Electric Cars: Chev Bolt seems to be the first practical one.

[houstonscott]

Until a truly decent solution to power the grid is put into place, electric cars will remain a stupid environmental disaster to own or operate. They are idiotic to say the least and only someone who knows nothing of physics would ever allow themselves to be hoodwinked into buying or owning one must less operating one. If it weren't for subsidies paid for by us taxpayers electric cars would not exist and every company producing one would be bankrupt and out of business as they should be. Electric cars are nothing more than an idiotic ruse played on ignorant people who are devoid of common sense. Someday I'll tell ya what I really feel about electric cars.

+1, you are a very wise man.... Google Tesla problems, it's a real piece of crap. 40% failure rate on drivetrain. To many issues to list, there are hundreds of issues that have trigger law suits. Think of all the problems on other manufacturers in last 50 years wrapped into one car. Envision a car where engine and transmission and differential fail completely 40% of time before 50k miles. Think of a car company that has never made a dime in profit.

 

[buickanddeere]

Agree the Tesla is a far better car. But Bolt is similar capabilities at 1/3 the price.

It's sort of the modern equivalent of the 6-cylinder rubber-floormats $1.900 versions of cars of the past. (You could order a 55 Chev coupe with no back seat!). If all you need is to haul your butt around and elegance means nothing - then why not build for that market too?

A comparison to the Tesla 3 could be considered.

 

[CobyRupert]

1.) Gasoline or diesel car uses about 5% of energy originally contained in the fuel when it was still underground. Electric car uses about 20-25%.
2.) Coal burning plants need night load (in ex. street lights) to keep running. Sooner or later all street lights will be replaced by high efficiency fixtures lowering the night load. Electric car night charging might be the night load that will keep the coal burning plants running.
Electric cars are comming and there is not way to stop it. Especially in Europe where comute is shorter and gasoline or diesel is several times more expensive than in the USA.

True, in the short term future. But in the far, far future (assuming some cheeto doesn't blow up the world), imagine the effects of:
1) Millions of people who now have a substantial energy (battery) storage device (that's also their car), combined with:
2) A (instantaneous) demand based electricity market, where all users can buy and sell at different times of the day based on the market (demand /prices). (Through "smart chargers" tied into an app on your smart phone that monitors the "market") Think about:
3) The stabilizing effect on the grid that this would have to counter the destabilizing effect of wind and solar.

It would revolutionize / and decentralize the energy industry like desk top computers did to computing industry in the 90's.
Example: Say, for my 30 mile daily commute, I only need to use 15% of my car's stored energy. Say I bought that energy during a sunny and windy day when electricity was 7 cents/kw-hr. Now I see it's a super hot/cold day, or night, or wind isn't blowing, etc. and energy is selling for 14cents/kw-hr....

This will reduce need for base loading grid with coal or nukes.
This would reduce loading on long distant transmission lines, as power would be more localized and/or flattened usage spikes.
This will also drive "smart appliances" that you can program so your dish washer only turns on when price falls below (say) 11cent/kw-hr.

 

[California]

True, in the short term future. But in the far, far future (assuming some cheeto doesn't blow up the world), imagine the effects of:

1) Millions of people who now have a substantial energy (battery) storage device (that's also their car), combined with:

2) A (instantaneous) demand based electricity market, where all users can buy and sell at different times of the day based on the market (demand /prices). (Through "smart chargers" tied into an app on your smart phone that monitors the "market") Think about:

3) The stabilizing effect on the grid that this would have to counter the destabilizing effect of wind and solar.

It would revolutionize / and decentralize the energy industry like desk top computers did to computing industry in the 90's....

This will reduce need for base loading grid with coal or nukes.

This would reduce loading on long distant transmission lines, as power would be more localized and/or flattened usage spikes.

This will also drive "smart appliances" that you can program so your dish washer only turns on when price falls below (say) 11cent/kw-hr.

Each of those points is very insightful. And more realistic than many here realize.

A close friend was on a team at ConEd (NYC utilities provider) studying improvement and extension of their present integrated signalling network. The ConEd dispatcher now sends orders to not only their traditional energy grid suppliers - nuclear and coal plants etc, but also to the rooftop solar plants mounted on larger factories and warehouses, small hydro, etc. They are working their way down to sending control signals to the smallest home solar installations. All of this is centered around load balancing. This is because the large plants are most efficient when running at constant load. Remotely controlling all input sources can gain huge efficiencies in generation and transmission compared to present configuration. Now add the concept of Tesla's backyard and warehouse-scale local battery storage - that he is proposing to test large-scale in Australia - and the need for new transmission capacity lessens.

Since she told me of that I've read a little more. U-Texas has published a paper studying the cost to get new energy sources online rated county by county across the US. I think it said it will never again be cost effective to build another coal plant and only a couple of small regions (Southern Indiana?) presently can run coal at lesser operating cost than all the less costly alternatives - right now. The laid off coal miners might as well get retrained in solar install or something, their jobs aren't coming back.

Finally I read another study that concluded localized wind, solar, hydro can drive down long term costs overall because of the cost savings of new or replacement generating plants that will now never be built. Nuclear is still so expensive that no insurance company will insure them, that industry got the taxpayers to subsidize their risk while they privatized the profit. As those plants age, there is a big cost savings in not replacing them like-for-like. And as I noted coal-fueled plants are already not cost-effective to renovate as was anticipated in their design. The rates charged for their use include anticipated renovation, that will now never be performed.

Times are changing.

 

[buickanddeere]

True, in the short term future. But in the far, far future (assuming some cheeto doesn't blow up the world), imagine the effects of:
1) Millions of people who now have a substantial energy (battery) storage device (that's also their car), combined with:
2) A (instantaneous) demand based electricity market, where all users can buy and sell at different times of the day based on the market (demand /prices). (Through "smart chargers" tied into an app on your smart phone that monitors the "market") Think about:
3) The stabilizing effect on the grid that this would have to counter the destabilizing effect of wind and solar.

It would revolutionize / and decentralize the energy industry like desk top computers did to computing industry in the 90's.
Example: Say, for my 30 mile daily commute, I only need to use 15% of my car's stored energy. Say I bought that energy during a sunny and windy day when electricity was 7 cents/kw-hr. Now I see it's a super hot/cold day, or night, or wind isn't blowing, etc. and energy is selling for 14cents/kw-hr....

This will reduce need for base loading grid with coal or nukes.
This would reduce loading on long distant transmission lines, as power would be more localized and/or flattened usage spikes.
This will also drive "smart appliances" that you can program so your dish washer only turns on when price falls below (say) 11cent/kw-hr.

Price swing would have to be more than that given the losses is charging a discharging.
What happened when you go to use the vehicle and you computer program has just sold the power from your EV ?
The more often the batteries are charged and discharged, the sooner they wear out . $$$ to replace.
A lot of up front cost to store an insufficient amount of energy. All sounds good however.

 

[buickanddeere]

Each of those points is very insightful. And more realistic than many here realize.

A close friend was on a team at ConEd (NYC utilities provider) studying improvement and extension of their present integrated signalling network. The ConEd dispatcher now sends orders to not only their traditional energy grid suppliers - nuclear and coal plants etc, but also to the rooftop solar plants mounted on larger factories and warehouses, small hydro, etc. They are working their way down to sending control signals to the smallest home solar installations. All of this is centered around load balancing. This is because the large plants are most efficient when running at constant load. Remotely controlling all input sources can gain huge efficiencies in generation and transmission compared to present configuration. Now add the concept of Tesla's backyard and warehouse-scale local battery storage - that he is proposing to test large-scale in Australia - and the need for new transmission capacity lessens.

Since she told me of that I've read a little more. U-Texas has published a paper studying the cost to get new energy sources online rated county by county across the US. I think it said it will never again be cost effective to build another coal plant and only a couple of small regions (Southern Indiana?) presently can run coal at lesser operating cost than all the less costly alternatives - right now. The laid off coal miners might as well get retrained in solar install or something, their jobs aren't coming back.

Finally I read another study that concluded localized wind, solar, hydro can drive down long term costs overall because of the cost savings of new or replacement generating plants that will now never be built. Nuclear is still so expensive that no insurance company will insure them, that industry got the taxpayers to subsidize their risk while they privatized the profit. As those plants age, there is a big cost savings in not replacing them like-for-like. And as I noted coal-fueled plants are already not cost-effective to renovate as was anticipated in their design. The rates charged for their use include anticipated renovation, that will now never be performed.

Times are changing.

After reading the reports from the anti nuclear , anti coal, anti oil and pro wind, solar & tidal power proponents. How about for balance, reading some reports that champion nuclear for base load and moderate load following with clean coal and hydraulic providing load following.
Solar PV does have a place in remote areas where power would otherwise be generated via imported diesel fuel . Hawaii with it's over priced electricity does have a place for daytime solar peaking however that still requires conventional generation from mid afternoon to mid morning to provide peak generation for AC and cooking supper, then over night base load.
hawaii politics has caused expensive power by banning cheap base load generation.

 

[Kyle_in_Tex]

I would hate to think my electricity would double just because the wind stopped blowing...

 

[houstonscott]

Why do it at all. You want a battery operated car fine, leave me alone.

 

[vvanders]

Zero maintenance ? Saved ownership dollars, how ? Are you comparing an EV to a mid 1970's big block pickup truck ?

Just cracked 50k on our Tesla, here's my maintenance items in total:

New tires at ~35k: $1000 @ $0.028/mi
4 year/50k service(new coolant fluid+misc): $850 @ $0.17/mi

Total electricity use: 16,348 kWH: $0.07 per kWH, $1146.88 @ $0.02/mi

That's it. Keep in mind this is on a high end car. Right now with hydro power @ 0.7c/kWH my most expensive costs per mile are actually tires.

Compare that at $0.11/mi just for gas @ $3.30/gal + 30mpg, not including oil changes.

Oh and it also does 0-60 in 3.9s and has more storage than some SUVs . I weekly do 300-400mi round trips, supercharger network coverage is great(and 120kW DC charging!).

Happy to see Gm bringing some proper competition, everyone wins there.

 

[vvanders]

+1, you are a very wise man.... Google Tesla problems, it's a real piece of crap. 40% failure rate on drivetrain. To many issues to list, there are hundreds of issues that have trigger law suits. Think of all the problems on other manufacturers in last 50 years wrapped into one car. Envision a car where engine and transmission and differential fail completely 40% of time before 50k miles. Think of a car company that has never made a dime in profit.

Oh please, if that were the case with Tesla these things would be all over the news.

We've owned ours for over two years and it's been flawless. All the owners I know are also pretty happy with theirs as well. I can speak from actual owner experience, what can you speak to?