Here Comes the Electric Fail

wilberforce15

Well-Known Member
As C.R. pointed out the electric car you choose if you live in cold weather areas should be rated to drive much further than what you typically drive because the demands of cold weather brings its range way down. So people buying a Nissan Leaf for example may find their winter month driving greatly inhibited unless they have access to charging stations at work. This also limits long drives away from home no matter the time of year. Most people in my opinion don't want to spend long periods charging on a road trip. I've read that Teslas are great cars but pretty expensive. When electric cars solve the issues and bring the costs down they'll go mainstream. Until then I would be happy with a hybrid. One thing that makes a Prius attractive to me is it can be 100 degrees outside and you can sit in air conditioned comfort with the car kicking on for a few minutes every so often to recharge the big battery, using little gas to do so. Owners even use that feature to run things with an inverter while camping. A fully electric vehicle in similar circumstances is just going to drain its battery. From everything I've read hydrogen may be the ultimate answer. India is getting into hydrogen cars now so maybe they'll be able to demonstrate some advantages.
Leafs are jokes. Nobody should ever need any charging after any normal commute or at work, in any level of cold at all. They're just garbage.

People sleep inside Model Y's camping below zero all the time. It doesn't drain bad. You can still get 120 to 150 miles of range in the worst part of any Canadian winter. And that's available for roughly the same price as the average American new car.

Hydrogen is never going to be a real answer. Battery electric is the solution to just about everything except needing diesel for heavy towing in the cold.

People are generally just not in the loop of how much advancement has already happened in electrics
 

vantexan

Well-Known Member
Leafs are jokes. Nobody should ever need any charging after any normal commute or at work, in any level of cold at all. They're just garbage.

People sleep inside Model Y's camping below zero all the time. It doesn't drain bad. You can still get 120 to 150 miles of range in the worst part of any Canadian winter. And that's available for roughly the same price as the average American new car.

Hydrogen is never going to be a real answer. Battery electric is the solution to just about everything except needing diesel for heavy towing in the cold.

People are generally just not in the loop of how much advancement has already happened in electrics
Have they solved the issues of finding enough lithium? Of producing enough electricity to charge all these millions of cars? Of how to dispose of millions of spent batteries over time? And 120 to 150 miles of range isn't going to get you far on a road trip without a lot of hassle. And why not hydrogen which gives about the same range as gas and fills up about as quickly? With water vapor for emissions? Is there some kind of political advantage to having electric cars?
 

MAKAVELI

Well-Known Member
As C.R. pointed out the electric car you choose if you live in cold weather areas should be rated to drive much further than what you typically drive because the demands of cold weather brings its range way down. So people buying a Nissan Leaf for example may find their winter month driving greatly inhibited unless they have access to charging stations at work. This also limits long drives away from home no matter the time of year. Most people in my opinion don't want to spend long periods charging on a road trip. I've read that Teslas are great cars but pretty expensive. When electric cars solve the issues and bring the costs down they'll go mainstream. Until then I would be happy with a hybrid. One thing that makes a Prius attractive to me is it can be 100 degrees outside and you can sit in air conditioned comfort with the car kicking on for a few minutes every so often to recharge the big battery, using little gas to do so. Owners even use that feature to run things with an inverter while camping. A fully electric vehicle in similar circumstances is just going to drain its battery. From everything I've read hydrogen may be the ultimate answer. India is getting into hydrogen cars now so maybe they'll be able to demonstrate some advantages.
Most people that live in those cold winter states aren't doing much driving in sub zero temps, regardless of what type of car they have.
 

vantexan

Well-Known Member
Most people that live in those cold winter states aren't doing much driving in sub zero temps, regardless of what type of car they have.
As C.R. pointed out it doesn't have to get down to subzero temps. The cold at freezing requires more power than at 50 to heat the car. Since the car has no engine that power has to come from the battery. Which is why performance at cold temps is worse, and the colder it gets the worse the performance.
 

MAKAVELI

Well-Known Member
As C.R. pointed out it doesn't have to get down to subzero temps. The cold at freezing requires more power than at 50 to heat the car. Since the car has no engine that power has to come from the battery. Which is why performance at cold temps is worse, and the colder it gets the worse the performance.
Performance is not worse just the load on the batteries is higher, lowering the range.
 

vantexan

Well-Known Member
Not bull*. People drive less in the winter. This is why the price of fuel drops in the winter goes up in the Spring and Summer.
I've been in Chicago, Detroit, and Minneapolis in the winter. Everyone is commuting to work and if they're like Kansas City the city gets out very quickly after snowstorms to clear the streets. The parking lots of malls, theaters, and restaurants are full, even more so during the holidays.
 

MAKAVELI

Well-Known Member
That's worse performance. Not talking about driving the Gran Prix.
That's not performance. The same happens on an ICE. When the load on the engine increases the lower the fuel mileage. That's why city driving fuel mileage is worse than highway driving.
 

MAKAVELI

Well-Known Member
I've been in Chicago, Detroit, and Minneapolis in the winter. Everyone is commuting to work and if they're like Kansas City the city gets out very quickly after snowstorms to clear the streets. The parking lots of malls, theaters, and restaurants are full, even more so during the holidays.
Still much less than spring and summer. Fuel prices don't drop for nothing.
 

wilberforce15

Well-Known Member
Everyone acknowledges that extreme cold hurts electric performance.

The answer is that it doesn't matter for the vast majority of people. They charge at home, and there is more than enough range available for all the commutes and errands you want to run.

For the very small number of people who do heavy long haul towing, or do lots of mileage in cold weather, don't get an electric.

It's a completely silly objection that doesn't apply to the vast, vast majority of people.
 

wilberforce15

Well-Known Member
Have they solved the issues of finding enough lithium? Of producing enough electricity to charge all these millions of cars? Of how to dispose of millions of spent batteries over time? And 120 to 150 miles of range isn't going to get you far on a road trip without a lot of hassle. And why not hydrogen which gives about the same range as gas and fills up about as quickly? With water vapor for emissions? Is there some kind of political advantage to having electric cars?
Lithium is easy. Mines are exploding in size and number.

Enough electricity is also not hard. The rate of new adoption is easily compensated for on the grid, except in California, who is permanently dedicated to being totally retarded. They're not solving their electricity problem because they are crazy hippies. It's not hard.

Long road trips in super cold weather aren't common for anyone, and if they do it, it would be a once or twice a year minor impediment. It's grasping at straws to even call that a problem.

As for spent batteries, there won't be any. The batteries will outlast the car body. They will then be adapted to grid storage use once the car is out of service. The battery retains its use. The car body is the thing that has to be scrapped. The world has changed.

Hydrogen will never be adopted in a widespread fashion, because it doesn't have enough advantages to justify overhauling so much infrastructure. Electrics can/will work for almost everything, and diesel/gas can easily do all the rest. There is a massive social expense and hassle to switch any number of cars to hydrogen, for almost no benefit.
 

vantexan

Well-Known Member
That's not performance. The same happens on an ICE. When the load on the engine increases the lower the fuel mileage. That's why city driving fuel mileage is worse than highway driving.
Yet an ICE heats the car but doesn't see similar drop off in range compared to an electric car that uses much more electricity to heat the car in cold weather.
 

vantexan

Well-Known Member
Lithium is easy. Mines are exploding in size and number.

Enough electricity is also not hard. The rate of new adoption is easily compensated for on the grid, except in California, who is permanently dedicated to being totally retarded. They're not solving their electricity problem because they are crazy hippies. It's not hard.

Long road trips in super cold weather aren't common for anyone, and if they do it, it would be a once or twice a year minor impediment. It's grasping at straws to even call that a problem.

As for spent batteries, there won't be any. The batteries will outlast the car body. They will then be adapted to grid storage use once the car is out of service. The battery retains its use. The car body is the thing that has to be scrapped. The world has changed.

Hydrogen will never be adopted in a widespread fashion, because it doesn't have enough advantages to justify overhauling so much infrastructure. Electrics can/will work for almost everything, and diesel/gas can easily do all the rest. There is a massive social expense and hassle to switch any number of cars to hydrogen, for almost no benefit.
Lithium is easy? The world's largest known deposit is in Bolivia, and it's extremely harsh on the environment to mine it. And we have nowhere near the infrastructure needed to have most cars electric. Again a real hit to the environment. And you're the only one I've seen saying there won't be any spent batteries. Nothing lasts forever.
 

MAKAVELI

Well-Known Member
Yet an ICE heats the car but doesn't see similar drop off in range compared to an electric car that uses much more electricity to heat the car in cold weather.
So what. The technology is advancing at such a fast pace that will be not an issue in the near future.
 

wilberforce15

Well-Known Member
Lithium is easy? The world's largest known deposit is in Bolivia, and it's extremely harsh on the environment to mine it. And we have nowhere near the infrastructure needed to have most cars electric. Again a real hit to the environment. And you're the only one I've seen saying there won't be any spent batteries. Nothing lasts forever.
I'm not sure what to tell you. I've listed the name and type of the battery, provided the link to the performance, and it's currently in some vehicles. 15,000 deep charging cycles with 90% or more retention of life. That's well over a million mile battery. It's the 4680 cell from tesla, but many more are coming along. They will outlast any car they're put into.

That's why Tesla and others have specifically said they plan to "recycle" the batteries into large grid storage banks where top-tier performance isn't necessary any more. They outlast the car, so they can then be used to sustain teh grid and meter out power.

Here is the future of lithium mining: Lake Resources - Lake Resources

It's completely sustainable, cheap, and very easy to do in bulk. Disclaimer: I've made a fortune on Lake Resources stock, and I will continue to do so.
 
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