Electric vehicle discussion

[Kat Tsun]

When you need to take your biweekly three day trek to the store and camp out on your way back.

This is why Pontiac made the Aztek.

Anyway the highways depopulated plenty of ghost towns and such, similar to the railroads before it. My hometown actually tried to make "a stand" against the railroad and told South Pacific Railroad to go take a hike. The company was like "bet" and just built the railroad anyway. The town moved and it took a while before it extended back to the old, old part of town, although much of that no longer exists anyway. Now it's bisected by a railroad.

They didn't repeat the same mistake with the highways a hundred years ago, but of course Eisenhower didn't build the highway 10 miles from town either. He built it basically right next to the railroad.

Mostly bypassed communities got hurt by highways because people like to live near people, because being near people, means economic exchange is easier. This might have been different in the poorly remembered wild West or prairie myth, but people only lived far apart because irrigation sucked back then and you needed tons of land to grow meager amounts of food and cattle.

 

[shin_getter]

Just thinking about the solar based power architecture....

If there is something positive to do in the transition this, it is figuring out the best solar -> fuel -> engine cycle and create awareness. There is a lot of people researching batteries and thus why prices are going down, however the alternative cycle do have potential because of the new operating environment.

The projected low cost of solar means that a good way to get stable electricity is to simply overbuild. For example if you build capacity equal to 3x of your normal peak demand, you can still get enough power when the system operates 30% capacity due to poor weather in the winter or something. What this translates to however is "excess", 'basically free', non-steady state power a lot of the time. This kind of power is pretty bad for normal applications, but conversion into fuels is a potential use case. Historically, produced fuels have been uncompetitive in many ways but they lack very low cost electricity input.

The current mainstream consciousness have not picked up on the real potential of this development as it isn't clear whether the system would work at all. If there is a process that can tick all the required boxes of future energy environment this is time to seriously invest. When there is general awareness that this will work and the environment evolves to the right spot, the money will pour in and the lobbying efforts ramped up.

The timing for societal level pushing of the above concepts is not at this very moment however, as energy costs are still high and super excessive power from renewables have not yet materialized. In 2030+ when the power generation system has TW of renewable excess power all over the place the cost equation flips on itself: convenience trumps efficiency.

Ultimately, who cares about lame road vehicles anyways, the future is personal VTOL for everyone!

 

[Hobbes]

I suspect that unless some impressive and unlikely advances are made,a thousand pounds of battery is goign to remain an expensive item

In the past 10 years, the cost of batteries has dropped by 85%. In 5 years, an EV will be cheaper to produce than an ICEV.

I just checked Craiglist: a car for sale, 2001 Chrysler Sebring, $900. Very likely not that great a car, but presumably it's adequate transportation. What EV can match that?

EVs depreciate just like ICE vehicles. It's quite obvious that at some point $2k EVs will be available.

It seems that a lot of people have problems with being told what to do. What's more, being told that they will be mandated to spend a lot more to be able to do a lot less. Not because there's no alternative, but because someone unaccountable and far away has simply decided that that's the way it shall be.

For decades, people have been getting away with activities that have negative consequences (pollution) while not being held responsible for those consequences. This is what's changing. It has to change, because those negative consequences are on the verge of overwhelming us.
Waiting for companies to change voluntarily won't work. It didn't work in the 1960 when all of Los Angeles was hidden under a yellow blanket. Government regulation got rid of smog. It didn't work in the 1970's when acid rain became a problem. Government regulation reduced the emissions responisble for that. It didn't work in the 1990s when the extent of global warming became clear. Government regulation was required to reduce CO2 emissions. Not telling people what to do is part of the problem.

 

[Orionblamblam]

For decades, people have been getting away with activities that have negative consequences (pollution) while not being held responsible for those consequences. This is what's changing. It has to change, because those negative consequences are on the verge of overwhelming us.

And yet China, India and the Third World are continuing not only to pollute, but to increase their polluting, all without so much as a peep of protest. So forgive me if I'm not concerned about the American motorist.

Government regulation was required to reduce CO2 emissions. Not telling people what to do is part of the problem.

Go ahead and tell China what to do. I'll wait over here.

 

[Arjen]

If you are not part of the solution, you are part of the problem. Intractable as the problem is.

 

[Hood]

The cheapest EV's in the UK as of March 2021 are:
Renault Twizy: £11,995
SEAT Mii electric: £20,300
Fiat 500: £20,495
VW e-up!: £20,695
Smart EQ fortwo: £21,345
Smart EQ forfour: £21,940
MG 5 EV: £24,495
MG ZS EV: £25,495
MINI Electric: £25,500
Peugeot e-208: £26,725

So everything from a glorified quadricycle to small hatchbacks (Chinese-built), what once would have been called superminis. The majority are city cars.

How does that compare with petrol?
Well the VW group stopped production of all petrol-powered Up!/Citigo/Mii due to small profit margins, charging up to £9k more for a pure-electric version has boosted the margin the right way to recoup some money.
The cheapest petrol Fiat 500 is £11,104 - so £9k less
The cheapest petrol Mini is £15,645, so £10k less
The cheapest petrol 208 is £16,310, so £10k less
£20,000 today would get you a mid/high-spec Fiesta or an entry-level Golf (an ID.3 will be about 7-8k more).

Now we all know as technology improves and as scale of production builds up, prices over the next decade will fall - but lets not make any bones about it, the car manufacturers today may bemoan the costs of having to develop their own batteries and motors etc. but already they can boost the price of their entire range by at least £10k and boost the profit margins.

Of course if you are buying a Fiat 500 EV on a PCP deal you might put down £3k and pay around £215 a month, if you don't pay up the final payment and swap it for a new one after 36 months then you don't feel the pain as much.
Swapping after 3 years builds up a used market (assuming people really trust a used car and battery or if they can afford a new battery for it), but by 2030 there should be a fair number of used EVs around. Of course used cars come with snags. What if your fancy 15in touchscreen fails, do you stump up the couple of grand replacement bill or do you just junk the car? Electrical faults are the most common complaint on modern cars, they also cost the most to fix.

But of course everyone swapping an EV after 3 years does nothing to stem consumerism at all. No matter how much they claim the seats are made from recycled plastic bottles, that's not really solving the wider problem of use of other plastics and alloys throughout the entire car.
Building 70 million EVs is hardly any less resource intensive than building 70 million petrol/diesel cars a year.
Then we get into the whole notion of single-person AI-driven personal transport and we're into the realms of building a couple of billion pods every year and on and on it goes.
The message very much is; don't worry it doesn't vent CO2, don't worry we used some recycled bits of plastic and woodpulp in your seat fabric and cupholder so you can consume, consume, consume without guilt.

I think the moans about activists and politicians rather misses the point, there are other drivers of change out there much more powerful. Make no bones about it, industry wants change as much as any government, if they can sell higher-spec cars to the middle classes who can afford them they make lots of nice dosh and keep the shareholders happy. China is going big in EV manufacture, why? For environmental reasons? No because it finally gives them a product they can sell globally and penetrate the lucrative Western markets just like the Japanese did 50 years ago. The marketing men feed off what people want and tell people what they think they need, the politicians follow suit as what makes good sales usually buys votes. Irrespective of what motive power you are using its business as usual.

 

[Archibald]

I have to say, as of today I can not replace my 10-years-old IC Grande Punto with a brand new electric car.

I'll have to wait for electric cars prices to drop further or that the second-hand market develops.

 

[Hobbes]

For decades, people have been getting away with activities that have negative consequences (pollution) while not being held responsible for those consequences. This is what's changing. It has to change, because those negative consequences are on the verge of overwhelming us.

And yet China, India and the Third World are continuing not only to pollute, but to increase their polluting, all without so much as a peep of protest. So forgive me if I'm not concerned about the American motorist.

Government regulation was required to reduce CO2 emissions. Not telling people what to do is part of the problem.

Go ahead and tell China what to do. I'll wait over here.

China (with 4-5 times the population) produces barely more CO2 than the US. If China's CO2 emissions are a problem, so are those of the USA. China is a signatory to the Paris climate agreement, and has implemented plans to achieve the climate goals of that agreement. The US (thanks to president Trump) dropped out of that agreement; thankfully that's been turned back by the new administration.

 

[Fluff]

For decades, people have been getting away with activities that have negative consequences (pollution) while not being held responsible for those consequences. This is what's changing. It has to change, because those negative consequences are on the verge of overwhelming us.

And yet China, India and the Third World are continuing not only to pollute, but to increase their polluting, all without so much as a peep of protest. So forgive me if I'm not concerned about the American motorist.

Government regulation was required to reduce CO2 emissions. Not telling people what to do is part of the problem.

Go ahead and tell China what to do. I'll wait over here.

China (with 4-5 times the population) produces barely more CO2 than the US. If China's CO2 emissions are a problem, so are those of the USA. China is a signatory to the Paris climate agreement, and has implemented plans to achieve the climate goals of that agreement. The US (thanks to president Trump) dropped out of that agreement; thankfully that's been turned back by the new administration.

China is going big on EV, because it knows it cant give 500M people a petrol car. There isnt much wrong with their current product standard, they have learnt about crash protection etc. The current sales to Europe etc are a bit of pocket change for them. The west agreed to the movement of manufacturing to China, its a bit rich to complain about their CO2 production.

 

[Orionblamblam]

China (with 4-5 times the population) produces barely more CO2 than the US.

If by "barely" you mean "about double," then, sure.

There's also the issue that while the US has been largely stagnant in CO2 production for about a decade, China continues to grow.

 

[Fluff]

China (with 4-5 times the population) produces barely more CO2 than the US.

If by "barely" you mean "about double," then, sure.

There's also the issue that while the US has been largely stagnant in CO2 production for about a decade, China continues to grow.

While we sent all our production there - what did we think would happen?

 

[edwest4]

One thing to remember -- or learn -- is that much of the condition of today's US cities is due to deliberate federal government policy to destroy cities started by the 1950s. One example: I-84, when it was planned through Hartford (the capital city of Connecticut) had no exits in the city. None. There was an exit in West Hartford (a quite nice suburb) and East Hartford (a somewhat more industrial suburb on the other side of a river) but none actually in Hartford. This was not accidental; much of the design of the Interstate Highway System was designed to depopulate cities.

Pardon me for being blunt but that's ridiculous. Look up the reason for freeways being built below ground level.

 

[Volkodav]

Getting a bit annoyed at the politicking on technical matters, I think we need a little more rationality here, just because the tech is supported by people whose politics you don't like, doesn't mean that it doesn't work and isn't worth pursuing.

And of course,a lot of people get off on telling other people how to live. These worldviews seem to conflict slightly.

Yes I gathered that, you have been telling us what to do and what not to do quite a bit in this topic. Just because you believe you are right doesn't give you anymore right to tell us what to do than the people you believe are wrong.

 

[Volkodav]

For decades, people have been getting away with activities that have negative consequences (pollution) while not being held responsible for those consequences. This is what's changing. It has to change, because those negative consequences are on the verge of overwhelming us.

And yet China, India and the Third World are continuing not only to pollute, but to increase their polluting, all without so much as a peep of protest. So forgive me if I'm not concerned about the American motorist.

Government regulation was required to reduce CO2 emissions. Not telling people what to do is part of the problem.

Go ahead and tell China what to do. I'll wait over here.

Ok so the bloke down the street is burning old tyres on a bonfire and the guy across the road is shooting passing school busses, does that mean you should do the same, or that you should just accept that it is the way things are and put up with it?

 

[overscan (PaulMM)]

"You are crazy if you think anyone's gonna buy these 'motor car' things. You're gonna need to build 'petrol stations' on every street corner to fill up from, and how will I afford to pay for that?. I think I'll stick to my horse, it eats grass I can find anywhere. Car's are super expensive to buy and don't get me started on reliability, everyone will need to be an expect mechanic to keep them running".

We all know how that turned out.

 

[overscan (PaulMM)]

For decades, people have been getting away with activities that have negative consequences (pollution) while not being held responsible for those consequences. This is what's changing. It has to change, because those negative consequences are on the verge of overwhelming us.

And yet China, India and the Third World are continuing not only to pollute, but to increase their polluting, all without so much as a peep of protest. So forgive me if I'm not concerned about the American motorist.

Government regulation was required to reduce CO2 emissions. Not telling people what to do is part of the problem.

Go ahead and tell China what to do. I'll wait over here.

Ok so the bloke down the street is burning old tyres on a bonfire and the guy across the road is shooting passing school busses, does that mean you should do the same, or that you should just accept that it is the way things are and put up with it?

"Other people aren't doing the right thing, so I don't have to" is one of the worst arguments ever.

 

[overscan (PaulMM)]

I bought an ebike last year and for the city it's pretty close to a perfect vehicle for commuting. I get to work in the city centre, 20km away, in 45 minutes. It takes about that to drive in a car on a a good day, longer if traffic is bad, and 70-90 mins on public transport.

I sail down the cycle path past queues of slow moving traffic on the motorway every day. Parking is free. Meanwhile I'm getting much-needed exercise as well.

I see many people on the cycle path on ebikes, electric scooters (privately owned or rented) and skateboards - a very diverse mix of vehicle types and shapes. It certainly seems like one part of the future.

 

[edwest4]

No matter the country, they will do whatever they want unless someone with the appropriate knowledge intervenes. For years, the oil companies and industrialists knew that pumping tons of pollutants into the air would catch up to them. The average person does not own factories or coal-fired power generating plants. There are 'scrubbers' that can be installed in smokestacks to remove the worst pollutants but they take away from profits. Look at a photo of an oil rig. See that flame that constantly burns on one side? It's called a 'fire stack' and it burns natural gas.

So the people in charge will be compelled by outside forces to do things they would not otherwise do. And as far as profits, if all of your competitors are required to do the same things to help the environment then all losses will be equal. And they can tell Wall Street that they had no choice.

 

[edwest4]

Homes set to be heated by sewage plants in future

Heat from industry and warmth from the sea feature in advice to government on future home heating.

www.bbc.com

 

[Orionblamblam]

"Other people aren't doing the right thing, so I don't have to" is one of the worst arguments ever.

An even worse one is "Even though YOU are doing the right thing, the other guy is doing the wrong thing so we're going to punish you."

 

[Orionblamblam]

I see many people on the cycle path on ebikes, electric scooters (privately owned or rented) and skateboards - a very diverse mix of vehicle types and shapes. It certainly seems like one part of the future.

Sure, it's good to have the little bitty things from time to time... a scooter or a concealable .380, for example. But the time comes when you need something more capable... a car or indeed a truck, a shotgun or modern sporting rifle. If you need to pack up and move a thousand kilometers away, good luck packing your library onto a scooter. You need to visit a sick friend or family member today, 300 kilometers distant. You need to get to the grocery store to pick up enough booze and hamburger for a gathering of twenty. You need to take the kids to their target practice. You need to take the dog to the vet. You have bodies to dispose of, or a CNC machine to transport to your shop or merchandise to take to the outlet. Good luck doing any of this on scooters, bikes or public transport.

 

[edwest4]

"... bodies to dispose of..."? Ewwwwwwww.

 

[Orionblamblam]

"... bodies to dispose of..."? Ewwwwwwww.

Well, you don't want to just leave 'em on your porch, do ya?

 

[shin_getter]

With electric drive train cost being heavily energy storage dependent..... you can get a cheaper than ICE vehicle by lowering the range.

Like this: Kandi K27 ($9900 with federal credits, 59 mile EPA range with 18kwh, more at city/low speed)

View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hxqXHyOLriY


If you use Chinese crash standards you get a , $4200/$5600 for the version with AC 110mile city range lol. (8yr warranty!!) The Wuling Hongguang Mini EV is a best seller and at a price point that makes sense as a toy. Operating cost is $1 for 50 miles.

View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RiXljigqRg0

----------------
The lower operating costs of EV at 1/2 (public fast charger) ~ 1/5 (self charging) means that long range and heavy hauls actually benefit significantly from electrification if the range issue can be sorted out. For personal, mostly random usage with minimum preparation one are limited by technology, but for fleet operators setting up a fast charger or batter swap midway point enables much reduced costs for long routes that can pay back upfront investment in time.

----------------
Some people have also commented on disposal of batteries: they are made of metal. Nickel, Lithium, Manganese, and Copper is pretty boring and not all that different from a engine block being a block of metal. Sounds to me like a media FUD issue.

Sure, it's good to have the little bitty things from time to time...a CNC machine to transport to your shop or merchandise to take to the outlet.

Ownership for a vehicle that can do it all is not economical relative to renting or using transport services if the usage rate is low. Do it yourself is expensive yo~

 

[Orionblamblam]

Sure, it's good to have the little bitty things from time to time...a CNC machine to transport to your shop or merchandise to take to the outlet.

Ownership for a vehicle that can do it all is not economical relative to renting or using transport services if the usage rate is low. Do it yourself is expensive yo~

The point being a good car, truck, SUV, whatever, can do *all* of that for you. The same vehicle I use to drive ten miles at a moments notice to get me a burger is the same vehicle that took me, my cats, computers and firearms 1200 miles in two days, and which could if I so chose take me to the USAF Museum in a day, the SAC museum in another day, Wings Over The Rockies in two days.

 

[chimeric oncogene]

Sure replacing oil (a finite resource) by lithium (another finite resource) won't help.
It is also a matter of 8 billion people (soon) wanting a common standard of living: the one from the advanced countries which is all by itself unaffordable...

Lithium could potentially be extracted from seawater; the concentration is "just" four orders of magnitude lower than magnesium (which is profitably extracted), and waaay higher than uranium. Recycling should handle the rest.

 

[Archibald]

Good to know !

 

[chimeric oncogene]

Good to know !

I made a mistake with the numbers; Li is in seawater at a concentration four orders of magnitude lower than magnesium. Sorry.
Should still in theory be easier than uranium seawater extraction.

 

[Orionblamblam]

Lithium could potentially be extracted from seawater; the concentration is "just" four orders of magnitude lower than magnesium (which is profitably extracted), and waaay higher than uranium. Recycling should handle the rest.

In a world where effectively all transportation is powered by lithium batteries, the need for lithium would be truly *vast.* It might be a few decades before the need levels off enough for recycling to make up a meaningful fraction of the annual supply.

But if uranium can be practically extracted from seawater (and IIRC several successful demos of just that were made more than a decade ago) then lithium should be extractable in truly vast tonnage.

 

[Archibald]

I remember some years ago when seawater was to save us via deuterium for thermonuclear fusion.
Seems that is has other interesting resources (uranium ? really ?)

Now, if lithium from seawater allows to frustrate China cynical and shameless blackmail related to rare earths, I'm all of it.

 

[Orionblamblam]

Seems that is has other interesting resources (uranium ? really ?)

Uranium. REALLY.

And:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Uranium_mining#Seawater_recovery

One method of extracting uranium from seawater is using a uranium-specific nonwoven fabric as an adsorbent. The total amount of uranium recovered from three collection boxes containing 350 kg of fabric was >1 kg of yellowcake after 240 days of submersion in the ocean.[26] According to the OECD, uranium may be extracted from seawater using this method for about $300/kg-U.[27] The experiment by Seko et al. was repeated by Tamada et al. in 2006. They found that the cost varied from ¥15,000 to ¥88,000 depending on assumptions and "The lowest cost attainable now is ¥25,000 with 4g-U/kg-adsorbent used in the sea area of Okinawa, with 18 repetitionuses [sic]." With the May, 2008 exchange rate, this was about $240/kg-U.

$240/kilo is certainly pricey. Spot price of U3O8 is about $31 for 250 pounds, which seems surprisingly low to me, but whatever. But those net-tests were early and small-scale; scale them up to industrial size, and prices will plummet. And what the heck, combine some things: built great big wind farms out at sea. Plant the wind turbines to the sea floor, string uranium adsorbent nets between them, constantly reeling them in like conveyor belts and scraping the uranium off. Automate it and if the nets are durable, the system become almost-kinda-sorta free.

 

[chimeric oncogene]

Well, lithium compounds are apparently selling at $13/kg, so they're going to have to bring the production costs of seawater lithium extraction waaay down. Also, demand is already 60,000 tonnes a year and will continue to rise.

In theory, max uranium consumption for a 60TW fast-breeder world is in the ballpark of 60,000 tonnes a year. Lithium is needed in far larger quantities than uranium could ever be.

 

[shin_getter]

Carbon driven Climate change is just the first salvo fired in the anthropocene global impact.

From a futurist perspective, the question is how will norms set today impact future geoengineering and other large scale weather influencing efforts, include space solar mirrors that'd make weather something to control on a real time scale. We are at the point where an agent can have global impact (high attitude sulfur injection) and the issue remain muddled.

Not many people have the vision on what kind of principles and organizations ought to exist to control all this and is thinking on the smallest, most tactical of scales of who whom.

How the hell does value of plausible weathers get measured and converted down into a execution plan? If it doesn't what are good rules that approximate a good answer?

With the anthropocene the question isn't climate change, but what climate to change to.....

Sure replacing oil (a finite resource) by lithium (another finite resource) won't help.

Surely the given finiteness of free energy and spacetime within the accessible universe, everything won't help.

Now, if lithium from seawater allows to frustrate China cynical and shameless blackmail related to rare earths, I'm all of it.

There is double digit million tons of known reserves enough for billions of cars without alternative technology, with US 4th in reserves ahead of China. The rare earth also isn't rare, the question is matching prices and local environmental disruption. Rare earth is also not used in battery but motors, and they are not strictly necessary just optimal.

If this EV plan stalls on resource scarcity it'd probably scuttle itself as greens detach from the movement due to increased environmental damage per unit mined and consumer price push back.

 

[Archibald]

D'oooooh, silly me - mixed lithium batteries with rare-earth engine components. My bad.

I recently turned into a supporter of the idea of slowing down global warming via (lunar ?) dust clouds at libration points. To cut the Sun energy output to Earth by 1% or a little more.

Unlike dropping iron into the oceans or peppering the atmosphere with aerosols, puttind dust clouds at libration points has no risk of screwing the biosphere per se - being far away into space with the dust free to scatter thanks to libration instability.

If BFR-Starship works properly (finger crossed) including its lunar variant NASA has just embraced - then on paper at least we have a basic tool to try that.

And Musk would like it as an interesting spinoff of his Mars plans... and making himself a hero and savior of humanity.

Remember, 2030 is probably the last point to achieve 1.5°C + so the battle is probably already lost.

I'm not a really big fan of grand scale space geoengineering, but that peculiar one sounds barely acceptable as a way to tackle global warming.

Note that I'm perfectly aware of two major caveats with it

a) some a$$holes will say "ah, problem solved, let's go CO2 crazy again"
and
b) it won't solve ocean acidification growing issue.

 

[Volkodav]

I bought an ebike last year and for the city it's pretty close to a perfect vehicle for commuting. I get to work in the city centre, 20km away, in 45 minutes. It takes about that to drive in a car on a a good day, longer if traffic is bad, and 70-90 mins on public transport.

I sail down the cycle path past queues of slow moving traffic on the motorway every day. Parking is free. Meanwhile I'm getting much-needed exercise as well.

I see many people on the cycle path on ebikes, electric scooters (privately owned or rented) and skateboards - a very diverse mix of vehicle types and shapes. It certainly seems like one part of the future.

Seriously considering a BEV as my next drive, especially if I relocate back to a large city. My brother has a hybrid and is regretting not going full BEV as he gets almost no use from the petrol motor and wouldn't even need that if he had the larger battery of the BEV.

 

[chimeric oncogene]

dust clouds at libration points

Mmm... orbital debris hazard. I'd go for sunshades (turn-offable) and ocean iron fertilization. The potential benefits to fisheries are pretty lucrative to explore, methinks.

But I'm spitballing here.

 

[Volkodav]

I see many people on the cycle path on ebikes, electric scooters (privately owned or rented) and skateboards - a very diverse mix of vehicle types and shapes. It certainly seems like one part of the future.

Sure, it's good to have the little bitty things from time to time... a scooter or a concealable .380, for example. But the time comes when you need something more capable... a car or indeed a truck, a shotgun or modern sporting rifle. If you need to pack up and move a thousand kilometers away, good luck packing your library onto a scooter. You need to visit a sick friend or family member today, 300 kilometers distant. You need to get to the grocery store to pick up enough booze and hamburger for a gathering of twenty. You need to take the kids to their target practice. You need to take the dog to the vet. You have bodies to dispose of, or a CNC machine to transport to your shop or merchandise to take to the outlet. Good luck doing any of this on scooters, bikes or public transport.

On the very rare occasions I need a truck (and I live rural), I hire one. When I relocate thousands of kilometres interstate I use a removalist as i have too much stuff for a pickup truck, in fact would be struggling to fit everything in two shipping containers. The truth is, except in very rare cases most people who buy pick up trucks would be served equally well by a moped as they are usually the only occupant and rarely if ever carry anything in the back, most pick ups are also painfully slow.

 

[Volkodav]

Sure, it's good to have the little bitty things from time to time...a CNC machine to transport to your shop or merchandise to take to the outlet.

Ownership for a vehicle that can do it all is not economical relative to renting or using transport services if the usage rate is low. Do it yourself is expensive yo~

The point being a good car, truck, SUV, whatever, can do *all* of that for you. The same vehicle I use to drive ten miles at a moments notice to get me a burger is the same vehicle that took me, my cats, computers and firearms 1200 miles in two days, and which could if I so chose take me to the USAF Museum in a day, the SAC museum in another day, Wings Over The Rockies in two days.

My wife drives an SUV because she likes it, in practicality terms it is less versatile than that the MPV and the small family wagon we owned previously but she didn't like them. Ironically I found the handling i.e. the go, turn and stop abilities of both the MPV and the wagon, far superior to the SUV, which to be honest, leaves me feeling violated every time I drive the miserable thing.

The worst thing about the SUV is its compromised cargo area, it holds less as its volume is compromised by wheel arches and other protuberances that weren't an issue in the wagon or MPV. "Sport" trucks are even worse with their suspension setups, they are meant to improve handling but fail to give them anywhere near equiveillance to that of a mediocre family car, while drastically reducing its load capacity.

Be honest with yourself, you like big boofy trucks and SUVs because you like them, no other reason, everything else is just an excuse to defend a personal choice. My personal vehicle is a small high performance turbo I6, I own it because I love it and enjoy driving it, again a personal choice, just like by big bore naked bike was, even my stupidly expensive pet parrot, personal choice. By the way before I moved to the defence industry, I spent years working in automotive R&D so have an idea about vehicle dynamics and test driving, as well as design compromises.

 

[Fluff]

Sure, it's good to have the little bitty things from time to time...a CNC machine to transport to your shop or merchandise to take to the outlet.

Ownership for a vehicle that can do it all is not economical relative to renting or using transport services if the usage rate is low. Do it yourself is expensive yo~

The point being a good car, truck, SUV, whatever, can do *all* of that for you. The same vehicle I use to drive ten miles at a moments notice to get me a burger is the same vehicle that took me, my cats, computers and firearms 1200 miles in two days, and which could if I so chose take me to the USAF Museum in a day, the SAC museum in another day, Wings Over The Rockies in two days.

Assuming that your human, so you urinate and drink coffee, so will your EV in ten years, by charging at a couple of stops for 15 minutes. w

 

[Fluff]

Lithium could potentially be extracted from seawater; the concentration is "just" four orders of magnitude lower than magnesium (which is profitably extracted), and waaay higher than uranium. Recycling should handle the rest.

In a world where effectively all transportation is powered by lithium batteries, the need for lithium would be truly *vast.* It might be a few decades before the need levels off enough for recycling to make up a meaningful fraction of the annual supply.

But if uranium can be practically extracted from seawater (and IIRC several successful demos of just that were made more than a decade ago) then lithium should be extractable in truly vast tonnage.

there is very little lithium, in a li-ion battery. We seem to manage ok for oil, rubber, steel, to make ICE cars.