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i just drove 13 hours from bay area to north eastern california (Alturas) and i didn't see one electric big rig.

mertd 1y ago
I wouldn't recognize the Volvo EV semi pictured in the article while driving. It looks generic.
wolrah 1y ago
1. How sure are you? The ones from established manufacturers don't really look substantially different from their diesel counterparts. Unless you're really looking closely you'd have a hard time telling them apart. 2. Electric semi trucks are not ideal for long distance trips, they're more for predictable day routes, so it wouldn't surprise me to not encounter many of them on what was presumably a highway drive.
seb1204 1y ago
Similar to cars, it's easy to spot Teslas but other brands don't stand out this much and you really need to know the little details to spot. Same for trucks.
- xienze 1y ago
  > Similar to cars, it's easy to spot Teslas but other brands don't stand out this much and you really need to know the little details to spot. Disagree. All you have to do is look for lack of a front grill or flush door handles to tell if a car is an EV.
  - rsynnott 1y ago
    This caused a lot of confusion with VW; a lot of people thought the id.3/4 were their first electric cars, because the eGolf and eUp looked so... normal. I'm fairly sure they deliberately said "we need to make it look more electric-car-y" at some point.
  - azernik 1y ago
    Flush door handles are completely orthogonal to whether a car is an EV; that just happened to be Tesla's design language.
    - xienze 1y ago
      I’ve yet to see an EV that doesn’t have some sort of flush handle design. My understanding is that it improves aerodynamics and I’m sure a secondary reason is “Tesla did it first” and the high tech aesthetic that EVs are expected to have.
      - tzs 1y ago
        Hyundai Kona and Kia Niro have normal doorhandles.
rsynnott 1y ago
These are mostly being sold in Europe, not the US. They're also not particularly distinctive looking, mostly; I'm sceptical that most people could identify one offhand as it passed by.

I wouldn't recognize the Volvo EV semi pictured in the article while driving. It looks generic.

1. How sure are you? The ones from established manufacturers don't really look substantially different from their diesel counterparts. Unless you're really looking closely you'd have a hard time telling them apart. 2. Electric semi trucks are not ideal for long distance trips, they're more for predictable day routes, so it wouldn't surprise me to not encounter many of them on what was presumably a highway drive.

seb1204 1y ago

Similar to cars, it's easy to spot Teslas but other brands don't stand out this much and you really need to know the little details to spot. Same for trucks.

xienze 1y ago
> Similar to cars, it's easy to spot Teslas but other brands don't stand out this much and you really need to know the little details to spot. Disagree. All you have to do is look for lack of a front grill or flush door handles to tell if a car is an EV.
- rsynnott 1y ago
  This caused a lot of confusion with VW; a lot of people thought the id.3/4 were their first electric cars, because the eGolf and eUp looked so... normal. I'm fairly sure they deliberately said "we need to make it look more electric-car-y" at some point.
- azernik 1y ago
  Flush door handles are completely orthogonal to whether a car is an EV; that just happened to be Tesla's design language.
  - xienze 1y ago
    I’ve yet to see an EV that doesn’t have some sort of flush handle design. My understanding is that it improves aerodynamics and I’m sure a secondary reason is “Tesla did it first” and the high tech aesthetic that EVs are expected to have.
    - tzs 1y ago
      Hyundai Kona and Kia Niro have normal doorhandles.

rsynnott 1y ago

These are mostly being sold in Europe, not the US. They're also not particularly distinctive looking, mostly; I'm sceptical that most people could identify one offhand as it passed by.