Post by aquaduct on Jan 25, 2024 21:18:10 GMT -5
My expectation is the "all EV by 2035" will be substantially modified well before it is supposed to go into effect. It's just a "feel-good" deal purposely put out far enough in future to allow time for the changes and modifications that will prove to be necessary. The "all EV by 2035" is, however, a clear signal to the industry, one of many. And the industry is responding.
And so are consumers. Not to pure EVs. But consumers are responding to various forms of hybrid gas/battery cars. And they are doing so willingly (as I will be pretty soon). And they are responding, not for the reasons Green advocates might have hoped for. Buyers are moving to hybrids because they are so much peppier and fun to drive.
I just finished test driving a couple Hyundai Tucsons, and the gas-only model was a complete dog (8.8 seconds 0-60 per Car and Driver) And it felt even slower. And the engine had to work noisily just to be slow. The Hybrid, on the other hand, was a blast to drive. (7.1 0-60 per Car and Driver) and it felt even faster. The torque came so easily and quietly, it was zoom zoom zoom. No contest.
You can read and watch reviews of every car out there, and if there is a hybrid version, every review says that is the one to get. Not for mileage, but for the clearly superior performance.
Caveat, it wouldn't have to be so. Manufactures are putting underpowered little engines in their mainstream vehicles in order to reach mileage specs (stupid little turbo-charged 3 and 4 cylinders you need to rev to high heaven), but that's the way it is. If you want good performance in an "everyman" sort of vehicle, it going to have a electric motor in it as well as a gas-powered one. So, in one form or another, batteries are coming. Gas might not go away, but electrics are definitely coming and they will take a progressively heavier portion of the load.
Wrong. The current EPA rules that have been proposed and will be finalized probably this summer, mandate (not just try hard. More like "if you don't, you won't get a certificate to sell anything in this country"), again, mandate that every manufacturer must sell 67% of their light duty vehicles as full EVs (not hybrids) by 2032. That's on the way to 100% in 2035. That's 0, again one zero followed by an infinite number of other zeros, CO2 emissions in 2035. The only technical way it can be done is with EVs.
The really scary part of the whole thing is how easily these people that are pushing this crap have been able to bury a very stark and bleak technical reality beneath the general public's complete (and very understandable) lack of understanding of any of it.
When I was hired into NHTSA in 2009, it was to do Corporate Average Fuel Economy (CAFE) standards for heavy duty trucks (> 14,000 lbs. GVWR- ie- semis, etc.). At the time, it had never been contemplated so it was approached with a real sense of seriousness.
However, the more you know about it, the more absurd the notion gets. But you know politicians. Absurdity has never been an impediment to bread and circuses.
I may sound overwrought, but what happened to me at NHTSA pales in comparison to what these idiots have cooked up for you normal folk.
Be afraid. Be very afraid. And the sooner the better.