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That's why so many people are cautious about "EVs to save us all", to put it mildly. We are so focused on climate change and greenhouse gases that we do not se

• dlahoda 3y ago
  EV bikes sure. price and weight of good EV bike dropped for last 5 years.
  • valianteffort 3y ago
    I don't know where you live but everything is too far apart in American suburbs. How you would fix that without tearing it all down? And it's totally impractical for transporting a family around. Road tripping. Visiting far away family. Day at the lake or beach. Going camping. How do you convince people to give all of that up and just be content with whatever is 15min away.
    • jacobolus 3y ago
      Residents of American suburbs should have to pay for their full costs (infrastructure and maintenance, environmental, healthcare, services, ...), and if many people can't afford it, we should do a universal cash subsidy to every resident at the federal level to make up the difference so the transition is not so damaging, then let people decide if they really want to spend that whole amount on paying the actual costs of their lifestyle or if they would prefer to move to a more efficient living arrangement and keep the cash to do something more productive with it. The USA subsidizes the suburbs to an absurd degree, pushing most of the costs into the future and making city dwellers pay more than their share for the rest. Living in a relatively large house in the suburbs should in principle cost several times more than living in a flat in the city, because it requires vastly more infrastructure and the amortized cost of services is much higher. But our broken economic system has flipped this around and made suburbs extremely artificially cheap, while making most of the building practices that make denser walkable neighborhoods possible illegal under building codes and local ordinances.
      • yowlingcat 3y ago
        I don't think it's broken. I think it's working as intended, but what it's optimizing for (people raising families) is perhaps not what you'd like for it to optimize for. Whether it's the right or wrong thing to optimize for is another conversation, but you may be surprised about what the collective political will of the US expresses. I think you'd be hard pressed to find a voting majority support for the idea that "American suburbs should have to pay for themselves."
        • Retric 3y ago
          American style suburbs are worse for raising a family than living in a city. Long commutes practically remove one or more parents from the equation 5 days a week. Long bus rides compromise sleep and exercise etc. All for a back yard that’s rarely used and worse in just about every way than a nice park. What they are is a cheap imitation of the wealthy enclaves near cities that only work because so few people can afford to live in them. You can imitate such buildings cheaply, what you can’t do is build or maintain the support structures which made such places so appealing.
          • macinjosh 3y ago
            My superior air quality, lower crime rate, and better schools disagree with your assessment.
            • Retric 3y ago
              Don’t confuse socioeconomics for inherent advantages. Adjusted for income people live longer in cities, they are thus objectively safer. Wealthy parts of cities have vastly better schools and less crime than the average suburbs, but the American middle class abandoned cities. Air pollution again can go either way, suburbs often have surprisingly terrible air quality made worse by long commutes.
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    • estebank 3y ago
      It is already a huge change if people who drive to thir offices didn't. People going camping or driving across the country aren't the problem. The Dutch do that as well, what they don't need to do is having to drive to go fetch milk or get to work. I have my dentist, grocery shop, restaurants, coffee shops, gym, bike shop, bank, park, hardware storeband bus stops within 15 minutes from my home, and all of those are in a residential neighborhood of an American city that to my Latin American sensibilities is too residential and spread around. The level of density needed to support "15 minute cities" is much lower than people think, but it means allowing there to be a bakery in the corner of your block within a residential neighborhood, and wrestling some space in the commons from inefficient forms of transportation in favour of more efficient ones.
      • InSteady 3y ago
        >wrestling some space in the commons from inefficient forms of transportation in favour of more efficient ones. And underused parking lots. Dear god the huge, empty parking lots.
    • kmeisthax 3y ago
      You start by not making the problem worse. Stop building stroads[0]. Liberalize the zoning code and allow mixed-use development. Get rid of parking minimums. The upside of how sparse American suburbs are is that we can repurpose all the junk/wasted land with normal market incentives. Roads can be thinned and the land handed back to the owners of that land, along with the setbacks that are used to force people to maintain water-intensive lawns[1]. Upzoned buildings can be redeveloped to higher density or turned into small commercial stores as market forces dictate. Anyone who wants to hold out can still do so. None of this requires absolutely banning cars[2]. People will stop driving as cars become less necessary for daily suburban life. Road trips can still happen. So instead of families with three or four cars, maybe they only have one or two. As car infrastructure is used less, it can be repurposed for transit networks that don't suck - i.e. BRT, light rail, or tram systems with dedicated rights of way. "15 minute city" doesn't mean "you should only ever travel 15 minutes on foot and anything further will be stopped by the pollution police". It means "building a city so that everything you need is closer and more convenient". [0] Surface street / highway combos, i.e. roads with 3 lanes on each side, highway speed traffic, no pedestrian infrastructure, and business access. They try to do everything and fail at everything. [1] Incidentally this was sold as a way to stop communism, somehow [2] OK, but can we still at least ban the giant Escalade mega-SUVs that let you run down like ten kids without even seeing them
    • InSteady 3y ago
      Many e-bikes have 100+ mile range. In theory you could have a few backup batteries for longer trips. You could also rent a car for the 5 or so days a year the average person is doing anything other than commuting, shopping, and other local activities.
    • CalRobert 3y ago
      Cars are great for all that, and an electric cargo bike like an urban arrow is great for all the things nearby, IF you have safe infrastructure. Plenty of people have cars in my Dutch city but it's still safe to do local things by biking and walking
    • nicoburns 3y ago
      You don’t have to tear it all down. Just tear some of it down. For example, you could tear down a single house and replace it with a shop, and suddenly a whole neighbourhood would have a shop within walking distance.
      • rootusrootus 3y ago
        I wonder where people live that this isn't already true. My suburban neighborhood has several small & medium sized markets. I have a suspicion that many HN participants idea of suburbia is the endless tract housing variety. That's just one version, and comparatively rare in my region. Our suburban neighborhoods are mixed.
      • adrianN 3y ago
        Suburbia probably doesn't have enough density that the number of people who choose to walk to the shop over driving twenty minutes to the huge shop could keep the small shop alive.
• BowBun 3y ago
  Agreed. Even solar + wind - when the buzz started it was all rainbows and butterflies because we found a silver bullet to energy! There is no such thing as free lunch. If you start absorbing massive amounts of solar, you will have some effect on the environment that we have absolutely no clue about. Same with interfering with wind patterns and ocean currents, which would happen with energy generation at true humanity-scale. Critical thinking left the room a long time ago.
  • luis8 3y ago
    Looks like nuclear with proper waste disposal is they way to go
    • seb1204 3y ago
      It is not. Proper waste disposal is an unsolved issue that extends beyond so many human generations. Also I suspect that social licence and NIMBYism will make it impossible to build them in time to save us from global warming.
      • margalabargala 3y ago
        Based on the conclusions in this comment thread, any energy source more exotic than a wood campfire is unacceptably damaging.
        • badtension 3y ago
          I get the joke but let me just mention that wood campfire is one of the worst solutions (if done at scale). This may sound idealistic (like the other comments mentioned) but I think we just have to reduce our energy footprint and then many solutions will be green again. One great example (some will say absurd and impractical) is just using energy whenever it is available, with minimum storage. That means cooking, heating water etc. during the day (or when the wind is high) and only using lighting and low-energy devices at night. Factories could work on a similar principle (producing more in the summer) but then we would have to rearrange a lot more stuff to suit the seasonal renewable energy production capabilities. This may sound absurd but it only shows how much we are locked in our way of thinking about how reality is supposed to work, not what it is. There's no reason to have high quality on-demand electrical energy available 24/7/365 other than convenience. Convenience that fossil fuels brought us.
• jayd16 3y ago
  This sentiment is just contrarianism, I think. I've lived in Los Angeles my whole life and the difference that clean air standards make is obvious. The black dust isn't just tire and brake dust. It's also soot and it used to be much much worse. Nothing is a silver bullet but I'll be much happier when we're done with ICE noise and exhaust.
  • jjav 3y ago
    > This sentiment is just contrarianism, I think. Maybe some of it, but it's very valid point. Switching everything about the country's infrastructure from gas to EVs is a huge undertaking. If we're going to do such a massive change, just to end up with something that still carries all the same problems except one, that's a missed opportunity. If there was a will to spend that quantity of effort in making public transit practical for the long haul and heavily promoting cycling and e-bikes for the short haul we'd be much better off.
  • oatmeal1 3y ago
    Generally agreed, but the noise from cars is mostly friction and turbulence (and honking/sirens). Switching to electric won't solve that.
    • bmitc 3y ago
      > the noise from cars is mostly friction and turbulence Agreed. I can't even hear the engine in my car on the highway over tire and wind noise.
      • kwhitefoot 3y ago
        People on the outside can hear it though.
        • bmitc 3y ago
          I don't think they can unless the car is not moving. The point is: the dominating sound pollution from a car is from sources that are not removed in EVs.
• arghwhat 3y ago
  EV's will not save us all, but every combustion engine still running is actively killing us. Would be better to walk, bike, take public transport or similar or course. And if your area makes that not viable, consider fixing that. (All the famed bicycle paths in Copenhagen are relatively new - they can be added anywhere.)
• aperson_hello 3y ago
  Decarbonization will have negative externalities. Yes, even environmental ones. I'd argue that those externalities are necessary and delay to mitigate them is going to be worse than fixing them later.
  • tuatoru 3y ago
    It sure isn't going to help with all the other things we are doing in parallel. Soil exhaustion, poisoning, and erosion; groundwater depletion and poisoning; deforestation; wild ecosystem destruction and food web destabilization; coastal sea surface and seabed destruction; river and lake poisoning; acid rain; carting invasive species around the world willy-nilly; anoxic ocean zones; hunting fish species to extinction; the ruinous effects of mineral and sand mining... all in parallel with the effects of extra carbon in the atmosphere. Just to put things in context.
  • matsemann 3y ago
    The point is that reducing car usage / dependency would solve both. Just switching to EVs doesn't really solve that much, except it saves the car industry.
    • aperson_hello 3y ago
      Good luck rebuilding all of our built infrastructure in the next two decades to reduce car dependency in time to meet decarbonization goals...
• HWR_14 3y ago
  EVs don't have to be heavier. If people mostly drove a low range EV it could use significantly smaller batteries.
  • lobocinza 3y ago
    If a low range EV is enough 100% just buy a bike.
    • HWR_14 3y ago
      Most trips most people take with a car right now (EV or ICE) are close enough to bike. They are unpopular. There are a lot of disadvantages to explain why.
    • jfim 3y ago
      Coming from a place where I'd bike nine months of the year as my primary mode of transportation, I tried it in the bay area and got hit by a car after a few months. So I got a car, even though I'd much rather bike.
    • margalabargala 3y ago
      How often does it rain and snow where you live? Do you have kids?
      • lobocinza 3y ago
        Very rarely actually and I don't have kids. I live in a small city and bicycles are the better mode vehicle for daily transportation. There are many reasons for someone to have a car: travel, heat waves, kids, etc. But the number 1 reason is because it is a symbol of status. People will buy a car because otherwise they would be a low status male and they want to f#. Note that cars are expensive, I live in a poor country with absurd interest rates, so many are making debts that they will need a decade to get rid of, if ever, just so they can constitute a family. Here at least car culture is squeezing the middle class into indebtedness and poverty and overcrowding the streets with cars and idiots, not a causal relation but a dangerous combination. Cars are great tools but f# car culture.
• newsclues 3y ago
  I wonder if heavy EVs cause more tire and brake dust.
  • vardump 3y ago
    Probably nearly no brake dust. EVs are notorious for using so little brakes that they just rust due to lack of use.
  • rootusrootus 3y ago
    Purpose-built EVs typically weigh 5-10% more than a comparable ICEV. That's not enough to make much of a difference. Go back to the usual target of anti-car hate -- pickups. Those are pretty heavy. And EVs make almost zero brake dust. On many EVs the pads will last the life of the vehicle, unless they malfunction due to non-usage.
    • hedora 3y ago
      Put another way, EVs average about 20% more tire dust, but the majority of ICE particulate emissions are from the engine. So, EVs are a huge improvement. Recently, tire manufacturers have started phasing out some of the nastier additives in tires (due to a new one causing fish die offs when it rains). Tire dust is still terrible though. Hopefully, it’ll be the biggest environmental problem today’s toddlers have to deal with.
• stcroixx 3y ago
  Exactly. Moving to EVs was a huge mistake. We would have had to practically abandon personal vehicles at some point. This was that chance. Blown. These things will keep us in this same pattern for at least another 50 years leaving this problem for a new generation. If anyone was serious about any of this, wfh for anyone that can is such an obvious solution with by far the lowest cost. Its a solved problem, we just don’t like the solution enough.
  • rootusrootus 3y ago
    The alternative to EVs was staying with ICEVs, not suddenly redistributing and redesigning society into your utopian ideal.
  • hedora 3y ago
    Many cities are laid out for cars. Fixing that is much harder than switching to EVs and would have a massive environmental impact. Buildings have 2x more global warming footprint than transportation.
• artursapek 3y ago
  EVs rip through tires lol
  • jjav 3y ago
    > EVs rip through tires lol Yes, they do. Even our lowly Fiat 500e's consumed tires much faster than any of our ICE cars. It's not just raw power, which a Fiat 500e doesn't have much. It's the fact that with an electric motor you have 100% torque at 0rpm starting from a standstill, which is when there is most opportunity to briefly spin the tire. Tire wear is much reduced when driving in a straight line at a constant speed.
  • rootusrootus 3y ago
    Eh, not really. Teslas tend to, because Tesla's slowest car is pretty fast. A typical EV driven by a normal driver gets pretty average life out of a set of tires.
    • hedora 3y ago
      Sadly, that’s not true. The large amount of low end torque leads to different rubber, etc. Also, due to range anxiety, they tend to use low rolling resistance tires that wear more. I spend more on tires than electricity for my EV, so I can imagine someone offering low efficiency / low wear tires as an option. The above leads to about 20% more tire dust on average.
      • artursapek 3y ago
        Sadly HN downvote me anyway lol
        • BowBun 3y ago
          Yours wasn't a really substantive answer. The next person provided more details and didn't add 'lol' at the end of his short statement. Just some feedback if you want people to accept your points more often!
• tuatoru 3y ago
  Yeah, EVs are the minimum possible change that at first glance looks like it might work, of course without disturbing the global capitalist system or our cultural values. Wow, people are going to be pissed off in thirty years. "Why didn't that fix it all? We have to do more?"
• michaelteter 3y ago
  > That's why so many people are cautious about "EVs to save us all" Certainly no, that's not why people are "cautious". They are hesitant about EVs because they fear running out of "gas" mid-trip. Most people don't give a shit about anything except their plans and needs (and not necessarily unreasonbly so). You can just look around at what kinds of cars most people purchase to reason what their priorities are (or are not). Reducing greenhouse gasses are not on most people's priority list.
  • matsemann 3y ago
    Range anxiety was solved years ago. I don't know of anyone with an EV (which is most car owners here in Norway) that actually feel this is a problem. You can charge at basically every gas station in the country, and new cars have 400km ++ range.
    • michaelteter 3y ago
      Millions of new cars are sold yearly in the US. It's a huge market. It's also a huge country, with some long distances between some cities. Assuming charging is available at most gas stations on US highways, it's still not attractive to most people to have to wait 30 minutes (or whatever) for a fast charge to allow them to continue their journey. Norway might be a good use case, but currently the US is not a good use case (except in town). So US buyers will still need one gasoline car for road trips. Personally I'd prefer passenger train infrastructure over millions of electric cars. Equal or more cars is, as the article notes, still a bad thing.
    • jjav 3y ago
      > Range anxiety was solved years ago. Well no, it wasn't. My partner just bought a new EV recently and range anxiety is huge. I've been researching places to charge and there's nothing convenient nearby. There's an old business campus but it's a sketchy area to go sit for an hour or more. There's one near a starbucks close by but they are ridiculously expensive (95c/kwh). The best one is at a whole foods, but requires driving 15 minutes away from their destination, go sit there for an hour and then drive to campus. Not so great.
    • 3y ago
• kibwen 3y ago
  EVs could "save us all" if we got over the meme of "range anxiety" and realized that a majority of Americans (who drive more than anyone else) drive less than 40 miles a day, and sized batteries appropriately, especially in dense urban environments. https://electrek.co/2023/03/22/wink-motors-test-drive-electric-microcar-lsv/ https://electrek.co/2023/03/22/wink-motors-test-drive-electr... There's no reason that an EV needs to weigh as much as a Sherman tank.