When you click on links to various merchants on this site and make a purchase, this can result in this site earning a commission. Affiliate programs and affiliations include, but are not limited to, the eBay Partner Network.
Regarding solar the key question is whether the majority of the generation is done at folks home and not the grid. As someone is just finishing their solar panel installation at my home, I can say that various factors this year triggered my decision to install solar. A big one is that our utility bills keep going up and solar prices are going down (our was $2.80/W) and the utility just switched to time of day pricing which will only make things worse. And it turns out quite a few other homes on just our one street are adding solar right now too and so are some of my friends. Seems like a wave of solar home installs going on here in Colorado at least. But having this solar now means I can at least consider some sort of electrified car in the future (not my corvette of course, I'm talking about the family transport). A stepping stone would be a plug-in for example. But if enough people add solar to their home it would perhaps enable more EV volume that would not rely on the grid?
WAKE UP AMERICA in the coming years there is going to be many changes in the car industry and the European manufacturers are already working on the future and here we are talking about a low volume sports car that should have come out years ago. GM is concentrating on making money for their shareholders and they are spending alot of money on electrification and autonomous vehicles and nothing has been said about the launch of the ME Corvette.
This is the best I have read in this entire thread. All getting worked up over nothing but speculation. Relax, it will be what it will be and no one here can do a thing about it.
This is a great chart - it illustrates the conundrum we face WRT C02 emissions. Most "renewable energy" sources still BURN stuff. Only nuclear, wind, solar and hydropower do not BURN stuff to make heat. These constitute less than 36% of our electrical power production, and over half of these watts are produced by nuclear fission. The real focus should be on these ZERO EMISSION sources. EV's just play the game of rearranging the deck chairs on the Titanic. Driving an EV powered (ultimately) by burning coal, wood or swamp gas does little to curb global warming which is the real threat - in fact a "coal-fired" EV probably creates MORE environmental harm than driving an IC engine car, due to the impact of coal aerosol particulates on human lungs, which can dramatically shorten your life.
There needs to be a sea change in production of energy in this country and around the world, or we are in a heap of deep doo-doo. Nuclear power is a clear winner but it has been (unfairly) downplayed in the debate for a zero-emission solution. Burning swamp gas does't really help at all. That said, construction of a couple hundred new safe, modern, modular nuclear reactors could get us to ZERO EMISSION power in a matter of a couple decades. I think that is the only alternative which makes sense in the near-term. A lot of $$$ has been spent to bring solar and wind energy to the rescue, but they still only constitute about 1/5th of zero emission energy production in this country and less than 1/10th of all power generation. We still have a long way to go.
While I'm at it - spending money on autonomous anything is a tremendous waste of time and precious resources. The reason is that autonomous systems totally ignore the idea of "proximate causality" and the legal and insurance liability issues involved altogether. The legal and insurance communities will ultimately NOT buy-into a technology that creates tremendous uncertainty into who is "at-fault" in an accident involving a human and an AI machine.
If the precedent for these vehicles follows product liability trends, then the auto manufacturers are setting themselves up for TREMENDOUS legal and financial risks or taxes, because the easiest way to compensate victims of these accidents is to TAX autonomous vehicle sales to create a public trust fund. That TAX will likely be as large as your annual insurance premium times the years of service the vehicle is expected to be employed - but all at the point of sale to either the dealer or the consumer. Imagine paying a $10,000 tax UPFRONT for the privilege of a self-driving car.
Any public or private $$$ going into these systems would be better spent on mass transportation and the infrastructure required to instantiate it over a much wider population of consumers who can taking advantage of it. The Metro in WDC is a great example of this. These trains are largely "autonomous" already, and get more people around WDC than cars. This should be the model for all cities in the US. Autonomous cars really doesn't solve any problems, they just create more.
Just because Silicon Valley THINKS some new cyber-thing is a good idea, doesn't make it so. Autonomous is just the latest example of "if we can do this, won't it be great ?!!"Just because you CAN doesn't mean you SHOULD. A textbook example is Facebook - what a pile of doo-doo. Not only does it trick people into giving up their private information for others to exploit, it may have been used by foreign agents to throw a national election. Who would argue today that the world is a better place with Facebook ? Not me.
There needs to be a sea change in production of energy in this country and around the world, or we are in a heap of deep doo-doo. Nuclear power is a clear winner but it has been (unfairly) downplayed in the debate for a zero-emission solution. .
Unfairly downplayed ?!?
You might want to ask the peoples around Fukushima and Chernobyl.
^^^
That's an unfair indictment of the industry as the one in Japan occurred because of an error in shutting off the cooling pumps and in Russia it was also human error incorrectly shutting down control systems!
Look at all the Nuclear systems in subs and ships that are still being built and operating fine and safe.. Then France where 75% of their electrical power comes from Nuclear! Yep in the US we had one incident and it was contained.
In my former life we suppled most of the welding materials to fabricate the ~10 inch thick steel reactor containment vessels. There folks fabricated those in the US, were Combustion Engineering in TN, B&W in OH and CB&I in several locations. All used our products and I discussed the difficult welding and materials application with all their engineers at the time. . Most of those facilities and knowledgeable personnel are gone! I recall an engineer from Combustion Engr telling me when the industry rapidly declined, it will take a major PR compaign to get it back! It declined for several reasons, a major issue was power companies were adding capacity based on "expected demand." The energy crisis in the Carter Years caused significant unexpected conservation.
Investing in Nuclear is costly, as is maintaining mostly 30+ year old plants! In fact I was happy to see the units in SC being built stopped. The South Koreans, who build a lot of systems for France, were booked up so the SC main reactor, very heavy wall vessels were being built in China. Very scary!
Nuclear power can be designed, built and operated safely, however for a variety of reasons it will be difficult to get new ones built. Until their is a viable alternative, natural gas is the cleanest of the current ~85% of the US power being produced with hydrocarbon methods (See my post #372 of 2017 US production data add add the 5% biofuel to the 80% hydrocarbon fuels.)
SAFE Nuclear is better than burning coal. Both Chernobyl was a bad design, (graphite moderated) and Fukushima was built in the wrong place - too close to the shoreline in a tsunami prone area. If you want safe Nuclear, you need to look at what the French have done. They get most of their power from Nuclear and have an excellent safety record.
Mostly generic information, some intelligent guesses, obvious stuff about the Camaro and then some buzz words like NVH, DSSV and MRC peppered here and there to make it seem believable. Its a nice job
But paragraph 4 is where it all falls apart. It just make zero sense. Im skeptical that GM has officially decided the title of the higher performance versions of this car since it is at least a year to two out past the release of the base model. During which time they will be testing new stuff with camo-ed cars and everyone will be speculating whats under the tarps as we all were a few months ago and still are today.
This is also exactly why it makes little to no sense that "those who have driven the GS tell me that it is literally frightening to floor it. GM even had a team of lawyers in to advise on the legal perils of selling such a potent vehicle for street use". That implies the car and engine are already either near completion or completed and they are in testing, which is clearly false. We've seen a couple variations of the same car around the track and doing launches and to be honest neither looked very powerful. Additionally, the higher performance version will almost certainly have body upgrades and a slew of new components that are probably no where near completion in terms of design let alone built as a prototype
Where are most EV sold in the US? California. State wide electricity comes from Hydro(18%) + Renewable(30%) + Nuclear(9%), so a total of 57% comes from a sources that have no carbon footprint. https://www.energy.ca.gov/almanac/el...tem_power.html
Many Communities in California are currently getting ALL their electric power from 100% renewable sources. https://www.greentechmedia.com/artic...ure#gs._0C7_pY
For these people their EV's are green!
Did you bother to read the hold report?
"we find that hydropower development does emit greenhouse gases (GHGs), but the rate of emissions per unit of electric generation from hydropower (excluding tropical reservoirs) is much lower than for fossil fuel technologies." In the United States we do NOT have any "tropical reservoirs" and probability of new Dams/Reservoirs being build is slim to none, so the report is talking about NEW reservoirs in Canada. They also talk about how the GHGs from reservoirs falls off over time. So your point is the renewables have some GHGs but what you don't seem to understand is that it is a hell of lot less (whole order of magnitude less) than fossil fuels.
Yo - you're missing that my "point" was not to tout fossil fuels over "renewable green" energy sources, nor was it to downplay benefits of "renewable" energy sources over traditional fossil fuel based ones - the point was to show that firstoff we are VERY far away from having a predominately renewable/green energy grid in this country AND even as we inch toward that goal people should be aware that not all renewable energy sources are created equal - some are a net neutral impact on the environment, some are not viable w/o govt subsidies & require alot of maintenance (wind comes to mind) & some take some time from implementation before they theoretically offset the carbon footprint they do leave.
The point was - relative to all that, EV's are the ultimate equivalent of putting the cart before the horse as a result. Until the energy used to power the EV's is green - THEY ARE NOT GREEN!!!!!!! Why not spend more time/energy/money improving the overall efficiency of the grid on a national level before incentivizing, subsidizing, promoting EV's as the savior for greenhouse gasses & all that is bad w/ internal combustion powered vehicles.
You know, I guess I can put up the source material only so many times, but I can't make you read it. Indeed, the green line is "cars" and it shows a dip. The dip is there as people hold off buying sedans in favor of future EVs. You can tell that because sales of SUVs and trucks are steady. They aren't causing the dip. If you want to actually study this thing a little more closely with more data, please go read the article.
An "article" that you have to register for (translation, get spammed) isn't really proof either.
Batteries are not renewable energy source. Huh? What?
Originally Posted by auburn2
Batteries are not a renewable energy source. That is like calling a Chevy Suburban gas tank a renewable energy source because you can fill it with E85 ethanol.
Photovoltaic cells are, but they are not accelerating at any significant rate compared to our energy needs. Most of the increase in renewables is in wind power and that is just now getting to where it is about comparable to hydroelectric which has been a dying energy source for 50 years. No single renewable will come close to matching coal currently or in the near future. All of them together probably won't match it.
The cost of coal depends on where you are. In the center of the country from Ohio south to the Florida panhandle it is pretty cheap because transport is nil, and that is even after the environmental regulations that limit its efficiency. California which has both substantial amounts of wind and hydro and has the 3rd largest oil production in the country pays 19 cents a KW/hr for electricity. Meahwhile coal produced electricity in Kentucy and Alabama is about 10 cents a kw/hr.
It is the same pretty much everywhere, look at the states that still use a lot of coal and they are states with a lot of iron ore and cheap electricity rates. The states that have transitioned away from it pay more for electricity.
Thanks for pointing out that batteries are not a renewable energy source. I thought you mined batteries like coal...
Whatever your point was, the technologies associated with electrical power usage in mobile platforms are rapidly evolving. Coal is DEAD. As well it SHOULD BE. No matter what state it's used to generate electricity, at any cost, it's filthy as all hell. A nightmare.
The transition to self-driving electric vehicles is coming. And it's coming fast. Heads in sand notwithstanding.
The seeking alpha article is only one perspective. I work in the power industry and all the majors don't see the adoption rate like seeking alpha does. Lots goes into this... is change coming? Yes... will demand for ICE vehicles collapse overnight? No.
Me personally... I need to be able to take a road trip. If I can't take my vehicle somewhere w/o a huge hassle I don't want it.
I'll gladly have an EV daily driver when they can be more than just an around-town car. I drove a friend's Tesla 3 and it was a great experience.
Thanks for pointing out that batteries are not a renewable energy source. I thought you mined batteries like coal...
Whatever your point was, the technologies associated with electrical power usage in mobile platforms are rapidly evolving. Coal is DEAD. As well it SHOULD BE. No matter what state it's used to generate electricity, at any cost, it's filthy as all hell. A nightmare.
The transition to self-driving electric vehicles is coming. And it's coming fast. Heads in sand notwithstanding.
By what measure can you say coal is dead when it accounts for 30% of electricity generation in the U.S.? While it may be slowly declining, it is far from dead.
Thanks for pointing out that batteries are not a renewable energy source. I thought you mined batteries like coal...
Whatever your point was, the technologies associated with electrical power usage in mobile platforms are rapidly evolving. Coal is DEAD. As well it SHOULD BE. No matter what state it's used to generate electricity, at any cost, it's filthy as all hell. A nightmare.
The transition to self-driving electric vehicles is coming. And it's coming fast. Heads in sand notwithstanding.
LOL - someone's completely missing the details here - actually, when it comes to the batteries used in EV's, yes - you quite literally MINE for the materials that make them work, they're not renewable - they're base elements contained in only finite quantities in the earth & are mined in their own right and/or result as a by-product from the mining/refining of other related base metals/elements - the most commonly used: LI, NI, CO - 2 of which are essentially non-recyclable & the batteries themselves once assembled really cannot be recycled either (at least not in any way that is efficient/economic/non-hazardous). Also as others mentioned - coal certainly is not dead, it's use as a traditional energy provider is being reduced - but it is still a huge part of our current energy grid.
Lead acid batteries though? The ones used in ALL traditional vehicles........those are 100% recyclable, as are the entire drivetrains of internal combustion engines - both the drivetrain & battery are INFINITELY recyclable.
Again Cart. Before. Horse.
There is a massive industry w/ processes that have been perfected over decades dedicated to the recycling of traditional internal combustion engines, EV's present unique challenges for recyclers & quite simply, are not fully recyclable. So- strip away the subsidies & credits for the EV's, consider that the vast majority of the power generated to charge them still comes from non-renewable (or non-green renewable) fossil fuel based sources, add to the discussion that the EV's motor is not easily recyclable, that the production of its battery drains the world of non-renewable finite base metals, & that the battery itself isn't recyclable & you wind up w/ a pretty damn good case that EV's are a fraud when it comes to their "green" footprint relative to traditional combustion vehicles & that their adoption rate has quite a bit more to do w/ poltics/big business/special interests than is really discussed in the mainstream media & you should come to the realization that they're truly not what they're cracked up to be & so much more thought has to be put into the energy generation issue rather than into inventing products that run off an energy source that still hasn't been proven to be "green" in the real sense.
LOL - someone's completely missing the details here - actually, when it comes to the batteries used in EV's, yes - you quite literally MINE for the materials that make them work, they're not renewable - they're base elements contained in only finite quantities in the earth & are mined in their own right and/or result as a by-product from the mining/refining of other related base metals/elements - the most commonly used: LI, NI, CO - 2 of which are essentially non-recyclable & the batteries themselves once assembled really cannot be recycled either (at least not in any way that is efficient/economic/non-hazardous). Also as others mentioned - coal certainly is not dead, it's use as a traditional energy provider is being reduced - but it is still a huge part of our current energy grid.
Lead acid batteries though? The ones used in ALL traditional vehicles........those are 100% recyclable, as are the entire drivetrains of internal combustion engines - both the drivetrain & battery are INFINITELY recyclable.
Again Cart. Before. Horse.
There is a massive industry w/ processes that have been perfected over decades dedicated to the recycling of traditional internal combustion engines, EV's present unique challenges for recyclers & quite simply, are not fully recyclable. So- strip away the subsidies & credits for the EV's, consider that the vast majority of the power generated to charge them still comes from non-renewable (or non-green renewable) fossil fuel based sources, add to the discussion that the EV's motor is not easily recyclable, that the production of its battery drains the world of non-renewable finite base metals, & that the battery itself isn't recyclable & you wind up w/ a pretty damn good case that EV's are a fraud when it comes to their "green" footprint relative to traditional combustion vehicles & that their adoption rate has quite a bit more to do w/ poltics/big business/special interests than is really discussed in the mainstream media & you should come to the realization that they're truly not what they're cracked up to be & so much more thought has to be put into the energy generation issue rather than into inventing products that run off an energy source that still hasn't been proven to be "green" in the real sense.
LOL - someone's completely missing the details here - actually, when it comes to the batteries used in EV's, yes - you quite literally MINE for the materials that make them work, they're not renewable - they're base elements contained in only finite quantities in the earth & are mined in their own right and/or result as a by-product from the mining/refining of other related base metals/elements - the most commonly used: LI, NI, CO - 2 of which are essentially non-recyclable & the batteries themselves once assembled really cannot be recycled either (at least not in any way that is efficient/economic/non-hazardous). Also as others mentioned - coal certainly is not dead, it's use as a traditional energy provider is being reduced - but it is still a huge part of our current energy grid.
Lead acid batteries though? The ones used in ALL traditional vehicles........those are 100% recyclable, as are the entire drivetrains of internal combustion engines - both the drivetrain & battery are INFINITELY recyclable.
Again Cart. Before. Horse.
There is a massive industry w/ processes that have been perfected over decades dedicated to the recycling of traditional internal combustion engines, EV's present unique challenges for recyclers & quite simply, are not fully recyclable. So- strip away the subsidies & credits for the EV's, consider that the vast majority of the power generated to charge them still comes from non-renewable (or non-green renewable) fossil fuel based sources, add to the discussion that the EV's motor is not easily recyclable, that the production of its battery drains the world of non-renewable finite base metals, & that the battery itself isn't recyclable & you wind up w/ a pretty damn good case that EV's are a fraud when it comes to their "green" footprint relative to traditional combustion vehicles & that their adoption rate has quite a bit more to do w/ poltics/big business/special interests than is really discussed in the mainstream media & you should come to the realization that they're truly not what they're cracked up to be & so much more thought has to be put into the energy generation issue rather than into inventing products that run off an energy source that still hasn't been proven to be "green" in the real sense.
Yes. EVs are not as environmentally benign as fanboys and girls would hope.
That will have no impact on the migration to driverless, electrically powered cars.
12-16-2018, 02:16 PM
