20-30 years for EV transition?

[devmach-e]

People that can charge at home and have typical daily commutes are good candidates for BEVs. But people also buy cars to meet all their needs. If they take several road trips a year, they need a car that can do that. If they're outdoors people and take frequent day trips out to the wilderness every weekend, they need a car that can do that. Commuting/errands is only one part of people's needs. Telling people to rent a different car for their other use cases is not a valid retort. Telling people to just change their lifestyle is bs. Telling people that no one needs something that does something you don't personally have a need for is just typical being stuck in your own echo chamber.

If you are a multiple car household, there's little reason to not have one of the cars be a BEV. And it might turn out that the BEV can do road-trip duty. At least that's been my experience. We've taken the Mach-E for road trips, and we've take the Highlander.

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[Mach1E]

This is a thorough response, and I appreciate that.



How often are you making these trips? This is certainly a fringe case, how many people in the US are actually regularly taking 600 mile trips? Most people are flying that.



No doubt, my argument is that your above argument is a unique lifestyle, most people would fly that distance.



If the infrastructure was better, would that not make the Mach E as enjoyable as the MY?



Why not, it's an operational characteristic of the vehicle, and not that complicated. Someone has to show you how to put gas in the car the first time, then it's pretty easy from there. My point is that the charging hardware is not uniform, that's a teething issue that could be resolved with some regulation.



EA isn't interested because they were forced to do it. There is money in fast charging, it's just not mature yet. Technology will have to improve, energy generation will have to be cleaner and more efficient. These things are not overnight changes, I understand that.

I want to make clear, I'm not talking about regulation of pricing/cost. I'm talking regulation of components. Gas stations sell the same grade of fuel that must meet certain regulations and that fuel must be dispensed using regulated equipment.

That being said, most infrastructure doesn't make money directly. It's social and societal profit. The interstate system makes $0 (not withstanding some toll sections), but its a benefit to the entire country. People are up in arms about taxes/government paying for EV infrastructure because of the political tilt, not because it could be a benefit or determent to the public at large. EV's have become a political hot button issue linked to climate change, both sides of the aisle are guilty here.



Tesla doesn't make money selling cars, they make money from regulatory credits. I agree their charging infrastructure is just plain better. I'm saying that any regulation could use the SC network as a basis for it's requirements. Standardization would go a long way to expanding the network and streamlining costs.



100% agree. Density, Charge times, AND infrastructure need to be improved. Solid state may help with density and charge time, but infrastructure is a massive part of this.



I agree with you, I'm just making the argument that the daily commute individuals are the majority, and the massive road trippers and outdoors people are the outliers. I'm a sales person by nature, so objections trigger my brain to overcome them. It's ok that people don't want them, but for those of us that do, and want to see more adoption, we know what's needed:

The hard part is you’re assuming people buy cars based on need rather than want.

I would bet most 4x4 SUVs and trucks rarely if ever tow anything or go off-road.

People don’t pay extra for 4x4 for the 95% use cases.

It’s the same with other products. Here in Florida, people take $600,000 triple engine boats on cruises to the beach. If the purchase was based on need, they’d have spent $30k on a simple pontoon boat.

 

[Mach1E]

If you told the average American in 1994 that only thirty years later a watch would out have 100x the computing power of a home computer, they'd tell you you're crazy.

Electric motors are incredibly reliable and efficient, which is why so much stock is being put into energy storage to power those devices. I agree we should develop multiple fuel sources, but they have to be clean and ideally renewable.

Computing power is exponential.

Battery power isn’t.

Based on the movies that came out around 1994 about the “future” around 2024, I would actually argue the opposite.

People in 1994 would be extremely disappointed with the lack of technological progression over the last 30 years. They were expecting much more than just smart watches and faster computers. Hoverboards, flying cars and self tying shoes come to mind! ?

 

[Hammered]

Respectfully, I don't think anyone who puts "climate" in the plus column when considering getting an EV cares whether you pay attention or not. A significant portion of the population isn't absolutist and believes that every little bit counts.

China has ~100 coal power plants currently under construction. I am not, nor have I ever been concerned about the AGW grift (outside of the hidden costs buried everywhere due to the $1tril+ that it's already redistributed in the economy). My decisions are made around the financials of it and how it benefits me. The loud mouths pushing the AGW grift often have energy usage just in their aircraft alone that exceeds that of a few dozen typical households combined. How anyone can take them serious is hilarious to ponder.

 

[Gloff]

Computing power is exponential.

Battery power isn’t.

Based on the movies that came out around 1994 about the “future” around 2024, I would actually argue the opposite.

People in 1994 would be extremely disappointed with the lack of technological progression over the last 30 years. They were expecting much more than just smart watches and faster computers. Hoverboards, flying cars and self tying shoes come to mind! ?

I think that's short sighted. Who is to say there's not a Moore's law equivalent for battery tech that hasn't been discovered yet? The semiconductor didn't exist when room sized computers were using vacuum tubes.

I'm not saying EVs are a panacea, just that they're a step in the right direction knowing what we know about combustible fuels and their byproducts.

 

[Mach1E]

I think that's short sighted. Who is to say there's not a Moore's law equivalent for battery tech that hasn't been discovered yet? The semiconductor didn't exist when room sized computers were using vacuum tubes.

I'm not saying EVs are a panacea, just that they're a step in the right direction knowing what we know about combustible fuels and their byproducts.

Me, I’m saying there isn’t a Moore’s law with battery tech.

It’s a physics problem. You can only store so much electricity in a physical space.

It can get incrementally better, but not exponentially better.

It’s like solar panels. Only so much solar energy comes in contact with a certain area. We are near the limits there too.

 

[Gloff]

Me, I’m saying there isn’t a Moore’s law with battery tech.

It’s a physics problem. You can only store so much electricity in a physical space.

It can get incrementally better, but not exponentially better.

It’s like solar panels. Only so much solar energy comes in contact with a certain area. We are near the limits there too.

I'm no expert, could there possibly be a different storage device, in theory?

Gasoline has incredibly high energy density, yes? If we could utilize that energy without waste heat, gasoline engines would be twice as efficient, correct?

Lithium metal is the best we discovered thus far.

 

[Mach1E]

I'm no expert, could there possibly be a different storage device, in theory?

Gasoline has incredibly high energy density, yes? If we could utilize that energy without waste heat, gasoline engines would be twice as efficient, correct?

Lithium metal is the best we discovered thus far.

That’s the thing, we tried all the materials.

I do think we should focus on other things to make electricity. Kinda what they are doing with hydrogen if we want to decrease weight and refueling times.

 

[voxel]

Honestly I don’t care how complex or simple it is if it gets the job done efficiently and reliably.

People seem to equate simplicity with reliability and unfortunately that hasn’t been the case for BEVs. Same goes for the cost of repairs.

EV powertrains (motors and inverters) have been reliable and could last 20+ years easily with maybe only minor part replacements like bearings or seals. It's batteries that struggle to survive past 8-10 years.

 

[voxel]

That’s the thing, we tried all the materials.

I do think we should focus on other things to make electricity. Kinda what they are doing with hydrogen if we want to decrease weight and refueling times.

And hydrogen has show us how difficult it is to move away from gasoline.

The compression + chilling + transporting of hydrogen fuel is extremely dangerous and complex. Hydrogen for passenger cars is dead. Pipelines need to be sealed to prevent hydrogen from leaking. Tanks are heavily re-inforced for the chilled/compressed hydrogen. Extracting hydrogen is mostly a dirty process. There's plenty of loss just chilling/transporting hydrogen from source to refuel station and supposed these refuel stations are broken more than EA chargers.

I still think PHEVs are the best solution for the next 20 years. EVs are fantastic at urban driving - highly efficient and low polluting (in the immediate air). Gasoline is great for long-range driving due to range and refuel times. Mix the two and you have a PHEV

Also we don't need to build complex expensive new delivery mechanism that hydrogen would.

 

[Mach1E]

EV powertrains (motors and inverters) have been reliable and could last 20+ years easily with maybe only minor part replacements like bearings or seals. It's batteries that struggle to survive past 8-10 years.

Unfortunately (for now at least) they’re a package deal.

And it’s not the longevity I’m criticizing, it’s the regular reliability stuff. Measured by how often you have a warranty claim. And unfortunately, BEVs seem to have much more frequent trips to the dealer.

Yeah, a lot is software related. But broken is broken. Doesn’t matter if it’s a hardware or software problem.

 

[devmach-e]

Me, I’m saying there isn’t a Moore’s law with battery tech.

It’s a physics problem. You can only store so much electricity in a physical space.

It can get incrementally better, but not exponentially better.

It’s like solar panels. Only so much solar energy comes in contact with a certain area. We are near the limits there too.

Solar panels have been constantly improving. 15 years ago they were around 15% efficient. These days it's common to see 22.5% panels. Prototype panels have hit 47%. Everytime we think we've hit a limit, we find a way around it. It is going to be the same with battery technology.

 

[AZBill]

Shenxing LFP battery can already charge at 5c. While 350kW may seem like the limit / a lot, the V4 supercharger has peak output of 615kW. There's already connectors that support up to 3MW rates as well. Another easy possibility is charge port teaming -- which is just like it sounds, 2 chargers, 1 vehicle via 2 ports.

You are missing the point, it has nothing to do with what an individual car can charge at. Most Supercharger locations have 16 chargers, some more than that. I have seen many that are alwasy full. So 16 charging at 500kw each is 8MW. Where are the transformers for that?

FYI there are zero V4 Superchargers supporting 1000V today in the US, not a single one. Tesla has to install DC-DC converters to get above 470V.

 

[devmach-e]

Electricity has a lot of waste heat in the process to manufacture it and get it into the EV battery.

That's assuming all electricity comes from fossil fuel sources. 40% of the power in the US comes from non-fossil fuel sources. As more wind and solar projects come online, that percentage will grow.

 

[Hammered]

You are missing the point, it has nothing to do with what an individual car can charge at. Most Supercharger locations have 16 chargers, some more than that. I have seen many that are alwasy full. So 16 charging at 500kw each is 8MW. Where are the transformers for that?

FYI there are zero V4 Superchargers supporting 1000V today in the US, not a single one. Tesla has to install DC-DC converters to get above 470V.

They'll load balance where appropriate. Currently there wouldn't be demand for such load due to number of vehicles actually charging.

Furthermore tesla builds out their own products, arguably the most reliable yet of all companies making these products. Today charging infrastructure, when working, is more than adequate to handle these demands as the vehicles are built. As needs increase, so to will the supporting infrastructure. Utilities make money selling energy. They'll upgrade as required so they can deliver as much of their product as possible. Furthermore tesla's energy strategy is to bury their batteries below the chargers to not only deliver their low-cost energy purchased overnight, but to also stiffen the grid / act as peaking plants due to the revenue it generates.

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