Sen. Schumer gas for electric car trade in program?

[ChuckMK23]

Most charging occurs during the evening when loads on the grid are minimal. Cooler hours and people not in offices. Some locations even have lower rates during those hours that makes charging cheaper.

I'm typically charging at home off peak after 10 PM at less than $.08 / Kwh

 

[Randy Daytona]

Most charging occurs during the evening when loads on the grid are minimal. Cooler hours and people not in offices. Some locations even have lower rates during those hours that makes charging cheaper.

Michigan just announced the plan to go to 100% carbon neutral by 2035. With a wholesale shift to electric cars charging at night as well as electric heat pumps, not sure how this will work in the winter - probably as well as Germany which went full green and now is burning lignite as well as biomass (chopping down forests to turn into wood pellets)

As for electric cars, if you want one, go ahead. Unfortunately, the EPA and the Biden administration keep raising fuel economy standards with the intent of killing the internal combustion engine. Somehow, I don’t think there will be enough lithium, or cobalt, or nickel for the entire US auto fleet to transition to electric, much less the global automotive fleet.

 

[exNavyOffRec]

Maybe in TX, but many places have excess capacity, like WA, which has >70% renewable energy. For you engineering nerds, check out how Grand Coulee Dam works during times of low demand. It uses the turbine generators to pump water uphill through these enormous pipes at night into Banks Lake. That process is reversed during times of high demand. Pretty fucking cool. Also, new nuke plants are now all the rage... and they're renewable. I don't think a shortage of electricity is going to be a show-stopper for EV vehicles.
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It isn't so much the capability of producing but the issue of getting it to the consumer. Those I know that work for Seattle City Light and PUD have all said the same thing and that it will take major upgrades and additions to support the Governor's plan for EV's. They are having a hard enough time keeping the existing equipment running and repairing it as it is. They can do it, but it will take a lot of money and a lot of manpower, of which they have neither.

 

[ChuckMK23]

Mr. Musk has said repeatedly in public that resource shortage of component materials (of batteries) is a myth. Market forces will of course drive investments in production. The next leap is solid state batteries - and engineering iteration and human achievement, being what it is - will soon make production of solid state batteries feasible at scale. These are all minor problems I think.

Our biggest issue should be understood as population/demographic decline - so you young guys need to get busy producing children! But colbalt, lithium, etc - there is no danger of running out of these - nor any natural material. I think Elon is correct in every respect here.

Its a great time to buy a Tesla - and I would in no way wave off anyone considering it. A software defined vehicle is sooo wonderous. Dedicated knobs and buttons for anything seem - well an anachronism.

I'm about to do a Cincy to Boston road trip - I look forward to seeing how it goes.

 

[Brett327]

I don’t think there will be enough lithium, or cobalt, or nickel for the entire US auto fleet

Especially true if it is all under water.

 

[Random8145]

Mr. Musk has said repeatedly in public that resource shortage of component materials (of batteries) is a myth. Market forces will of course drive investments in production. The next leap is solid state batteries - and engineering iteration and human achievement, being what it is - will soon make production of solid state batteries feasible at scale. These are all minor problems I think.

Our biggest issue should be understood as population/demographic decline - so you young guys need to get busy producing children! But colbalt, lithium, etc - there is no danger of running out of these - nor any natural material. I think Elon is correct in every respect here.

Its a great time to buy a Tesla - and I would in no way wave off anyone considering it. A software defined vehicle is sooo wonderous. Dedicated knobs and buttons for anything seem - well an anachronism.

I'm about to do a Cincy to Boston road trip - I look forward to seeing how it goes.

Dedicated knobs and buttons are not anachronistic IMO. To the contrary, they're actually making a comeback, as consumers hate the touch screens in cars. It is a major pain to have to go into a sub-menu and then try to press buttons on the screen or slide your finger to adjust the climate controls, sound system, and so forth, versus just having physical buttons and some big knobs. It's also highly dangerous, as it is like messing with a phone or tablet while driving. Don't get me wrong, touch screens in vehicles definitely have a place, but as a complement to physical buttons and dials, not as a replacement.

Also Musk saying it though doesn't necessarily make it true. I'm not saying he's wrong, but Musk is a combination of very smart and very stupid combined. He has also repeatedly said the Tesla self-driving would become truly functional and the date keeps getting pushed out. Same for the Cyber Truck, which many (most) in the automotive industry don't think will ever be feasible.

Musk was responsible for figuring out the original design for a reusable rocket. When he and his people were flying back from meeting with the Russians to try and buy rockets (the Russians said no), he said, "Hey guys, I think we can do this ourselves." His engineer thought no way, but looked over his proposal and couldn't come up with a legitimate rebuttal, but still thought Musk must be missing something because otherwise the big aerospace companies would surely have already figured it out, right? As we know now, Musk was correct.

OTOH, with Tesla, he insisted they instantly automate the whole factory. His management warned him that you can't just do something like that, you must start gradually and build up over time, but Musk insisted he knew best, so they tried to make everything robots and the whole thing blew up in his face and almost destroyed the company. They came within weeks of running out of money. There's also their notoriously bad lack of quality control and build quality. Musk also insisted on the (IMO) rather absurd pop-out door handles and Formula One type of steering wheel. The pop-out door handles involved a bunch of unnecessary complication and engineering (and waste of money for what was a startup) and the steering wheel just isn't functional for most people. I honestly think part of the reason SpaceX has done so well is that Musk isn't the CEO, he's the CTO. He still owns the company and so ultimately is the CEO too, but officially, Gwynne Shotwell is the CEO, and she is responsible to a good degree for the company's success. Had Musk been the CEO, it might have failed or struggled a lot more. Similarly, I think he should hire a good CEO for Tesla (he is the CEO) there and stick with being involved in the technical stuff there. He also seems to have showed an amateurish-ness regarding the process of mergers and acquisitions in that he ended up way overpaying for Twitter.

Sorry for all the detail, but thus going back to the statement of, "Elon Musk says..." well he may be right or may be a bonehead.

 

[sevenhelmet]

(chopping down forests to turn into wood pellets)

This is an important takeaway- in all this zeal for “green energy”, is one form of ecological devastation simply being traded for another?

Despite allegedly scientific studies to the contrary (e.g. the UN saying there is sufficient land to feed 10B+), I have a hard time not seeing this as an overpopulation problem.

 

[number9]

Also Musk saying it though doesn't necessarily make it true. I'm not saying he's wrong, but Musk is a combination of very smart and very stupid combined. He has also repeatedly said the Tesla self-driving would become truly functional and the date keeps getting pushed out. Same for the Cyber Truck, which many (most) in the automotive industry don't think will ever be feasible.

Elon Musk Today

elonmusk.today

Despite being a Tesla owner, I think the Cyber Truck looks like hammered shit. It is comically ugly.

 

[taxi1]

For you engineering nerds, check out how Grand Coulee Dam works during times of low demand. It uses the turbine generators to pump water uphill through these enormous pipes at night into Banks Lake. That process is reversed during times of high demand. Pretty fucking cool.

This is a crazy riff on pumped storage. They add a powder to water to make it 2.5 times denser, which means everything can be smaller for the same energy storage. Obviously not just dumping it into a lake.

Waterless high-density hydro makes more energy from less elevation

UK company RheEnergise is quietly rolling out an interesting new approach to pumped hydro energy storage, aiming for a capacity of at least 100 MW by 2030. It works with small hills instead of mountains, making it relevant in many more areas.

newatlas.com

But RheEnergise has added a simple tweak: it doesn't use water. Well, not by itself. It uses a proprietary "high-tech fluid" it calls R-19, which it says is both environmentally neutral and 2.5 times as dense as water...So what is this R-19 fluid? Well, it's a secret sauce, so RheEnergise isn't saying. But we do know it ships as a powder that's added to water to form a pasty-looking high-density goop. And the company says it's "ultra-cheap."

 

[taxi1]

Somehow, I don’t think there will be enough lithium, or cobalt, or nickel for the entire US auto fleet to transition to electric, much less the global automotive fleet.

There are plenty of other battery chemistries waiting to be exploited. With more money to be made from batteries, more investment pursue them.

This is a cool one, for the grid instead of cars. Iron and Oxygen, of which there is plenty of.

Super-cheap gigawatt-scale rust battery greenlit for Minnesota

Gates- and Bezos-backed startup Form Energy is one of the most exciting companies in the grid-level renewable energy storage space, with a multi-day iron-air battery system just 10% the cost of lithium. A 10-MW/1-GWh demo system has now been approved.

newatlas.com

Aluminum and sea water make a high density power source too.

There is too much money to be made here, for the problem to go unsolved.

 

[Random8145]

This is an important takeaway- in all this zeal for “green energy”, is one form of ecological devastation simply being traded for another?

Despite allegedly scientific studies to the contrary (e.g. the UN saying there is sufficient land to feed 10B+), I have a hard time not seeing this as an overpopulation problem.

I've read wind turbines chop up birds and kill zillions of insects.

 

[Brett327]

I've read wind turbines chop up birds and kill zillions of insects.

So do cats... and yet they persist.

 

[Random8145]

Elon Musk Today

elonmusk.today

Despite being a Tesla owner, I think the Cyber Truck looks like hammered shit. It is comically ugly.

Me too! I just don't get it. So many great potential designs for electric trucks and Jeep/Bronco-type vehicles Tesla could make and they decide to pursue that!?

 

[Random8145]

So do cats... and yet they persist.

Yeah but cats are part of the ecosystem in doing it. Wind turbines could mess up the ecology if they are doing that excessively.

 

[JTS11]

So do cats... and yet they persist.

Many people are saying the noise from wind turbines causes cancer. Many many people.

Big tough miners tell me (with tears in their eyes), 'Sir, please let me go dig coal, I don't want to catch cancer from the turbines." ?