New Republic Mag: ‘The Modern Automobile Must Die’ – ‘If we want to solve climate change, there’s no other option’
Excerpts:
‘Transportation is now the largest source of carbon dioxide emissions in the United States’
‘In 2010, a NASA study declared that automobiles were officially the largest net contributor of climate change pollution in the world.’
‘The power generation sector may have emitted the most greenhouse gases in total. But it also released so many sulfates and cooling aerosols that the net impact was less than the automobile industry, according to NASA.’
The problem is that most automakers seek to meet those requirements by developing electric cars. If those cars are charged with electricity from a coal-fired power plant, they create “more emissions than a car that burns petrol,” energy storage expert Dénes Csala pointed out last year.
“For such a switch to actually reduce net emissions, the electricity that powers those cars must be renewable.”
https://newrepublic.com/article/150689/modern-automobile-must-die
h/t to Climate Depot
“‘Transportation is now the largest source of carbon dioxide emissions in the United States’”
yeah, and China has twice the emissions of the US….emissions are not our problem any more
Automobiles must be modified to produce “sulfates and cooling aerosols “. Long live the Clean Air!
Since Clean Air Act was a major cause of the warming we are supposed to be crapping ourselves over, That would be the logical solution.
Just don’t say to charge them from Roof Top Solar. Most drivers, during the winter months, wouldn’t get home before dark, (even during the Summer months after 5pm renders panels practically useless for output) and couldn’t recharge from roof top solar at night. At least not without the assistance of a Battery Back-up system that recharges during daylight hours. Although then we will need even more battery materials and mining those is very environmentally unfriendly. Battery powered electric vehicles aren’t practical beyond Golf Carts, and not affordable for any with range beyond 200 miles.
Don’t forget needing to clean the snow off the panels before you can recharge your car.
Bryan A,
Well, the solution is very simple! Everyone will have to stay home during the day when their cars are being charged, and then go to work, school, shopping, etc. at night. /sarc
Enter the Vampire Colonies
Oh a waking tax for those that want to be awake in the daytime!
The size of the solar panel array to recharge an electric automobile in a reasonable amount of time would be enormous.
If you do it from a battery recharged from solar…
30Kw Battery ($6000) + installation ($5-8000) is $11-15,000)
30Kw Solar system is $55,000 for a 30 panel rooftop system (+ potentially $30,000 for a new roof for support)
Looks like that 30Kw Tesla will cost you around $195,000 for the needed infrastructure without the use of Carbon Energy
1000 watt solar panels? Try 90 panels. Battery will much more expensive as well.
But, you are just about correct about the dollar figure!
Please don’t give Jerry Brown any more “ideas” … he’ll be increasing the MANDATORY residential solar panels to 30 panels instead of 3. The senile Jerry Brown is making irrational deathbed decisions that are further RUINING the affordability of being a Californian. Too bad he won’t live to see the mess he’s made
I live at 45N remote rural isolated impoverished.
The community asked for an estimate to solar heat our Olympic sized swimming pool, the largest single power demand on the Island. The solar array would be larger than the pool. We still use propane.
Especially in northern latitudes, compounded by cloud cover. I’m guessing Seattle will shut down entirely from October to March.
Bryan A says “Just don’t say to charge them from …”
Many folks miss the fact that Billions of dollars, Euros, and other coins are being spent for thousands of smart folks to figure out how to transition away from ICE. The “charging” issue will be solved. For example, VW is exploring mobile robots moving through parkings lots and charging batteries while the owners work, shop, or play. This is not unlike have a chipped windshield fixed via a roving van. In the future charging scenario a person won’t be needed.
I’m not arguing this will be a great thing, cheap, or efficient — I’m only saying things will change, slowly oveall I think.
Maybe something else will happen — think of smart cell phones and how they have changed what people do. And that in just a few years.
Let’s assume that all the batteries are free and that each car can hold 1GWhr.
The idea that we could refill all the cars with renewable energy is laughable. Its simply not possible.
Okay…
So if you are not arguing this will be great cheap or efficient then you are basically arguing it will be poor, expensive and waste more of your free time.
Or in other words this is a solution no one really wants but are going to have to deal with because Big Paris told us we need to.
Sorry John, but this is a very poor argument made worse by the fact the examples you give are also ever so slightly complete rubbish.
“Think of smart phones” you say. Sure, okay then, lets. Back in the day the first phones were bricks. However they were status because you had a mobile phone. Then manufacturers, in an effort to remain market leader, made the brick into a smaller brick. Then a smaller brick that could do more. It was market driven because he (or she) who made the better phone got the sales. They also saw that some people wanted cheaper phones with less features. A market opportunity if you will. This is why not every phone is 100% cutting edge. Newest doesn’t need to be greatest provided there is a market for it.
This is how a market works. Either a seller tells the people ‘Hey, you want this new cool thing’ or even better, the people tell the seller ‘we want you to sell us a new and cooler thing.’ To keep a share in the market you need to either get better or smarter or cheaper then the other people. If you can’t do these things the only way to sell your products is by metaphorical gunpoint or by artificially regulating the market to prevent challenging tech from competing the largely unwanted rubbish you are trying to push.
Sorry John, your argument is poor. Those billions of dollars, euros and other coins? Ever consider they might be better spent elsewhere? You know, solving world hunger? Involving child health? Getting me drunk? Are they tax dollars or private industry dollars? Big difference. One is a company taking a risk, the other is money that effectively belongs to the people and could be better spent elsewhere.
You also talk about VW robots. Who recharges them? How does a robot carry enough charge to juice up enough cars? If you tell me the new batteries will be smaller and faster charging then why do we need the robot again? Can we have fuel carrying robots instead? Get 20L of diesel put into my vehicle while I sit here typing at you to save me stopping on the way home? Your chipped windscreen argument is also flawed, because the vast vast majority of people don’t need new chips removed every day.
Sorry, John, but I disagree with everything you said.
“Getting me drunk?</em"
I've known smarter drunks.
Note that I did not claim to like electric cars nor expect a large scale transition quickly. Nor do I think solar and wind will be the main power source. I drive an ICE Subaru; about 500 miles on a tank of gas. Also, my main phone is still the POTS, although I have an inexpensive phone ($125) that is "more computer" than the one I started on. You can see that one here: IBM 1620
In almost all cases of urban travel the purpose is to get someone or something from point A to point B. It is not to have a driving experience like I remember in this:
Ford 1957 C.
What would need to happen is to have Every parking space equipped with a Tesla Supercharger or equivalent so that you can recharge more energy than you utilized to get to the mall/store/work during the time you spend inside.
If your trip to the store is 10 miles and takes 1/2 hour you need to be able to recharge that 10 miles worth of electricity during that 1/2 hour in the store. If you commute 50 miles to work, you need to be able to recharge that 50 miles worth of electricity over the 8 hours at work (better not go home sick before you’re recharged though) Then your grid needs to be able to handle the added load of Millions of cars recharging while you are also using electricity during the workday. Business runs on electrons too.
So to make rechargeable battery powered vehicles work without fossil fuels you need every parking space to have a recharging station and enough generation to accommodate millions of recharging cars during working hours and still power business.
Don’t forget paying for those 10’s of millions of charging stations. That and figuring out a way to bill the customer for the energy provided.
Don’t forget the 10’s of millions of square feet of solar panels covering the landscape to provide “cheap, clean, renewable energy” for all those automobiles. Come to think of it … screw it. Just have the centralized, one-world, one-love, UN government decree that EVERYONE should ride the bus. No AUTOmovement with AUTOmobiles for anyone.
Right. Now imagine all of the good things that could be done with that time, money, and skill if we didn’t worry about stupid things like electric cars! It’s money wastes in a non-existent problem that could be better used elsewhere.
Smart folks have been trying to figure this out for decades, so far all we have are crazy paper solutions.
What we should do is listen to the WISE folks who understand what the real problem is first. Anyone who advocates eliminating the ICE is not a WISE person regardless of how smart they claim to be.
WISE people understand CO2 is not a problem but that forcing people to live in energy poverty is.
Mobile phones provide a service that was not available before. Electric cars just replace regular cars, but don’t work as well.
Just how much charging can be done in an hour so? Not to mention that partial charging like that is murder on battery life.
Beyond that, how do you charge for this charging, or are you arguing that the energy is going to be given away for free?
Most places have a Kiosk that you plug into, swipe your credit/debit card and are charged a fee of $.15 per minute of charging time. If your battery tops off after 5 minutes you pay $.75, if your battery tops off after 20 minutes you pay $3.00, if you are shopping for an hour and still haven’t finished charging you pay $9.00.
Yeah … JUST like a mobile window chip repair van servicing 1/125k cars … vs recharging 120k/125k cars … exactly the same thing. Warmists are math challenged … ELEMENTARY math challenged
“The “charging” issue will be solved.”
Statements of faith do not a business case make.
The charging issue will be solved though…
By eliminating the battery and producing the electricity through some other means.
No more monolithic battery weight
“The charging issue will be solved though…
By eliminating the battery and producing the electricity through some other means.”
And you know what, there already is another means: it’s called Internal Combustion, and you don’t have to change a thing in order to get it working because it’s already in place.
Doesn’t Clean Air produce asthma?
And projections are that it will double again before the Paris Accord requires action from China.
We hear little from the global warming crowd about China. What little we do hear makes it sound as if China is doing wonderful things to stop AGW. All the preaching is about Western Democracies, most especially the USA. Yet back a few years ago someone claimed that even if the USA reduced its emissions to zero AGW would still continue primarily because of developing countries.
In 1985 China had relatively few cars, there was no private ownership; today the estimates are between 217-300 million, with a continually expanding market, compared to the USA with about 270 million where the market is basically replacement. So who exactly is the problem? Population of China 1.37 billion. Population of the USA 325 million. Hmmm?
China is a communist nation. A totalitarian, authoritarian, system beloved by Warmists everywhere who want nothing more than to TELL EVERYONE what to do … and MAKE THEM do it.
Slightly OT but funny …. Tesla on autopilot decides driver needs lunch: https://twitter.com/DFWscanner/status/1030896449821794306
To follow the dramatic Tesla drama, open this page and keep it open:
https://seekingalpha.com/symbol/TSLA
Latitude: To be a good example for the Chinese, the editors of the New Republic have given up their cars. They only take cabs and limos now.
Democrats, like all other communists, are fixated on death camps. Killing 100 million in the previous century isn’t enough. Killing 60 million pre-born babies in America since 1973, and some 800 million worldwide, through a bortion, is not enough. Now it’s death camps for cars.
They won’t stop there.
Dean Bruckner
120,000,000 predicted to die in developing countries by 2050 (32 years away) from smoke inhalation conditions because they have no alternative but to burn dung and wood for heating and cooking (World Health Organisation).
1,000,000 a year dying from vitamin A deficiency that can be alleviated by allowing golden rice to be grown as a staple food, but the greens wont let it happen because it’s GM.
They haven’t even got into top gear yet.
Here I thought agenda 21/2030 was a tin foil deal, per some Jack wagon on the other thread about denial.
Make no mistake, this is absolutely part of the satanic eugenics agenda 21. I wonder how those progressives will appreciate not being permitted to leave the city and go skiing or camping, or ever retire in the mountains.
They don’t think that far ahead
Honest liberty
Tragically, as far as I can see, the manifestation of agenda 21 isn’t even a concious decision. It’s just a creeping development of a left wing agenda.
In other words, the morons don’t even know they are doing it to themselves.
A frog boiling itself …..
I have to wonder, given current birth rates and death rates, how does that 2050 figure of 120,000,000 fare against normal mortality rate? What’s the average life expectancy in those developing countries currently and how many millions (tens, hundreds) will attain that average age by 2050.
Just how many of those 2050 deaths will still be from natural causes?
Bryan A
World Health Organisation numbers. Posted on their web site, I daresay WHO have thought of most of your questions.
Indeed, if you go along and look, they cite half a dozen or so conditions related to burning dung and wood they deem directly attributable to the deaths. I suspect the normal mortality rate is over and above the 120,000,000.
Life expectancy SUDDENLY plummeted in the USA and the EU. Huh? Coincidental with the importation of millions of 3rd world refugees. Soon … the numbers for “developing” countries (aka basket-case, shitholes) will be the same as “developed” nations.
You left out DDT-ban related DEATHS, and the coming Weed-killer-ban related DEATHS
Yep. Going from “cash for clunkers” … to “execution of clunker-drivers”. Boil the frog slowly.
“For such a switch to actually reduce net emissions, the electricity that powers those cars must be renewable.” Do hydro and nuclear count as renewable?
Markl, I think nuclear counts as renewable if you use a breeder reactor. This adds neutrons to uranium and creates plutonium. The plutonium really fires up a nuclear reactor (and you can sell the plutonium to certain countries that want it really bad). Sorry, I should not have said that. my bad.
“>>> I think nuclear counts as renewable if you use a breeder reactor. <<<"
Actually, no. Breeders extend the availability of nuclear fuel from decades to centuries, yes, but the fuel runs out eventually, as all else does in nature, even the sun. But, by the same token, the "renewables" (I prefer to call them the "unreliables", why don't we all?) will run out of puff when the sun does too.
“…will run out of puff when the sun does too”
Except … they don’t last that long. As with the cars they power, they will need constant replacement as they wear out and maybe that will make them ‘run out of puff’ much sooner than the end of the sun.
There is enough known deposits of Uranium and Thorium to last some billion or more years in breeder reactors at current electricity production rates. We will likely not be around then because the sun will have become so hot that our oceans will have boiled away. So it seems that breeder reactors and solar/wind converters have about the same renewability.
…the fuel runs out eventually…
As do the materials to make batteries in electric vehicles. and the rare earths to manufacture Wind Turbines and Solar Panels.
All materials are finite within the bounds of what is recoverable.
Nope. Not because they aren’t renewable (hydro is) but because they provide cheap energy. “Giving society cheap, abundant energy would be the equivalent of giving an idiot child a machine gun.” – Paul Ehrlich, Stanford Woods Institute
How about this: “Giving society cheap, abundant energy would be the equivalent of giving Paul Ehrlich a typewriter.”
Yes!!! Make him walk everywhere too!! And take away his internet connection!!!!
How about making his airline tickets 5 times the cost everyone else pays, that might make him think twice about his airmiles!
Richard: you got it.
At least Oregon has declared that hydro is not a renewable. They did this when they came up with their 25% renewable by 2025 scheme and since hydro supplies 40% of our power…Greens hate hydro because tossing dams across rivers is bad for the environment in general and specifically kill salmon runs. But then they also protest the removal of seals that sit below dams and bite the bellies out of returning salmon to get at all those yummy eggs.
Salmon Ladders can allow for migration to spawning grounds without affecting the populations.
Hmmm a dam with a switchback salmon ladder along its face.
Largest emitter of CD is all animals breathing.
Not to worry … the ever-increasing MASSIVE wildfires throughout the Western US will slaughter millions of living things. Makes you wonder about the wildfire industrial complex … which just billed State government $ 3.7 BILLION … in overtime alone. See … wildfire is “natural” … and “beneficial”
“For such a switch to actually reduce net emissions, the electricity that powers those cars must be renewable.”
WRONG^10. With the energy load of ALL Transportation, you need NUCLEAR. PERIOD. Transportation includes Planes, Ships and Trains, not just automobiles.
And trucks, which AFAIK emit more CO2 than “cars”
I wonder if Musk has gotten his Tesla Truck to work as promised?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fQvGSkTYJSE
Has he ever gotten anything to work as promised?
He will … just as soon as he catches up on his sleep … zzzzzzzzzzz
As usual I got a charge out of this article.
Things that produce CO2:
Cars
buses
trucks
fossil fueled power plants
Breathing
Things we must stop to stop CO2 production;
Stop all transportation
Stop electric production except for Nuclear, solar and wind. Except the greens don’t like nuclear, and the other two are not reliable.
Stop breathing
In other words we must completely stop the economy and drop dead. ( And also do the same to China and the rest of the world.)
Things that produceCO2:
The tiny bubbles in my beer and the satisfying foam they produce as I quaff it.
Tell a millennial* that his craft microbrew beer has to go as a sacrifice to solve climate change.
Then watch the gears turn in his head as he tries to accept two mutually incompatible positions.
* you know this guy. He’s the one with the man-bun hair making your coffee at Starbucks.
Speaking of bubbles in your beer, I have an observation: I drink Dr. Pepper and have for years and in the not-so-distant past when I would open a two-liter bottle of DP I would have to get that cap off quick or the carbon dioxide coming out of solution would cause the liquid to overflow the bottle making a big mess. I had to develop several techinques in order to keep that overflow from happening.
But I have noticed lately that no matter how I open the bottle, it never overflows anymore and I got to thinking that maybe the people who make DP have reduced the amount of CO2 in the beverage.
I don’t know it that is true or not, but I haven’t had a DP bottle spew on me in quite some time. 🙂
Coca Cola make a Bi-carb free coke in Papua- New Guinea. I got a can in Honiara, without noticing the small label. It tastes like New Coke that has been left opened at room temp for a week.
It is probably being stored at a cooler temperature.
Maybe it’s getting shaken less during shipping?
The green blob hates private cars on principle, as they reduce state control, and besides, they give uppity peasants the wrong idea about their proper status. What the green blob really wants is a return to sedan chairs.
Tom, having managed a bunch of young rank and file green blobs I can assure you like most things, they hate everyone else’s whatever but not their own. Their own car is vital for them to do their “good work” saving the planet.
Prior to a staff meeting beginning one day they were arguing over something to do about “evil” auto industry, CAFE standards, pollution etc. I asked how many drove cars (all but one.) Then what mpg their cars got ( all less than 25.) I was considered Darth Vader, evil polluter of the world. I then explained that for four years I had ridden a bike to work and had never owned a car that got less than 25 mpg with my average being over 30 mpg. I didn’t expect it would change their attitude but they did get very quiet.
I’ll bet as soon as they left your presence they resumed their hypocrisy.
If all the Green Blobs stop exhaling CO2, the world will be a better place
Make some squiggly line graphs and then proceed to destroy the auto industry.
Makes sense.
Andrew
energy storage expert Dénes Csala pointed out last year. “For such a switch to actually reduce net emissions, the electricity that powers those cars must be renewable.”
How much of an “expert” can he/she/it be it he/she/it doesn’t mention hydro & nuclear?
He did, he mentioned that Germany was planning to phase out nuclear and that the potential for sufficiently increased renewable didn’t exist.
He also pointed out:
“Therefore, unless the electricity shortfall is filled almost entirely with new natural gas plants, Germany could switch to 100% electric cars and it would still end up with a net increase in emissions.”
They are correct that electric cars don’t do much for climate change unless the electricity is renewable. It is a bait and switch. Nuclear, hydro, wind, solar work but the storage problem with wind and solar is no where near solution, the greens hate nuclear, and hydro in the US is maxed out (no more good sites). So electric cars will only help to clean the air in cities (since it is easier to clean the stack of a power plant than the tailpipe of a car) and will not help with climate change.
“hydro in the US is maxed out ”
How about we just replace the sites the greens have had us tear down in the last 20 years?
” So electric cars will only help to clean the air in cities (since it is easier to clean the stack of a power plant than the tailpipe of a car)”
I don’t think that is correct. It is very expensive to produce clean emissions from PP stacks, but the tail pipes of ICE powered cars are about 99% pollution free today.
Okay, now add it to the Party planks so the public can take notice of that crazy list this time around.
“>>> The modern automobile must die. If we want to solve climate change there’s no other option. <<<"
Ah, but there is: do nothing. The climate will cool all by itself eventually, as it did so many times in the Earth's geologic history, and in human recorded history as well. It's cooling already. The average global temperature has already dropped by about 0.6 degree Celsius since its recent El Nino peak in 2015.
“The modern automobile must die. If we want to solve climate change there’s no other option. ”
Are they saying the climate will stop changing if we kill off the modern automobile? If so, are they willing to place a bet on that?
Only 3 things to say…
• 5 minute fill-up time — is what we’ve become dependent on as consumers
• 168,000 retail locations — to purchase the refill, whatever it is.
• below $500/mo cost — for The Car, its fuel, its upkeep.
That is the equation that sits in most-every consumers mind — if they bother to think about it — that governs how and why the infernal combustion engine car is so well accepted in the market. Modest running cost AND totally convenient nation-wide (continent-wide, for most-every continent) refilling and servicing fabric.
THAT is what the electric-car industry has to rise to.
There are what, less than 1,500 e-car fast-charge stations which are PAINFULLY SLOW compared to gasoline? Well, that’s a no brainer: not convenient enough. Not convenient enough EVEN with the ubiquitous “apps” on one’s cell phone that aim to be super-helpful in locating and directing a driver to an available ‘tricity pump somewhere near them.
REFILL ANXIETY is the № 1 problem people end up having with e-cars.
That and the very highly likelihood of missing appointments if one doesn’t really plan out the refill-the-car situation on modestly long trips. Even commuting can be a challenge for the reduced-range el-cheapo e-cars which abound in the market. Have to find a parking-lot recharger in order to get home from work. And have it available. And so on.
Since “a decent refill” — to average consumers — is very likely “getting a few days worth of juice” at a fill up (under normal city-living circumstances), and if consumers according to leasing companies are putting about 1,000 miles a month on cars, well … “few days” is 7 so 1,000 ÷ 30 × 7 = 235 miles in in-car battery capacity.
235 miles at 3.3 miles per kilowatt hour → 72 kWh.
5 minutes is ⁵/₆₀ = ¹/₁₂ hour. 72 ÷ ¹/₁₂ = 864 kilowatts charge rate.
Note that that (864 kW) is the raw charge time for a fully empty tank to be fully restored to fullness. It is not the “at station time”, which is a couple of minutes on each end … driving up, addressing the pump, milling around, decoupling from pump and negotiating leaving the station. I’ve been doing a lot of record-keeping, and it takes about 4 minutes in filling station “overhead” on each visit.
Still … 7 to 10 minutes is the expected time. Consumers MIGHT be coërced to deal with 10 to 15 total minutes (like a slow day at the filling pump) as the norm, but not much more. 15 minutes less 4 minutes overhead leaves 11 minutes. 72 × 60 ÷ 11 = 400 kW. Still a pretty outrageous power delivery rate.
WITH PRESENT super-durable consumer-handled electricity connectors, that’d take no fewer than 4 connectors of the 100 kW max type … to get the job done. Can you imagine the outrage at needing to hook up 4 connectors to your car just to get a fill-up? Its both ridiculous and patently dangerous.
So in a nutshell … the problem: energy density, safety, consumer-grade (protected) connectors, and handling rather astounding specific energy needs at the fill up station. 400 kW.
_______
Since consumers are driving about 1,000 miles/mo … divided by 3.3 mi/kWh = 300 kWh per month in electricity would need to be budgeted into that $500/mo cost. In Kalifornia, we’re being billed nearly 24¢/kWh right now on the average — straight from the Pacific Gouge-and-Excruciate municipal utility. I know: I just did 3 years worth of residential power bill analysis to see if solar power would be justified.
The retail price of power would be HIGHER than this average, say if priced like gasoline, then about 30¢/kWh. If it weren’t underwritten, subsidized and fake rates. 300 kWh × 30¢/kWh = $90/mo. That leaves $410/mo for “reasonable car costs”, outside replacing tires and servicing the vehicle. At 4% financing, on a 5 year loan, with nothing down (got to make it attractive) that backs into $22,260 in finance-cost per month. Assuming that Mr. Musk’s e-car of the Model 3 variety is really the paradigm of cost-effective vehicles that will have high adoption here in America (at least), then its $35,000 base price must have a down payment of over $12,750 or 36% of the price, at the outset.
Methinks that this is a non-starter. Maybe one can lease the thing for less (assuming a 50% depreciation, it’d work), but still … not terribly attractive finance optics.
_______
Just saying
GoatGuy
You will literally need to be able to recharge at every place you stop and park. Work, store, mall, park, doctors office, library, home, restaurants, etc… and all of that infrastructure will be subject to theft overnight. I’ve seen whole unbuilt subdivisions stripped overnight
The copper raiders will have dollar signs in their eyes.
Drive a little, top off. Drive a little, top off.
I can’t think of a better way to destroy your battery quickly.
I don’t believe Eco-Jezuz Elon has delivered a SINGLE Model-3 for anywhere NEAR $35k … yet. He is selling “loaded” models in the $50-60k range to help his NEGATIVE cash flow. Your numbers are going even further upside-down. Only the TRULY wealthy (triple-dipping government bureaucrats for eg.) will be able to afford a personal mobility device in the not so distant future. Gotta KILL FREEDOM of mobility … then the government can KILL the rest of our FREEDOM’s
I am busy flying around the world telling people to curb their carbon emissions.
As a friend keeps telling me, “we grew up in the Golden Age” of high-horsepower muscle cars. Sad how the enviro-Nazis have managed to ruin the car industry but I’m certain fossil-fuel-powered cars will be dominant while I’m alive.
I don’t know about that. Dodge has some nice Hemi-powered goodness out there at the moment. Some variants have over 700HP! Insane, but amusing.
I saw a new Ford Mustang on tv this morning that had 787 horsepower right off the factory floor! It cost $57,000.
I’m wondering where a person would put 787 horsepower to good use on the public highways. Drag racing is illegal. Speeding and reckless driving are illegal.
It doesn’t look like the car companies are too concerned about fuel efficiency.
Going from stop turn signal light to freeway merge at 65 mph in less than 4 seconds.
Nice to have a vehicle that can get out of it’s own way
Hauling heavy equipment to and from job sites. In addition to pulling power, you also need enough weight in the vehicle body to resist a loaded trailer’s momentum when changing lanes or taking turns at speed. Not too good for fuel economy, but essential for road safety.
0 to 60 isn’t the only measure.
At times being safe depends on what your 60 to 80 time is.
Having enough horsepower to get out of the way of something when you are already going highway speeds can be important.
also your 60 – zero time is equally important
True. And the high performance cars today are much improved in performance, driveability, safety, and fuel economy. But they are relatively more expensive and relatively rare. I had two high school/college friends who were able to afford Plymouth 426 street Hemis in the late 60s on what they earned from their jobs while going to school. I doubt a kid could afford today’s equivalent.
Today’s muscle cars are bargain compared to EVs.
I had a friend whose father bought a brand new 1968 426 Hemi Plymouth Satellite with a claimed 425 horsepower, and the first time I got in it with him, he turned a corner slowly and then stomped down on the accelerator and almost lost control of the car. The rear wheels were spinning so fast it made it feel like you were driving on ice as the rearend fishtailed wildly, and smoke from burning tire rubber billowed into the air.
Some rich daddy is going to buy his son one of those new 787 H.P Ford Mustangs and his son might have a similar experience. Don’t let that thing get away from you, son!
As far as I’m concerned 400 H.P. is plenty for me. That gets me up to speed just fine. 🙂
Good thing I have a pickup truck.
The most popular personal transportation around. Geeze I wonder why (?). Let me just give you a few reasons. (1) It is the safest POV around (I’m not including the dinky pickup wannabes that were popular for a while) I have been rear-ended three times in my pickup (every time fully stopped) and received less than a Grand of damage-one of the guys that hit me had his car totaled. (2) you can actually carry a pile of junk-try carrying anything but yourself in a “smart” car. (3) in my case at least it is the only vehicle I have ever owned that I can actually stretch my legs out. (I’m 6.5ft tall-198cm)
Richard Patton,
Imagine when the Oroville Dam was on the verge of failure. If people had been required to evacuate, they could have put the kids and pets in the family car, along with a few valuables. On the other hand, if they would have had to depend on public transportation, assuming that there was even sufficient capacity, taking the pets and any valuables too large or heavy to carry easily would be out of the question. What the implications are of doing away with cars as we know them is definitely a step down in the standard of living.
The Oroville dam was never close to failure.
And hindsight is 20/20.
Please do tell the ACE, State of Cali and many others.
The emergency overflow was eroding. The emergency overflow was on the opposite side of a rock ridge from the dam itself.
To endanger the dam, the rock ridge would have had to been completely eroded first.
Just because idiots panic is not evidence that the idiots were in danger.
Lake Oroville is Gods Country
Careful what you say about Gods Dam
If the cult of CAGW’s actions were based on logic and reason, the cult of CAGW would be advocating for a change to nuclear power rather than wasting more and more money on green scams (wind and solar) which Germany has proved has absolute limits.
France emits six time less greenhouse gases per capital than the European average.
France has the maximum engineering limited nuclear power.
The maximum nuclear power or combined cycle power, for an electrical grid is limited by the lower range of a electrical grid power demand, as nuclear and combined cycle power plants cannot be turned on/off/on/off/on/off.
Combined cycle power plants produce steam from the waste heat from first pass natural gas turbines.
Combined cycle power plants are 20% more efficient than single pass natural gas turbines, however, they are roughly twice as expensive and take 10 hours to start up and hence cannot be turned on/off/on/off/on/off.
Proof: German Vs France
https://www.edf.fr/en/edf/co-sub-2-sub-emissions
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Electricity_sector_in_France
German CO2 emissions have not fallen in 10 years even though Germany has spent more money on wind and solar than any country on the earth.
https://www.forbes.com/sites/jamesconca/2017/10/10/why-arent-renewables-decreasing-germanys-carbon-emissions/#104271d268e1
If the cult of CAGW’s actions were based on logic and reason, they’d have abandoned the cult of CAGW long ago.
Note: There is more carbon (CO2) use to manufacture, transport, and install a wind turbine than it will save in its lifetime. (This does not even begin to speak to decommissioning. Have you seen any removed?)
Additionally, solar and wind are not clean, they simply destroy parts of the Earth not in the USA with the mining, purification, use of rare earths, and other manufacturing processes.
As for EVs, note the environmental disaster the batteries are, along with the rare earth destruction required for the motors.
Sounds like a wonderful way to lose an election: perhaps especially in the US with a scattered population and iffy public transport outside the major cities
As we’ve seen in many a past election, the major cities (all voting deep blue) and the rest of the US (a sea of red with scatterings of blue) are worlds apart in their beliefs and desires.
“For such a switch to actually reduce net emissions, the electricity that powers those cars must be renewable.”
Actually what he said was:
“Therefore, unless the electricity shortfall is filled almost entirely with new natural gas plants, Germany could switch to 100% electric cars and it would still end up with a net increase in emissions.”
“But it also released so many sulfates and cooling aerosols ”
That problem was resolved back in the 70’s and 80’s.
No clue why my previous comment is “in moderation” (it was just filled with docile geek-friendly numbers), but it was. Here was the summary:
Only 3 things to say…
• 5 minute fill-up time — is what we’ve become dependent on as consumers
• 168,000 retail locations — to purchase the refill, whatever it is.
• below $500/mo cost — for The Car, its fuel, its upkeep.
That is the equation that sits in most-every consumers mind — if they bother to think about it — that governs how and why the infernal combustion engine car is so well accepted in the market. Modest running cost AND totally convenient nation-wide (continent-wide, for most-every continent) refilling and servicing fabric.
THAT is what the electric-car industry has to rise to.
There are what, less than 1,500 e-car fast-charge stations which are PAINFULLY SLOW compared to gasoline? Well, that’s a no brainer: not convenient enough. Not convenient enough EVEN with the ubiquitous “apps” on one’s cell phone that aim to be super-helpful in locating and directing a driver to an available ‘tricity pump somewhere near them.
REFILL ANXIETY is the № 1 problem people end up having with e-cars.
Fix that… and they’ll be rolling off the assembly lines like chocolate chip cookies.
GoatGuy
If it takes 3 times as long to recharge, even on fast charge (which damages batteries), then you are going to need 3 times as many refilling stations.
And that’s assuming a full charge has the equivalent range of a tank of gas. If the range is half that of a tank of gas, then double that number (as EV cars will need to fill-up twice as often to go the same distance) IE 3x as long to recharge for half the range means you need 6 times as many refilling stations.
From the Grauniad – it is a real gem.
https://www.theguardian.com/cities/2018/jul/03/all-humanity-has-left-the-area-the-cities-paying-for-tesla-gigafactory
All Humanity Certainly Has Left The Area
But which area..
Science.
Education.
Politics.
Healthcare.
Social Care.
Policing
(add your favourites here)
yup. The Grauniad nails it
See also Matt Ridley’s blog article ‘Censorious Age’
http://www.rationaloptimist.com/blog/the-censorious-age/
Also, in order to charge your e-car at home you’ll need a Smart Meter.
YOU WILL HAVE TO INSTALL a smart meter if you want a home charger.
By Order. HM Government.
So they can switch it off if you are deemed to be overusing it or at ‘the wrong time of day’
At a cost of at least £1,000 each.
Gotta laugh: eleven quid per year predicted saving
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-44903471
Some of us have come to learn what THAT means – negative savings after a couple of years and thereafter evermore.
The invention of electric car is not to answer to CO2 emission, but to solve the problem of fossil fuel running out.
The electric car is having a revival in order to satisfy the inexhaustible, renewable demand for virtue-signaling, no matter how silly and trivial the signal.
Since that won’t happen for several hundred years, there is no need to start worrying about it now.
In other words, AMP, to solve a problem that isn’t a problem and won’t be in our lifetimes. Fossil fuels won’t be running out for a long time to come.
Fine. Their cars first, though. Then we’ll “kill” ours. We plomise.
Yes, they should lead by example. Ditto for the population reduction supporters. But they are hypocrites, so they won’t.
Let those that think Population is a problem FORCE sterilization on their own children first
All we have to do is place everyone under house arrest so they can’t use transportation. Then stop transporting food and other goods. Curl up and die to “save the world.”
“For such a switch to actually reduce net emissions, the electricity that powers those cars must be renewable.” Notice that they don’t say “low carbon.” Nuclear produces far more low carbon power than wind and solar combined.
Anthony, I wish conservatives such as yourself would engage in more critical thinking in this area.
I am a libertarian BTW and love you blog for the most part. But when you cover renewable energy, electric cars, etc, you just slap on your conservative hat and go to town. Instead, put on your free market hat and ask yourself: Is BEV technology disruptive, even without any subsidy? The answer is clearly yes when you actually examine the information available critically.
Tony Seba is a good source of general info if you want a quick overview. And I could care less about CO2 emissions, but if I did,, it certainly makes more sense to power a car with an 85% plus efficient drive train than one with 20% efficiency. Even of the power plant uses coal. But again since CO2 is not a problem, ask yourself: How about the other pollution created by cars? Electric cars require no OBDII systems, no catalytic converters, O2 sensors, etc, in order to keep emissions low. Modern power plants already clean most of the smokestack emissions of harmful chemicals, etc. So the electricity going into BEVs is made clean, even if from coal (unless you fret about Co2). Try sitting next to a diesel F350 for a few minutes and let me know how clean you think that thing is. We should all want a nicer, cleaner environment in which to live. Liberals, conservatives, and Libertarians alike.
Thanks for hosting this blog. Great stuff really.
gator,
how the heck can a technology that has to be subsidized before anyone will buy it be “disruptive”?
I wish you electric car guys would spend even a couple of minutes studying up on a little bit of physics.
The car itself might be 85% efficient, however the system that creates and distributes that electricity is less than 50% efficient. In some places, way less.
BTW, the internal combustion engine has been way above 20% efficient for decades.
Spouting bad data to support their belief system is what we have come to expect from liberals, not conservatives or libertarians.
The problem of pollution from cars was resolved decades ago as well.
In some places, the air coming out of the tail pipe is cleaner than the air being sucked in.
Great, then why don’t you turn your car on tonight in your garage and sit in it to take a nap sir? And Sir, I did study physics with calculus and differential equations at UF. Open your mind drone.
For someone who claims to have studied physics, you don’t seem have bothered actually understanding any of it.
UF? There’s your problem.
Gator,
Just take a close look at how many of the rare raw materials that are used to produce the motors and batteries are mined in many 3rd world countries, and then tell me that’s OK with you. Then take a look at how worn-out battery packs are discarded. None of that is good for the environment or the human condition either. So it’s not all as rosy as you paint it.
Also, the OBDII systems, catalytic converters, O2 sensors, etc. are a small part of the modern internal combustion engine. Electrics have their own special systems as well, not the least of which is the charger and charge maintenance systems. In the end, all this probably washes out anyway and we are left with the obvious issues: battery technology is not nearly good enough to replace liquid fuels, and the current electric infrastructure will take billions, if not trillions to upgrade if we are to replace just surface transportation with all electric vehicles. There’s just no way to sugar coat it; from an engineering perspective it looks like EVs will remain a niche product for some time yet. Probably a long time. Which is a pity, because I really like most of the properties of EVs.
So said Kodak, the actual inventors of digital photography. You may want to read the Innovators Dilemma for some background.
Kodak invented the technology indeed but they figured it would not take off in favor of film. They were very very wrong.
Early digital cameras were quite low-res and nowhere near the picture quality of film, so Kodak’s position was fairly reasonable, at first. As the technology was refined and resolution/quality of digital images improved, the convenience of the digital camera (no waiting for development, easy to retake shots, no need to restock film) started to shine and it began to penetrate and then dominate the market.
Film still has an edge over digital in picture quality, but the difference is small enough now that only photography enthusiasts really care about it these days.
gator,
The two situations aren’t comparable at all. The fact that you would even imply they are just shows how little you really understand about the issues.
Kodak was wrong, therefore anyone who doesn’t favor electric cars is wrong.
Geeze, can’t you guys come up with new fallacies?
Modern brain cells must die to fear climate change.
Dead brain cells, thus, foster electric cars that require long times to wait for recharging.
I can see it now –masses of people waiting at charging stations for hours on end to juice up their new electric, dead-brain-cell, auto creations. Really, though, who do you know who will wait hours for an electric juice up, when they can use a car that FILLS up in a few minutes with eeeeeeeeeeeevil carbon juice?
And, yeah, how do you create the electric juice for the alternate-power? — with carbon-produced juice, right? So, what’s the success here? I’m not seeing it yet.
Design a car that requires hours to infuse with electric energy that, in turn, requires fossil fuels to produce the electric energy to run it, … and requires fossil-fuel energy to even build the car, … driving across vast landscapes of noisy, bird-killing blade farms and wondrous expanses of silver panels collecting sunlight, when they can, and probably frying anything that might land on them (not sure about that). And this solves what?
Fix the errors in my sarcasm/pessimism. I like to make it the best I can. (^_^)
“I can see it now –masses of people waiting at charging stations for hours on end to juice up their new electric, dead-brain-cell, auto creations”
Someone will just create an app for that.
Well, another idiotic solution would be to have cars emit more “sulfates and cooling aerosols” to put them on par with power plants.
Shhhh…
Climate extremists keep finding new ways to demonstrate their stupidity.
Here’s something that bothers me: “Transportation is now the largest source of carbon dioxide emissions in the United States” (The NASA quote, main article)
It bothers me because like most countries, America has exported its CO₂ producing heavy industries to the Far East. All those manufacturing industries are gone. We just import stuff. Cargo ship after cargo ship after cargo ship.
Maybe I’m easily bothered.
But something tells me that the atoms of oxygen that I breathe might well have cycled through a Chinese panda or a Venezuelan water buffalo. Or a Canadian goose, or a Nigerian politician. While we’re on wild animals.
GoatGuy
When the electric car manufacturers learn to cut their prices to bring them in line with current gasoline-powered types, they’ll have a chance to increase sales. Along with this, they’ll have to increase cruising ranges, decrease recharge times and expand the number of recharging stations. So the whole business is still a pretty tall order and certainly won’t happen overnight.
At $1500 per kiosk, electric vehicle charging stations would run around $450,000 for a grocery store parking lot with spaces for 300 vehicles. Then you would need 60,000 solar panels to supply the juice which would require an area of 1500′ x 900′ and cost 50,000 x 300 = 15,000,000 to power recharging stations at 1 store.
How many public parking spaces are there? X $55,000 per space to allow for Solar powered recharging of electric vehicles. (Each parking space would need a spread of solar panels covering an area 50′ x 10′)
Good example of the result of low energy density of batteries & solar. Let’s add an adjacent pin-wheel farm (couple hundred acres) to power it during the night, at least if the wind’s blowing.
Found a good spot for another practical example
Google 37.336431, -121.893403
A parking garage in San Jose Ca. It contains some 1542 parking spaces.
To add the 1542 recharging kiosks, batteries and needed Solar Panels would cost $84,810,000
It would require covering an area between San Pedro St to the west, W Santa Clara on the South, N 21st on the East and Jackson on the north or around 132 city blocks with solar panels to power the parking structures recharging kiosks.
High density parking would also need to become a thing of the past
“When the electric car manufacturers learn to cut their prices to bring them in line with current gasoline-powered types, they’ll have a chance to increase sales”
They would if they could. The cost of manufacture is too great for them to do so without govt. subsidies.
Ha!
I’m doing my thing as an unrepentant denier.
I just took delivery of my brand new, gasoline powered, gas guzzling new car. Total on the clock is 12 miles.
I plan to drive it often, and as fast as I can.
I also have my new NRA bumper sticker, but I think I will just hide that under my bed. No point in having my brand new paint job scratched by one of those tolerant and inclusive greenies.
We do what we can; and this is my contribution.
Ok, so never mind the cost and environmental impact that would occur from having to redesign and reconstruct our cities, suburbs, and countryside – all of which were laid out around the automobile!
Horses and carts are still available.
And Horses are 100% renewalable. Though they do have a habit of emitting methane from one end and CO2 from the other.
Muscle cars will still be racing on the road long after global warming died
GeneralLee speaking…Yes
‘Transportation is now the largest source of carbon dioxide emissions in the United States’
HUH? Then the US of A must really be radically different from the rest of the world. Because all the LDV traffic in the world (LDV = Light Duty Vehicle, the kind that can be run on accumulators) accounts for app. 3.25% of human emissions of CO2. And you can’t run locomotives, trucks, etc. on accumulators – but you can run them with hybrid diesel-electric engines: see e.g. General Electric EMD G16, Komatsu XDE170, Liebherr T282C, Belaz-75710 (3430 kW), etc. ..
Again, somebody was dreaming instead of checking data for the article. Unfortunately, this type of crap gets published so often with little or no protests that is comes over as sensible.
Well, consider the source…NASA. Oh how the mighty have fallen.
Here’s something I just posted on the Seeking Alpha TSLA page:
[Instead of EVs these are the alternatives I like:] a serial hybrid [without two power trains like a parallel hybrid such as a Prius] like Nissan’s e-energy series, ideally with a plug-in option, and ideally with a rotary engine supplying power to the battery, for lightness, compactness, and low cost. Toyota is working with Mazda along this line in its under-construction factory in Alabama.
Next, I like the radical new ICEs coming next year from Mazda (SkyActiv-X) and GM, which they allege will be 30% more efficient. Their low up-front cost will make them ten times more popular than EVs and therefore reduce ten times more emissions.
Next I like the cleaned-up diesels coming next year incorporating Bosch’s new tweaks.
[I should have added that I like the on-coming 48-volt electrical system will also make ICE cars more efficient.]
For trucks, I like natural gas as a fuel, and I wish Obama’s climate advisors had settled for the “half a loaf” solution they provide instead of chasing after the purist electrification ideal.
This is the first I have heard of any plans to increase the voltage for a car’s electrical system.
Do you have more information on it?
With electronics getting less power hunger and the advent of LED lighting, I thought the need for such an increase would have gone down.
There are lots of recent stories on it if you Google for “48-volt automotive electrical systems”. The first story in the list, from the NY Times, is at https://www.nytimes.com/2018/02/08/business/electric-cars-48-volts.html
It says that these systems provide 70% of the value of a hybrid for 30% of the cost. Also, that at a cost between $650 and $1000 they can improve milage by 15%. Also that lots of automakers are interested in them, and that Volvo is going to implement them in all its cars.
also search for “mild hybrid” — here’s a link to Wikipedia’s entry on it: https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web&cd=1&cad=rja&uact=8&ved=2ahUKEwibxpKfooTdAhX4FjQIHUc6AO4QFjAAegQIMhAB&url=https%3A%2F%2Fen.wikipedia.org%2Fwiki%2FMild_hybrid&usg=AOvVaw16-X_dNR2isQ3powK7we0G
Sounds like most of that improvement is from what they are calling “mild-hybrid”, not just efficiency improvements from using 48V instead of 12V. The 48V is necessary to provide the power for it.
Here’s a run-down of what’s involved in a mild hybrid: Retention of the 12-volt system for light-duty tasks; Electrically powered water and oil plumps and A/C, rather than being belt-powered or mechanically powered; electrically boosted turbocharger (aka supercharger) at start-up; regenerative braking (optional); a combination starter/generator, which can power the car on its own for short distances, and give the engine a smooth boost when it’s running on reduced cylinders; greater plower to heat seats and windshields; power for the components needed in an autonomous driving system; heating at start-up for the catalytic converter; smoother start/stop at traffic lights; etc.
Fuel efficiency is boosted about 15%, and emissions are reduced by 25%. Acceleration is increased. Various pundits estimate that by 2025 between 10% and 15% of autos sold worldwide will be mild hybrids. The components are being pioneered by parts-makers like Bosch, Continental, and Delphi, not auto-makers.
Well, that’s what they want this week – next week they’ll come for something else.
Better to say ‘no’ NOW’, and resolve to stop indulging them in the future.
What is climate change pollution?
Climate change pollution is what comes out of alarmist’s mouths.
I like Climate Change Pollution…It’s a Gas
The “cars-must-die” meme is wrong on two levels:
1) We need more CO2. We’ve been at starvation levels for more than 30 million years.
2) Global Warming is good and is NOT caused by CO2. We live in an Ice Age, and CO2 has close to zero correlation with global temperature. Even on Gore’s favorite time scale (10s to 100s of thousands of years), temperature led CO2; not the other way around.