That's a very real issue that car enthusiasts have a hard time with. There's just something about a great sounding engine that is the cherry on top of a car you like. My weak spot is a 4 rotor screaming like a banshee from Mazda's Le Mans car.
The whole notion of loud = fast falls apart with electric engines.
Not many people buy cars just because they sound good. It's usually the engine that makes it sound good.(+exhaust, etc). Which means tha there's still the need for speed.
But if you want speed, you need to go electric.
The whole macho V8 rumble and manually shifting gears is now less effective than a one-pedal, one-gear, quiet electeic setup.
This must such a huge disconnect in their heads, that they go about posting "electric = gay" on car videos.
Just like listening to loud music with windows down, the loud fart cans are just for seeking attention.
A loud engine is now an equivalent of a dog that barks, but doesn't bite.
I agree that there are many cars that sound incredible (four rotor Mazdas, Porche Carerra GTs, Black or Brabus Mercs, you name it), but disliking electric cars because they make a silly quiet noise just makes one a poser, IMO.
Electric cars are fun, and I don't personally mind they're basically silent. But nothing will replace the fun of a manual transmission ICE.
I don't think most people get a loud exhaust for attention either, but because they like it. But windows down blasting music is pointless and toxic, IMO.
Also saying if you want speed to go electric is too generic, IMO. What kind of speed and when you're going to use it is important. For example, if you want speed from a standstill, then sure electric. Want speed once you're already moving, like a race track, then ICE is fine since you'll be high RPMs.
And I don’t get this. I mean I also love the feel of power you get from a large engine turning over, but really? You over there in that mustang making all that noise and effort, really straining to accelerate, while my Tesla effortlessly leaves you in the dust? Do people not understand how much more powerful it feel to be the fastest car with seemingly no effort?
I feel like this is directed towards ICE vs EV cars. If that's the case, it's sort of frustrating.
EVs have some very real drawbacks. Even if those drawbacks are solvable problems, they are still problems right now. Pushing this narrative that EVs are universally better or that the biggest hurdle to adoption is irrational consumer sentiment will just make people feel gaslit. It'll also make people more hesitant to adopt later on, because they'll be skeptical of positive reviews that are honest.
Battery cost pushing up vehicle cost, battery replacement cost, battery weight, low battery energy density, batteries that only last half of a car lifespan of 20 years.
We need much better batteries.
For now, plug in Hybrids are a good way to avoid many of these problems.
I agree. ICE vehicles usually have more range, fuel is basically available everywhere, they take minutes to fill, and generally have a cheaper initial cost.
In addition to that, ICE cars, though needing more maintenance, have repair shops in just about every village, town, city.... often several of them.
I feel like EVs are a bit of a glass cannon when it comes to anything that might go wrong with them. Whatever goes wrong is very likely to cause the vehicle to stop operation entirely. Most ICE cars will either just keep working when something is wrong, or at worst go into a limp mode, allowing you to get to a repair shop to have the vehicle repaired.
I understand why EVs are the way they are, high voltage electricity is no joke, but then you need a tow truck to get to the service center that's likely much further away.
EVs are great, don't get me wrong, but if you're planning for the worst case and/or failure cases, ICE vehicles just fail more gradually, frequently giving you some leeway to take care of the problem well before the vehicle completely stops working.
EVs are also a major issue for firefighters. Lithium ion battery fires following an accident are ridiculously hard to put out and present a significant safety hazard in confined spaces, like tunnels or narrow streets. It takes close to 6 times the water to control EV vehicle fires.
And while it's a more minor issue, EVs are heavier than ICE vehicles in the same class, which causes more road wear and more tire wear (and more micro plastics to enter the environment).
And, I guess, finally, there's no established break-even point for carbon emissions over ICE vehicles. The estimates provided in the literature vary wildly--from 13,000 miles to 94,000.
I love the technology, but I hope solid state batteries become a viable option for EVs.
And while it's a more minor issue, EVs are heavier than ICE vehicles in the same class, which causes more road wear and more tire wear (and more micro plastics to enter the environment).
Easy solution is to move to Indiana. Our environment means that almost every day from November through April, the temperatures will be in the 30s-50s in the day and 10-20 at night, so the pavement is constantly cracking. Combine that with the lack of investment in infrastructure (Indy literally has a ban on new streetlights and stop lights going back to the 80s) and it doesn't matter how heavy the car is, the pavement will be just as broken.
which causes more road wear and more tire wear (and more micro plastics
I’ll buy more tire wear and microplastics, but argue the reduction in carbon emissions still makes it a better choice. However I don’t think there’s a noticeable difference in road wear. We’ve all heard the claim that road wear increases dramatically with weight, but compared to large trucks, EVs are still in the category of “close to zero”
no established break-even point for carbon emissions over ICE vehicles. The estimates… vary wildly–from 13,000 miles to 94,000.
I once read an article that I wish I kept, that addressed this (for US) by calculating per state, based on each state’s typical energy portfolio. While you’d really need your local energy portfolio, state level really improved accuracy and gave something you could use.
West Virginia and Wyoming really stood out. As the two states still getting most of their electricity from coal the break-even is further out - I think it was as long as 14 years typical driving. Don’t buy an EV yet if you live in those states, unless you have solar.
Several states with more renewables or nuclear, had break-even as low as 2 years typical driving.
For most of us, the breakeven is low enough to consider the switch. It’s important to remember that electricity generation is getting cleaner all the time, even in Wyoming, so it’s quite likely the break-even point will move toward you over the years of owning a vehicle
Those drawbacks are endlessly discussed online, to a ridiculous degree. Nothing is universally better, but EVs are almost as close as it gets. If there weren't several whole industries dead set on preventing adoption they would have been adopted much quicker.
The reason I'm pretty much undecided about EVs is the rare metals in the batteries. The pollution by gathering and the inhumane treatment of the workers who extract these resources. I'm still hoping for better alternatives in the energy storage medium
Let's not forget that EVs are heavier than their ICE equivalent classes of vehicle, meaning they use more energy. Which is a problem because a) they store ever so much less energy, and b) they're ever so much less energy-efficient. So you need more energy to move them, and charging inefficiency mounts on top of that, but hey, at least you have shorter range!
EVs are not what is going to save the environment. Indeed depending on your source of electricity (most of the world still uses fossil fuels to generate electricity, recall!) you could well be making things worse by switching to an EV.
You know what will save the environment? Ending personal automobile ownership and instead beefing up public transportation.
This is just incorrect. Lol. While I agree with the ending. EV aren't the solution to climate change. EVs are a lot cleaner than ICE and use less energy.
EVs do not use more energy than gasoline cars, that's nonsense. The best ICE engine is ~40% efficient plus the losses from braking. Battery electric is closer to 80%. They are only around 10-15% heavier.
They're still working on this. I've more or less been holding my breath on the battery tech.
I want to see, either easily recycled materials that are common (sodium cells seem to fit here), or batteries that last the useful life of the vehicle and beyond (solid state batteries are a good example here). I don't really care which.
Cheap sodium based batteries, with adequate recycling technology would be a fine solution. Alternatively, even fairly "expensive" (in terms of rare metals) solid state batteries, would also be fine, since a single set of batteries may survive over several vehicles, depending on what solid state batteries can do when they finally hit the mass market.
I just don't want to have to replace the battery at nearly the cost of a whole ass new EV, well short of the useful life of the rest of the vehicle. Either the battery cost and environmental impact comes down, or we remove the need to replace the batteries with a version that lasts as long or longer than the rest of the vehicle.
I like EVs. I want an EV. I don't want to buy the current EVs on the market.
Also, if any vehicle designers are reading this, can we cut the shit where anything hybrid or EV looks ridiculous? IMO, a big reason why Tesla was so successful, is that they made it into a car. The model S, though unique in design, isn't a significant departure from pretty much every other sedan, in terms of design. Compare with something like the Prius, which is generally only a funny looking hatchback, or the Volt.... Which also looks pretty dumb IMO. Just give me a regular car.
... Okay, the Prius and Volt probably aren't the best examples. I'll put a better one here.... The BMW i3. Just.... What the hell.
There will always be a better choice on the horizon, but you can’t let that into delaying forever. Batteries in use right now are better the environment, even when judging by the entire lifecycle, and if sodium batteries happen, they are farther off than you’re likely to keep your vehicle. It does not pay to keep pushing it off
It pays for me to push it off. I own my car and I'm not really using it. So I pay very little in fuel and maintenance because the vehicle sits in my driveway most days.
I can afford to wait.
When the day comes that my vehicle is no longer viable, then I'll consider my options. For now, I'm happy to sit on my hands.
I work from home, and the only time I get in the car is for rare site visits for work or occasional leisure activities, like grocery shopping or running other errands.
When that time comes, I'll have to consider if I even still need a vehicle or if my SO and I should just share one.
All concerns for the future. I'm excited to see what happens with sodium and solid state over the next decade, and I have no problem waiting to see before I make any decisions about my needs. Hopefully we get some progress before I have to make that decision. I spend so little time in the car right now that it would be a shame to spend tens of thousands of dollars on a newer vehicle for it to sit in my driveway.
Fwiw mining and manufacturing isn't as bad as some people want you to believe.
About 40% of lithium comes from brine extraction. There's a lot of lithium in the ground which are dissolved in brine - a super salty solution of minerals and water. They're extracted by allowing the water to evaporate into the atmosphere and then retrieving the minerals from that.
While that "wastes" a lot of water, none of that water was usable in the first place. It's too salty for humans and would kill any plants or fish if used for crops or dumped respectively.
Another 60% comes from normal hard rock mining. This is as environmentally friendly as most mining is.
A small portion - about 2% - comes from clay mining. This is actually rather bad for the environment and results in a lot of atmospheric pollution. Fortunately, it's a small shrinking portion of total mining.
The other main minerals in li-ions are cobalt, manganese, and lithium.
A large amount of cobalt comes from artisanal mining in the Congo. Artisanal is just a fancy term that means it's not work being performed by a company at a dedicated mine, but on a small scale such as a single person digging an area and collecting it or a handful of people who run their own mine. Unfortunately, though, we know that slave and child labor are used at a large portion of these mines.
Fortunately, there has been a large push to move to more sustainable mining practices. Some Congo miners have allowed outside observers to verify that all miners are adults working of their own volition.
Other countries such as Cuba and Indonesia have begun mining cobalt and are also following minimum employment practices. As a side benefit, these mines are also the main sources for nickel which reduces the number of mines we need.
Manganese is rather interesting. The current extraction process involves using natural gas to separate the components. However, there are nodules on the ocean floor which are rich in manganese. While these would produce less pollution to process, there are worries that removing the nodules would cause irreparable harm to the local environment.
However, even if your batteries were mined in the most harmful method possible and your power comes from the dirtiest plant of all time, the long term emissions are still much better than driving the most fuel-efficient ICE over the same time period.
I think of the mining issues somewhat like nuclear power. That mining is also very problematic and destructive to the environment. However in both cases, it’s a relatively small amount. Even if the local environmental or social cost is higher, it is such a small amount of material that the overall cost is still lower.
Also, consider supply and demand. Every article talking about how bad. The mining is, mentions how there’s reasons more developed countries don’t do it. Recent years have seen several announcements of newly discovered resource in the US, for example. Will they be mined, despite higher worker safety and environmental protection? One way to encourage this is higher demand, raising the price enough to drive their profitability
Yes! It could be like Assassin's Creed where most of the story takes place in Civilization, but then there are interludes that take place in the modern world.
it's normally upper managers sand baging. Everytime we have a new product they don't involve anyone later stages in pipeline and keep the engineering team in a sealed space lab IN Mars. Then release the product half baked because the eng team quit or got dissolved to work on other more important projects. Then demand the sustainability team to develop it. So now it's in limbo for 2 years but noo we must go to market now. Now it's all trash but marketing cleans it's image.
Never fails to happen.
Worst is new management come and say new product v2 but we are doing it all from scratch and ignore previous team mistakes. Like why?
Armchair pseudo-scientific thinking like this was why Mythbusters became so popular. They even devoted at least one episode to this very myth. Spoiler, hydrogen wasn't what made that particular lead ballon unsafe.
I don't think airship travel is viable due to inability to properly steer them outside of very specific conditions, regardless of the filling. I would love to be proven wrong if it were somehow economic for shipping, but I have no high expectations.
xkcd
Oldest