Here’s why you won’t see an electric Bronco

[boxwood]

+ @MacHudson

Laundry is a significant issue for BOTH landlords and tenants.

You typically need a vent out which means significant (in the several thousands) in install costs if you are upgrading to adding a washer/dryer.

Also Landlords do not want to give up coin laundry revenue AND they don't want to upkeep one of the most broken appliances in EVERY unit.

Tenants want Washer/Dryers, but the issue is much more complex because Landlords want to increase revenue and decrease hassle/costs.

I don't want to steer too far away from the original point. The economics of landlord income isn't what i was really driving at, so perhaps it was a bad example.


Maybe think of it like a boat... I could own a boat. I like to go waterskiing. I don't go very often though. Owning a boat is a lot more costly than renting a boat every now and again when i want to go for it. I know not really as much of a necessity as a car, but same basic principal. Cost per use may not be worth it for everyone to own a car.

I am not suggesting every city dweller, or @MacHudson, must give up their cars. Just that depending on a persons situation it could be economically beneficial. Whether they are willing to or not. The same way I am not willing to go buy a boat right now. just a new Bronco.

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[boxwood]

ERCOT was only planning for 6000MW of power from wind before the storm. and was still operating at 2/3rds or approximately productin 4000MW ... a 2000MW loss

yet ERCOT reports a loss of 34000 MW from thermal (fossil fuel)

That is not a problem with wind, that is a problem with WEATHER
and being isolated from other grids outside the impacted area.

@NCOBX i need your rational energy input here lol

 

[boxwood]

Just thought I'd put a little perspective out there.

There are some people in some really awful situations right now, without heat, having to find warming centers. Looking for instructions on how to stay safe and warm at home by huddling together.

So as we banter back and forth lets just be grateful for what we have if we aren't impacted and thoughtful of those who are struggling right now.

 

[NCOBX]

ERCOT was only planning for 6000MW of power from wind before the storm. and was still operating at 2/3rds or approximately productin 4000MW ... a 2000MW loss

yet ERCOT reports a loss of 34000 MW from thermal (fossil fuel)

That is not a problem with wind, that is a problem with WEATHER
and being isolated from other grids outside the impacted area.

@NCOBX i need your rational energy input here lol

Again as resident coal lover, there is way too much emphasis on gas turbines to deliver power. Most gas turbines aren’t inside of a nice building other than the small enclosure over them unless your in the deep north.

With that said I’ve worked on an outdoor gas unit near Chicago so they can be winterized but what company would pay to winterize equipment in Texas?

On the flip side almost every coal plant I’ve been in has been nestled in a nice warm building with a gantry crane. Why aren’t these units running? Every explanation provided is for gas unit supply issues.
If they get the steam boiler running fine there will be losses on an unwinterized outdoor coal unit but it should still run plenty efficient to keep sensors and auxiliary equipment plenty warm. Well placed diesel heaters can be placed on lift oil stands if necessary to keep the hydrogen gas exchangers on the generator from freezing.

On top of all of this the entire Midwest is having similar outages, Kentucky just started doing the rolling outages due to lack of capacity - Kentucky is definitely on the grid. Conveniently I worked at a brand new combined cycle plant near Louisville about 3 years back that was taking over for a much larger coal plant being shut down. That added capacity would really be helpful for TVA right about now... not to mention those units are winterized and would not experience the Texas issue.

 

[j_marinelli]

I assume you are in Texas, going through this?

Yes and no. Been blessed to not lose power but our well water line is froze so no water. We have plenty of bottle water and are using snow water for flushing toilet.

 

[OX1]

Valid on having more charging accessibility for your phone than your car.

Do you think your situation is the norm or the exception.

It sounds like you are claiming you are incapable of planning to keep one of your many spots on your 5 acres for a specific vehicle?

It also sounds like you would often forget to lock your car or your house when you leave, or roll up your windows when you get home, all about the same level of effort is grabbing a cord when you come home.

Or can't think of anyway to manage your electrical cords, I fell like i have seen a few mechanics shops figure this out

re #4 if you are suggesting every car is an EV for that many cars...we are thinking FAR into the future and who knows what charing that may hold. But thats about your only valid point in 1-5, manuevering around 4 cars in a single drive/garage would be a pain and i wouldn't recommend.

#5. I am assuming this is a joke, but similar to #4 implies Mass adoption which isn't the near term, and would suggest far better infrastructure or efficiencies where having to pick up a charge will either be the exception, or so cheap you really would care. but seriously. What about the golden rule. what kind a friend are you?


Let's be honest none of those are great excuses about why an EV wouldn't work for someone.

Tell me there isn't a charger within 10-15 miles of you and you travel 300 miles a day...maybe.
But those supposed "inconveniences" aren't really inconveniences as much as a slight change in behavior.

You mistake capability with inconvenience (or in this example, safety). IE, my daily drivers are under a 2 car canopy (not attached to house). Sometimes if it snows a lot, the woman parks right up near the house, as the driveway slopes quite a bit, so she may not want to walk down the slope while slippery. And No, I am certainly not alone. Many park in a different location if it MIGHT snow due to possible ease of snow removal. So every person that does this needs super long cords or more outlets.

My mother lives in residential area. My father passed away last year. She still has both cars. One parks on the street, one in driveway. So now she would need a cord that runs out across the sidewalk. Many cars on her street, sometimes she doesn't even get to park in front of her own house. Now you need a cord ACROSS the street. Unless you are advocating outlets , every car length, on every street, in every residential area where the streets are crammed with cars. So that's virtually every town in north jersey. Once again, the NORM!! (are all these outlets public, so now I have to pay public rates, without the choice of where I buy?)

Retractable cords are great if they come from above. Use them at human height, you then many times have to wrap them under tension, around a car (they also eventually wear out and break, yet MORE hardware I have to keep up). And it will be great to have yet another possibility of dragging a cord across Fords current clearcoats, which manage to scratch if you look at them funny, but are a bitch to compound out, all at the same time (quite the feat of engineering). Or are you now saying I can't even park the car in the opposite direction of this PERFECT parking scenario, since my plug-in will be on the opposite side?

Banning IC cars (or effectively doing it with draconian CAFE) is not that far off. Multiple cars with multiple cords running all over will be an issue very soon.

If we really want to be honest, it's pretty obvious you have been indoctrinated into the electric car cult. It's fine, you are not alone. No amount of discussion will change your mind. No amount of issues or inconvenience (or outright, it really can't be done) matters.

 

[Carolina Jim]

Banning IC cars (or effectively doing it with draconian CAFE) is not that far off.

Leading the way on this futuristic concept is the EU. If you're not familiar with them, they're the insightful blob of countries in Europe with the sinking economy, socialism banners everywhere, open borders, no effective military defenses...you know - couldn't even plan ahead last year to order their own supply of Covid vaccine.

I wanna be just like them when I grow up.

 

[Pancho Kornwallace]

Leading the way on this futuristic concept is the EU. If you're not familiar with them, they're the insightful blob of countries in Europe with the sinking economy, socialism banners everywhere, open borders, no effective military defenses...you know - couldn't even plan ahead last year to order their own supply of Covid vaccine.

I wanna be just like them when I grow up.

1. The reason Texas is in the situation they are in, is precisely because they are not "socialist" as you call them. They opted out of the national grid so they could avoid federal regulations.
2. Of course borders and the military are "socialist" by your very loose definition of that word. We all have to collectively pay in to get those services.
3. The U.S. has been far worse than Europe in handling the spread of COVID. The only country you can say is remotely as bad as the U.S. in Europe is the UK, which actually is not technically part of the the E.U. So much for that theory. You can find the data here:
https://covid19.who.int/

 

[Pancho Kornwallace]

Ford EU will have all plug ins for EVERY model by 2026:
https://fordeurope.blogspot.com/2021/02/Ford-invests-in-Cologne-2021.html

 

[Drex]

1. The reason Texas is in the situation they are in, is precisely because they are not "socialist" as you call them. They opted out of the national grid so they could avoid federal regulations.
2. Of course borders and the military are "socialist" by your very loose definition of that word. We all have to collectively pay in to get those services.
3. The U.S. has been far worse than Europe in handling the spread of COVID. The only country you can say is remotely as bad as the U.S. in Europe is the UK, which actually is not technically part of the the E.U. So much for that theory. You can find the data here:
https://covid19.who.int/

I think you may not understand what the term 'socialism' means. It is the ownership, or controlling through regulations, of the means of production by government.

While your point 1. is not entirely on shaky ground as the government would have some say in the distribution of electrical power, it is not entirely relevant as public utilities have been subject to specific rules and regulations for practically forever. In short, they already are quasi-socialist and the government cannot force them to increase or decrease actual power generation.

Point 2. Military falls outside the definition of a means of production, it is a service. Your point that people who pay net taxes pay for that and everyone uses them regardless of ability or willingness to pay makes is moot due to the service nature of it. Like roads, public infrastructure and service items do not fall under socialism by definition.

Point 3. I have no idea. My subjective and personal belief is that the reporting in other countries is different than ours. As you may be unaware, the US has a very high rate of infant mortality compared to Europe. We count baby's that are stillborn and any that die after that. Some countries do not count it unless the child survives the first year (eliminating stillborn and SIDS cases from their tally). They may have different thresholds for what they consider Covid positive (symptoms without an actual positive test can be inferred as positive here). They may not consider asymptomatic presence of the virus in the blood as positive. Since it is not listed as a percent of population, the US has done the most tests they would have more cases. If your country ran zero tests and did not add symptoms, the would have zero reported cases (like the miracle that is North Korea)(and possibly the UK is relatively high up there in testing as well) They maybe be exactly the same, point is that unless you are using the same standards, there can be no direct comparison with any meaning whatsoever. The WHO knows that the numbers are worthless as a comparative tool without percent of population added in.

per your link; India has more than four times the US population, much more crowded conditions, far lower sewer and drinking water quality and they report 11M cases to the US's 27M cases. If you believe that, there is no convincing you to take the other numbers with a grain of salt.

 

[Carolina Jim]

You can find the data here:

Yeah...I don't even take a shit without checking with the WHO first

 

[Pancho Kornwallace]

I think you may not understand what the term 'socialism' means. It is the ownership, or controlling through regulations, of the means of production by government.

While your point 1. is not entirely on shaky ground as the government would have some say in the distribution of electrical power, it is not entirely relevant as public utilities have been subject to specific rules and regulations for practically forever. In short, they already are quasi-socialist and the government cannot force them to increase or decrease actual power generation.

Point 2. Military falls outside the definition of a means of production, it is a service. Your point that people who pay net taxes pay for that and everyone uses them regardless of ability or willingness to pay makes is moot due to the service nature of it. Like roads, public infrastructure and service items do not fall under socialism by definition.

Point 3. I have no idea. My subjective and personal belief is that the reporting in other countries is different than ours. As you may be unaware, the US has a very high rate of infant mortality compared to Europe. We count baby's that are stillborn and any that die after that. Some countries do not count it unless the child survives the first year (eliminating stillborn and SIDS cases from their tally). They may have different thresholds for what they consider Covid positive (symptoms without an actual positive test can be inferred as positive here). They may not consider asymptomatic presence of the virus in the blood as positive. Since it is not listed as a percent of population, the US has done the most tests they would have more cases. If your country ran zero tests and did not add symptoms, the would have zero reported cases (like the miracle that is North Korea)(and possibly the UK is relatively high up there in testing as well) They maybe be exactly the same, point is that unless you are using the same standards, there can be no direct comparison with any meaning whatsoever. The WHO knows that the numbers are worthless as a comparative tool without percent of population added in.

per your link; India has more than four times the US population, much more crowded conditions, far lower sewer and drinking water quality and they report 11M cases to the US's 27M cases. If you believe that, there is no convincing you to take the other numbers with a grain of salt.

Thank you for your insightful comments! Here is my response...


Regarding Socialism:
It would be great if all had a common definition of Socialism. It was nice for you to look it up. But few actually adhere to that tight definition when critiquing the other side.

Under that tight definition, I cannot think of a single "socialist" policy that any House or Senate member has proposed because for any of those definitions, "services" could be a layer on top of products.

For example, I can call the Military "Socialist" because the Government control the means of production for jets (Specifically, they are highly regulated by government bureaucrats, made only for the government to the specifications of the government, no free market, prices fixed). But you can layer on a "services" layer to say it is not Socialism. Same with Police, Fire, Schools, Roads, Border Patrol and Electricity... and of course Heath care. ALL Services, not "production" of products.

The problem is we have a floating definition of Socialism. It is "bad" when it is from the other side, but its is "good" (and not Socialism) when it is something that we support. And no one seems to be using the precise definition that you gave.

In Texas, they opted out of the National "Socialist" Grid...the one that has strict rules for winterizing power plants and sharing capacity when another region is in trouble, for example.


Regarding India and Europe:
Most of Asia has a collective, not individualistic sense of society. It makes total sense that a higher percentage of Asians would follow rules for the collective good, much more than in the US.

Also, there was not "two sides" debate to wearing a mask in Asia. Everyone was on the same side and for much of Asia, there were penalties for not complying that do not exist here.

EU reporting standards should not be much different than the US. Same thing for Australia, New Zealand, Japan, Canada, etc. All did better than the US, some dramatically better.

 

[Pancho Kornwallace]

Yeah...I don't even take a shit without checking with the WHO first

I used to like them, but then I realized their songs were too long and repetitive.
I ended up liking Led Zeppelin much more.

 

[Carolina Jim]

It would be great if all had a common definition of Socialism.

The dictionary I have shows LBJ's picture right next to Socialism...in case you're confused about the concept of confiscating someone's resource simply to give it to another person. Of course, LBJ must's been a big Marx fan...and I don't mean Groucho

 

[boxwood]

You mistake capability with inconvenience (or in this example, safety). IE, my daily drivers are under a 2 car canopy (not attached to house). Sometimes if it snows a lot, the woman parks right up near the house, as the driveway slopes quite a bit, so she may not want to walk down the slope while slippery. And No, I am certainly not alone. Many park in a different location if it MIGHT snow due to possible ease of snow removal. So every person that does this needs super long cords or more outlets.

.
Totally fair, Makes sense. You know a good hubby would keep that driveway shoveled and salted ;P only kidding. Would love to know more about the percentage of people nationally with unpredictable parking.

My mother lives in residential area. My father passed away last year. She still has both cars. One parks on the street, one in driveway. So now she would need a cord that runs out across the sidewalk. Many cars on her street, sometimes she doesn't even get to park in front of her own house. Now you need a cord ACROSS the street. Unless you are advocating outlets , every car length, on every street, in every residential area where the streets are crammed with cars. So that's virtually every town in north jersey. Once again, the NORM!! (are all these outlets public, so now I have to pay public rates, without the choice of where I buy?)

As we talked about before, towns with no residential parking are still somewhat of a different use case and. And this is somewhat of a stretch, she needs BOTH cars? Still somewhat of a unique situation that is looking past the general application. If your mother had 1 EV would it be problematic for her and her driving scenarios.

Retractable cords are great if they come from above. Use them at human height, you then many times have to wrap them under tension, around a car (they also eventually wear out and break, yet MORE hardware I have to keep up). And it will be great to have yet another possibility of dragging a cord across Fords current clearcoats, which manage to scratch if you look at them funny, but are a bitch to compound out, all at the same time (quite the feat of engineering). Or are you now saying I can't even park the car in the opposite direction of this PERFECT parking scenario, since my plug-in will be on the opposite side?

Just saying anyone can do a little planning and place their charging cables in a well thought out location where a car will have consistent access with minimal intrusion. You make is sound more like an electric leaf blower being dragged across all parts of the lawn, where its more like a charger for phone next to your bed, always in a reliable location with little interference. Simply put this cord management problem doesn't really exist. Unless you make it exist.

Banning IC cars (or effectively doing it with draconian CAFE) is not that far off. Multiple cars with multiple cords running all over will be an issue very soon.

I am not suggesting Banning IC cars though, just that they are extremely applicable in many scenarios. Your cord situation is a bit blow out of proportion and lacks any proper planning. I still don't get this multiple cords all over.
Either
A) you have mass adoption, so many EV's on the road, in this scenario charging infrastructure HAS to change, you won't get mass adoption like this unless charging is readily available like a gas station, and no one is complaining about the pumps getting tangled.
Or
B) One household has tons of EV's and doesn't have great on lot parking. but since the average car ownership in US is 2 cars per household, and even less in the towns you describe 1 per household those use cases are not by law of averages, the norm

If we really want to be honest, it's pretty obvious you have been indoctrinated into the electric car cult. It's fine, you are not alone. No amount of discussion will change your mind. No amount of issues or inconvenience (or outright, it really can't be done) matters.

LOL cult...na, I bought an EV because it was cheap. No other reason. $12,500 off sticker and 0% for 6 years. Was silly not to buy it. And after driving it for 6 years and actually HAVE experience with cable management and looking for charging I can say, again with real life experience, its been a great experience. I'm not trying to Solve any "issues" with my car. Its just been a great drive, no maintenance. So when someone says they are awful and would suck i have to wonder if they really have had experience with one. The cult i AM part of is actually understanding all the facts a bout a situation.

You say nothing will change my mind. Not much would change my mind that an EV will fit a large swath of the populations driving habits as it stands today, at least based on the information presented. I haven't seen much to show otherwise. But wholly admit there are scenarios that don't fit an EV. @MacHudson made some good points and you have made some good points. Good points on future infrastructure etc. But a lot of them are just "I don't want one" or "EV's Suck" which is fine but thats a lot different than they just wouldn't work. Or even still a lot of them are just made up due to lack of experience.

My issue is not that I think EVERYONE MUST EV. cuz i don't and have said that repeatedly. My issue is that many have a misunderstanding of an EV's capabilities, especially those who haven't had any experience driving one or charging one, and believe that they don't fit their scenario.

I am thinking on a larger scale across a larger population, stating it can work for a lot of people NOT EVERYBODY, but a lot of people.

In most every scenario you have presented is a very unique one off issue made to sound like a huge inconvenience that would be awful for everyone. But really seems more like its awful for just a few and maybe really not that awful.

You don't want an EV fine. But there is technically nothing overly complex about your household that would make owning or driving one or even two EV's difficult short of adding a charger or two to your covered car port. Complaining about friends coming over and stretching their cords over you lawn, is well, a stretch.

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