Best car I ever owned was the nonexistent one.
  • anticensor 4y ago
    Best car I own is my own feet. And my second preferred mode is public transport.
• Gravityloss 4y ago
  There are alternatives to cobalt, nickel, manganese and even lithium in batteries. There are a lot of articles being written how EV:s are not possible because they require so much materials and often mention cobalt and nickel. A Tesla Model 3 version that has been available to buy for a long time already has LFP batteries don't contain cobalt, nickel or manganese [1] Hence, are the articles actually worth it if they don't acknowledge this? 1: https://www.allaboutcircuits.com/news/a-closer-look-at-lithium-iron-phosphate-batteries-teslas-new-choice-of-battery/ https://www.allaboutcircuits.com/news/a-closer-look-at-lithi...
• pastacacioepepe 4y ago
  Cars have no place in a sustainable future. Independently from their source of power, a society built on cars as the primary mean of transportation is unsustainable and will always be. We don't need to invest trilions in transitioning fuel engines to EV. We need to invest them in rebuilding our cities and suburbs to be walkable and to minimize the need for travels.
  • marbartolome 4y ago
    I'm surprised nobody else echoes this argument, is the US really that car dependant? I think micromobilty and improvements in transportation on demand would really reduce the need for car ownership. Already in big cities with good public transport cars don't make much sense anymore, but I believe suburbs will follow.
    • pastacacioepepe 4y ago
      Check out the excellent "Not Just Bikes" and "Strong Towns" YT channels to know how dependant we are on cars (spoiler: a lot, unless you live in exceptional places like the Netherlands) and to see how we are still in time to build a better future.
• amadeuspagel 4y ago
  > Volvo cars CEO Jim Rowan boldly proclaims that electric vehicles will reach price parity with internal-combustion-engine (ICE) vehicles by 2025. Not likely, counter Mercedes-Benz’s chief technology officer Markus Schäfer and Renault Group CEO Luca de Meo. "If an elderly but distinguished scientist says that something is possible, he is almost certainly right; but if he says that it is impossible, he is very probably wrong." — Arthur C. Clarke Maybe all of them are right for their own companies.
• Tade0 4y ago
  I see a lot of analogies between this and mobile phones. The Motorola DynaTAC was made commercially available in 1983 and not very useful considering the lack of coverage infrastructure. Within 30 years we went from 30min of talk time and 8h standby through hours of talk time and weeks of standby to days of talk time and a day of usage, not to mention a whole spectrum of form factors and features. And nobody, especially the incumbents, could predict the final shape the devices would take, sometimes to their demise(like in the case of Nokia). The Mitsubishi i-MiEV was slow, expensive and small, with little range. The Tesla Model 3 costs roughly the same (comparing to the 2011 MSRP for the Mitsubishi) adjusted for inflation, but is much better in every aspect. That's less than 15 years of development. Who knows what will happen by 2035? Maybe we'll ditch lithium in favour of sodium, just like cobalt stopped being neccesary? Maybe the battery manufacturer Amprius will get acquired by a car company and scale the production of its 500Wh/kg batteries well beyond the planned 5GWh/yr? Maybe we'll have slow chargers attached to every streetlamp? Norway is largely there regarding transitioning, despite having a cold climate. Took less than 15 years and their grid didn't collapse. Sounds like something the rest of the wolrd is capable of doing eventually.
  • esalman 4y ago
    There's a Porsche factory in Chile there they make synthetic fuel by synthesizing water and CO2 from air. So it is net zero emission (might even be negative). It costs $40 a gallon now. By 2035 it'll probably cost $2 a gallon.. maybe even mobile synthesizers will be available and we will end up seeing EVs extinct.
    • pstrateman 4y ago
      It seems far more likely that synthetic fuels will become cheaper than ev cars will become universally useful.
    • godzillabrennus 4y ago
      More info for others: https://techcrunch.com/2022/12/20/porsche-pumps-first-synthetic-fuel-as-chilean-plant-finally-starts-producing/ https://techcrunch.com/2022/12/20/porsche-pumps-first-synthe...
• callamdelaney 4y ago
  My model 3 lease is up next year aand I'm getting a Ford Ranger next.
• timwaagh 4y ago
  I think if the batteries will be too big of an issue then we will end up going hydrogen for cheap cars and battery ev for more expensive vehicles for people who drive a lot.
• bad_alloc 4y ago
  Last summer I did a 4200km roadtrip in my 41kWh Renault Zoe from southern Germany to northern Spain. The car is *absolutely not* built for long range. There were significant gaps in the charging network in some regions. The terrain was largely mountainous and traffic was fairly bad. Despite all this, the trip was great: The car never was a limiting factor and always could go further than me as a lone driver (maximum daily distance: 660km). With 2 apps, google maps and some planning while charging it was possible to reach basically every place I wanted to go. Unlike the dozens of broken down ICE cars i saw, the Zoe had zero issues. The only problem worth mentioning was a company called EDP supplying too few and totally unreliable chargers in Asturias and Galicia. With a car with a longer range charging on the highway becomes less and less important, so as long as there are plenty of 11kW chargers in cities for overnight charging or 300kW chargers for day charging (solar!), EV use is easy and already 100% usable. If you can charge at home for your daily commute and we are smart about the timing, I see few issues here.
• AnIdiotOnTheNet 4y ago
  It's not so much hard as it is just not easy and society has lost the will to do things that are not easy.
• lr1970 4y ago
  Most of combating climate change debates implicitly assume that reducing GHG emissions alone will stop or slow down significantly the climate change. I am afraid we already passed that point. At least in short term we should give a serious consideration to active climate engineering that working together with limiting GHG gives us a fighting change to restore the planetary climate to a set-point we are comfortable with. Unfortunately, most of debates are emotionally charged and single-mindedly focused. My hopes for a rational multi-prong approach to climate control are low.
• 1970-01-01 4y ago
  >going to scale threatens people’s long-held beliefs, ways of life, and livelihoods, many of which will be altered, if not made obsolete. This is the biggest challenge. You can't teach an old buyer new concepts without ramming it down their throat. The biggest transition hack will be training mechanics to become EV-focused. We have about 40 years of mechanic knowledge to churn before their knowledge retires with them. Eventually, fixing engines becomes cost prohibitive, and the roads will grow silent. Only then will the throat-ramming process be complete.
• user3939382 4y ago
  I can’t imagine relying on an EV in a wide scale emergency. Maybe as a secondary car.
• cultureswitch 4y ago
  And rightly so. The best car for the environment and for you and for the economy is the one you don't buy. Subsidizing buying new cars is an incredibly misguided policy no matter what the new car is. The emissions an costs of production are nothing to scoff at unless you're an extremely heavy driver.