[timbit]

Yea not to mention who wants to rely on an electric ambulance in -50+ degree weather.

 

[Adjuster1111]

My kids are in Germany. Berlin and London already have prohibitions on gas cars accessing the city.

I live in Colorado. Our politicians have decided to follow California rules. We have an ozone problem in the metro area.

I'm in the market for a PHEV that I'll keep 10 years.

I suspect within those 10 years, we'll see a partial/total ban on driving gas vehicles either downtown or in certain counties, near the city center. You may say fine, I just won't go but, the Stanley Cup finals are currently being held downtown. The Rockies are downtown, Broncos just a bit West.

I'm trying to buy a future proofed vehicle. If I had real guts, I'd go full on EV, I'm not there yet.

Politicians play the long game, and they are forcing me to play along.

 

[gunrunnerjohn]

I suspect within those 10 years, we'll see a partial/total ban on driving gas vehicles either downtown or in certain counties, near the city center. You may say fine, I just won't go but, the Stanley Cup finals are currently being held downtown. The Rockies are downtown, Broncos just a bit West.

I have no problem skipping any event that is in the city, doesn't bother me at all.

 

[joemsj51]

I expect you are going to see more hydrogen powered cars.

Hydrogen is the real future and in the meantime, finding charging stations will become easier between today and early 2030s.

There is no turning back to build gasoline / diesel vehicles in the next decade. Saving the planet from oxygen extinction is what's most important. What needs to be done right now is massive tree plantings everywhere on earth. Our planet is slowly turning into a huge open wasteland without shade that's helping to raise temperatures because of a lack of shade.

Just look at closeup pics of our metro areas from 50 years ago and then look at what the areas look like today. Incredible difference in shade-then and sun-filled open spaces today...... mostly hot concrete and asphalt.

 

[asianwagon]

The UK has banned the sale of new Petrol and Diesel cars from 2030
My car is just 2 years old (Sportage 1.6 T-GDI) and I am not averse to keeping a car for 10 to 15 years.
I normally have one new-ish car and one older car.

So what is the future?
Full electric is not an option. The UK simply does not have the infrastructure for everyone to go full-electric.
Also range is still an issue - I can drive from my home to the south coast (~500 miles) with one or two short breaks. Can't do that with an electric car!

Personally I think the whole car-ownership model needs a shake up.
Moving to cars-as-a-service would make more sense. (But less enjoyable!) This is where no-one owns a vehicle, but you 'summon' one whenever you need one, and if you're doing a long trip you swap vehicles midway. It brings itslef to you and is fully charged when it arrives. It's only a small jump from there to full automomous vehicles. I can actually see a future where that will become the norm.

When new internal combustion cars are banned, fuel prices will rise exponentially as forecourts close down. That's just ecconomics. Thus rapidly accelerating the move away from petrol and diesel powered cars completely.

When it comes to internal combusion engined vehicles, when the chips start to fall, they will fall quckly.

This entire forced conversion to EV's is nothing but an ill-conceived political ploy by the "woke" climate change imbeciles. Some of those are driven solely by foolish ideology, BUT, you have to know that there are also enormous financial issues involved; follow the money! As you touched on, the vehicles themselves are inadequate to meet peoples' transportation needs, plus, forget the lack of support infrastructure, do you know how long it takes to recharge one of those EV's? Hours. And what happens if you run out of juice on the road somewhere? Is AAA gonna bring you a gallon of electricity to get you going? No, you'll have to be towed to the nearest charging station, which might be 25, 50, 150 miles away! Then, wait in line possibly for hours(or days!) for your turn to sit for 3+ hrs while your $60K EV gulps down some volts.
Yeah, buy an EV and you'll stop "global warming" dead in its tracks. If you're stupid enough to believe that, then I have some prime lakefront property to sell you.......... on Mars. (cash only, no checks)

 

[KennyMillar]

This entire forced conversion to EV's is nothing but an ill-conceived political ploy by the "woke" climate change imbeciles. Some of those are driven solely by foolish ideology, BUT, you have to know that there are also enormous financial issues involved; follow the money! As you touched on, the vehicles themselves are inadequate to meet peoples' transportation needs, plus, forget the lack of support infrastructure, do you know how long it takes to recharge one of those EV's? Hours. And what happens if you run out of juice on the road somewhere? Is AAA gonna bring you a gallon of electricity to get you going? No, you'll have to be towed to the nearest charging station, which might be 25, 50, 150 miles away! Then, wait in line possibly for hours(or days!) for your turn to sit for 3+ hrs while your $60K EV gulps down some volts.
Yeah, buy an EV and you'll stop "global warming" dead in its tracks. If you're stupid enough to believe that, then I have some prime lakefront property to sell you.......... on Mars. (cash only, no checks)

Quite! I went to the launch of the new Kia Niro EV here in the UK this week.
I asked them how long to charge from 10% to 80% - but they wouldn't answer me.
They claim "18" Minutes for the EV6, and in a presentation they said to get "up to 80%" was 43 minutes. But when I asked "up to 80% from what %?" again they wouldn't answer.
I aksked about this claim of getting from 10% to 80% on an EV6.. he eventually admitted that to do that requires a 3-Phase installation capable of delivering.... wait for it.... up to 850 kW of power. For goodness sake. Nothing in the domestic market can deliver 850 kW - even on 3-Phase supply, which very few houses in the UK have. Could you imagine the size of the conductors in that cable?
So, a backwards step in vehicle utility, a backwards step in joy-of-ownership, an no infrastructure to support their dreams anyway. What are we left with?

 

[joemsj51]

Topic moving in the wrong direction. I apologize for going in that planet-saving direction.

I'm too old to see my first-ever acquisition of full battery-powered vehicles. Our current 2019 and 2020 lineup may be the last-2 we ever purchase. It will take us another 12-15 years to have conquered 100k on both of our vehicles. Neither of us plan on seeing our late-80s birthdays. We both lived life to the fullest and have no regrets on our life choices of the past.

See you on the next topic. I'm done here.

 

[ron1004]

Reminder - read the forum rules, and keep political BS out of this forum.

 

[rvoll]

Good points, but there will always be solutions. Just because the infrastructure doesn't exist now does not mean it won't exist in the future when demand requires it. In California, if all we have are EV's, then there will be emergency charging stations that will give you an 80% charge in 18 minutes or so. Those emergency stations will most likely be powered by solar and storage batteries --- which exist now and don't require any infrastructure. Unfortunately, in the U.S., infrastructure is only built when demand requires it. We are not forward thinking in this country. Our road infrastructure is crumbling and in many places, is unsafe. Do we invest what we should? Not even close. If the consumer demands it -- it will be delivered. That's the way things work. Looking at the current situation and thinking that it will be that way in the future is not the smart way of thinking. Most people are stuck in the past and really don't want to do things differently. They will be absolutely dragged into the future whether it is smartphones, brick and mortar stores, or EV's. If we have a blackout here in Vegas, I'm good for at least 3-4 days without any power and won't miss a moment. Apartment buildings will have charging spots for renters or they will just lose money. I am not saddened at all by losing ICE's. I'm not stuck to the past. Give me a faster car with less maintenance and you'll see a big smile on my face. I used to own Porsches which had modified engines and were very fast. I took a drive in my friends Model S and it made my Porsche feel like a VW.

 

[rvoll]

Reminder - read the forum rules, and keep political BS out of this forum.

Ron, I don't think talking about the future and infrastructure is political, especially when it comes to cars and EV's vs. ICE's. Talking about what governments are actually doing is also not political. Talking about politicians and/or political parties is political. Do you really disagree?

 

[ron1004]

Ron, I don't think talking about the future and infrastructure is political, especially when it comes to cars and EV's vs. ICE's. Talking about what governments are actually doing is also not political. Talking about politicians and/or political parties is political. Do you really disagree?

Agreed, but you most likely missed an offending post that was deleted.

 

[rvoll]

Agreed, but you most likely missed an offending post that was deleted.

I find it difficult to read deleted posts.......

 

[KennyMillar]

there will be emergency charging stations that will give you an 80% charge in 18 minutes

I've heard this claim before. I heard it again at a main dealer last night. When I questioned them about it they admitted you need DC inverter style charging and a 3-phase supply. There is not going to be a lot of that around!

 

[ron1004]

I've heard this claim before. I heard it again at a main dealer last night. When I questioned them about it they admitted you need DC inverter style charging and a 3-phase supply. There is not going to be a lot of that around!

In the 80's when there was talk of every man in the street owning a cell phone (no smart phones yet), there was many skeptics, ... won't be enough towers and coverage.

Thanks to those high tech pioneers, we now have high speed data mobile networks to support our smart phones.

It was also around that time that they started controlling car engines with computers ........

 

[KennyMillar]

In the 80's when there was talk of every man in the street owning a cell phone (no smart phones yet), there was many skeptics, ... won't be enough towers and coverage.

Thanks to those high tech pioneers, we now have high speed data mobile networks to support our smart phones.

It was also around that time that they started controlling car engines with computers ........

Thanks - that's an interesting point. As you suggest, history dictates that the industry rises to challenges.
However I feel there are barriers to adoption of EVs for everyone. There are signs that the industry does acknowledge this.
Remember where you heard this first: MaaS. Mobility as a service. That's an upcoming incentive to get rid of car ownership and let everyone plan their trips in advance. The service gives you a travel plan including walk/autonomous-vehicle/bus/tram/plane/etc - just somethign to think about.

 

[davidchristianson3]

I've been saying this for years. The future of personal transportation is a subscription service. The subscription allows access to multiple automated transportation tiers: personal/residential, regional, national. Small cars will not be driven long distances. This will push a lot of a person's daily transportation into public/mass transit. The spontaneous "Road Trip" as we know it will be a thing of the past.

Automation has good points as well as huge potential for abuse, but that's a separate topic.

The goal of full electrification in 8 years is unattainable, not only because of current technological limitations, but regulatory ones. To power all the necessary infrastructure we need to increase the capacity of our baseline generation, and that's not going to be met by solar or wind. The only real viable option is nuclear, and here in the US it can take more than 8 years to plan, approve, permit, build, and initialize a nuclear plant, unless some form of Operation Warp Speed is used to eliminate red tape and parallelize certain processes. In my pessimistic view, it's not going to happen.

There are many challenges that need to be overcome. Hydrogen has its own limitations, most notably the extraction of hydrogen is a very energy-intensive process in and of itself. Megawatt charging requires even larger conductors and/or greater cooling capacity and the cabling can be cumbersome. And regarding a vehicle generating its own charge, there is no free lunch. One proposal is to use super- or ultracapacitors to capture the charge from regeneration, as they can be charged much more quickly than conventional batteries, and those can in turn replenish the batteries as you drive, providing more effective range extension. Of course, those systems also add weight to an already heavy vehicle, so there's always a bit of a trade-off.

I guess I'm of the opinion that the 2030 deadline will not be met and there will be necessary adjustments in timeline or scope.

 

[KennyMillar]

I guess I'm of the opinion that the 2030 deadline will not be met and there will be necessary adjustments in timeline or scope.

You speak a lot of sense. I agree that the deadline can't be met.
Although, we need to admit that sooner rather than later to avoid a situation where industry stops producing ICE vehicles too soon.

 

[ron1004]

Megawatt charging requires even larger conductors and/or greater cooling capacity and the cabling can be cumbersome.

That word reminded me of this:

Martin Cooper of Motorola, shown here in a 2007 reenactment, made the first publicized handheld mobile phone call on a prototype DynaTAC model on 3 April 1973.

 

[davidchristianson3]

Another challenge is the supply of materials to produce motors and batteries. There are many geopolitical dynamics in play here, and the current outlook isn't necessarily rosy.

 

[rvoll]

The future is built by people who look for ways to make the positive happen. The vast majority of people look at new things and come up with hurdles because they base their opinion on what currently exists. This is no different. In 10 years, if we are still alive (many of us are well into our 70's), we will look back and wonder why we didn't see it. When Eisenhower built the interstate, people thought that was a big waste of money because there wouldn't be enough cars that would use it. Cars were slow, required so much maintenance, and too expensive for most people. New battery technologies utilize different materials than the current ones and motors are becoming much smaller thus using less materials. Given that the people now keep their cars for 10 years or so, you won't see a majority of EV's on the road until 2040 or later. That's a long time to build solar and add it to the electrical grid. There will also come a time when solar is required for all new homes and that will increase capacity dramatically. I hope we don't have a Project Warp Speed because that didn't do much and it was all politics. If the politicians get involved it usually gums up the works. Industry will take the lead because this is a global initiative and not a country by country one. (If you want to discuss PWS and politics, I'd be happy to discuss this offline. This is not the place for that...)