Drew Dowdell

A lot of the Anti-EVers like to say "Well, your EV is powered by coal! Coal is what is used to generate your electricity!" Well... that's become less and less true. It's time to start retiring that line. According to the Energy Information Administration - U.S. Renewable Sources Generate More Electricity Than Either Coal or Nuclear and Begin to Close the Gap with Natural Gas For the period January - September, solar-generated electricity – including distributed solar - expanded by 22.1% (compared to the same period in 2019) and provided more than 3.4% of the nation’s total. Wind grew by 12.2% and accounted for 7.9% of total generation. Combined, net electrical generation by wind and solar was 15.0% greater than a year ago. Electrical generation by geothermal energy and hydropower also increased - by 3.3% and 0.1% respectively - while that from biomass fell by 2.1%. Together with wind and solar, renewables provided 20.5% of total electrical output - up from 18.4% a year earlier. Moreover, renewables' share of U.S. electrical generation has eclipsed that of nuclear power (19.4%) and coal (18.6%). Renewables produced almost a tenth (i.e., 9.8%) more electricity than coal through September 2020. In fact, electrical generation by coal was 23.5% lower than a year earlier. In addition, renewable energy sources produced 5.2% more electricity than did nuclear power whose output fell 1.8% during the same nine-month period.

I agree with most of this, however, there are some people who are against progress of any sort and just hate it to hate it. They hold the view that "It won't work for me today, so that means it will NEVER WORK FOR ANYONE EVER!". Tesla was a game changer for EVs. It made EVs substantially more accessible to more people, not just in cost, but in range. Before Tesla, most EVs topped out at 120 miles or 150miles max. It doesn't matter if you were Jeff Bezos, that is a deficit of utility that those EVs could not overcome. Telsa coming out with 250, 300, 350, 400 mile ranges meant that suddenly the vehicle was usable to 99.9% of trips with no range anxiety. Yes they are still more expensive than regular cars, but now you don't have to be Jeff Bezos to own one. EV development will largely be incremental from here on out. There is really no need for a range beyond 400 miles in a standard passenger, so rather than adding additional range, manufacturers are going to start to work on things like charging speed and battery size... neither of which will generate much in terms of headlines. So, you're correct that the next Tesla with a 350 mile range is going to be 105% of the current one, that means the 30 minute charge from 0%-80% will take 28 minutes instead of 30, but also the battery will weigh less and the car will improve its regen efficiency. Battery cost will also stay flat or go down making it more accessible to more people. So, it's really only a matter of time before EVs become ubiquitous even if you don't personally own one.

That was definitely the case with the Encore.

I'll be coming up on the Avalanche's first oil change soon. The Chrysler still has a while to go. I drove it yesterday and Albert has hardly put any miles on it at all.

I’m.... not seeing locomotive in the current crop of Chevy trucks. Where are you seeing it?

The Bolinger is what Gru from Minions would drive if they ever did a live action version of the movie.... except it would be nuclear fission powered or something.

Cool I guess. (see what I did there?) But the other two vaccines don't require that sort of cold storage. The Pfizer vaccine is probably only going to be used for frontline healthcare workers. The third vaccine coming can be stored in a standard freezer purchased at lowes.

I've seen the Bolinger in person. It's what happens when someone gets an EV powertrain and has a bunch of flat sheet metal, an arc welder, a JC Whitney Catalog, and a few rolls of remnant office carpeting laying around. They had a booth at the L.A. show the same year the Rivian debuted.... and I was like, "You can't be serious.... "

There's a number of flaws with this, it makes assumptions that aren't part of reality. It assumes that everyone would plug-in and charge their vehicle at the same time. I think everyone here can agree that would not be the case. Also, most modern chargers are, or have the capability to be, smart chargers. They can be set up to only charge at the rate required to get to the desired level of charge by a specific time and during specific hours. What do I mean by that? I'll give you the scenario... these numbers are made up for this illustration, but the actual numbers work the same way. You drive your Tesla home from work and it has a 60% charge left. You've had a long day and don't intend to go out again that evening when you get home at 6pm. Because you want to preserve your battery health as long as possible, you've already set your Tesla to only charge up to 80% capacity. You plug your car in at 6, but because you get a lower electricity rate starting at 11pm, your charger doesn't start charging the car until 11. You tell the car that you want to be at 80% charge by 7am tomorrow. Once the charger kicks in, it only charges at the rate required to get you to 80% at 7am when starting charging even though the charger can go faster. This is much better for the battery as slow charging is better. So instead of running at the max 11.5 kWh, the Tesla charger will run at say, 8kWh. The reason the electric rate is cheap from 11pm to 6am is because that's when usage is lowest. It's the best time for EVs to charge. It takes a long time for power plants to ramp up and ramp down demand (unless they're NatGas Spiker units only used for unplanned spikes in demand). So a lot of energy gets wasted during this low demand period. A bunch of EVs charging at night would smooth out demand for utilities significantly. Do we still need more capacity? Yes. Do we need as much as this article is claiming? No

@ocnblu Did you see the new color for Jeep for 2021?

You'll probably be shopping for the new platform by the time you're ready to trade, so everything you know about the current vehicle will be out the window. The one I specd out was $79,500 in Forest Green w/Green Interior and 7 seats.

I learned a long time ago to not read Facebook comments as they are generally from people who are unhinged and/or without a firm grasp on reality. A bunch of keyboard warriors who can barely make the payment on their '15 Malibu are not Cadillac's target market. If Cadillac makes a product with a powertrain equal or greater than Tesla and actually puts some style back in their vehicles (unlike the puke worthy stuff they have out now - excepting remaining CT6 and '21 Escalade) then I'll be back in the Cadillac camp.... but they've gotta make the vehicles look GREAT.

I don't really care for older Pontiacs, but that one is gorgeous.

I run steels on my Toronado because that's what it came with of course. There were optional alloy wheels available but they're made of unobtainium.. there is a rumor that the few that were sold were recalled by GM and destroyed due to wheel failures. If any actually still exist I would love to own a set just for the obscurity of them. I was actually looking at some retro steel wheels for my Avalanche to run snow tires with this morning after we were chatting about the Defender. These with some Blizzacks on 17s on my 'Lanche? Could be fun.

Yeah I know.. I was pointing out the difference.

His Jeep has been remarkably good to him. 96k miles and just general wear and tear items plus one water pump which I taught him how to replace a couple weeks ago.

I can't seem to figure out how to configure the Defender with those wheels

I REALLY like those wheels on that. My best friend has a Jeep Liberty and loves it. He's not really sure what he wants to go to next and he's kinda defaulting to a Wrangler, but I've been raising the idea of a Defender to him for a few years from now when they've worked the bugs out.

I am reversing this. It makes browsing on mobile rather tedious.

So, F-150 EV?

Why do you hate choice?

Prius Prime is a plug-in hybrid... not a BEV.

10+ years when you want to start looking at retiring but you know you never will because you're like me in that if you didn't work you'd be bored, but you realize you can step back from 2500 series trucks and get a 1500 series with a 400+ mile EV range to do the work and just have the heavier stuff delivered by the supplier.

I was specifically only addressing your situation. I'm aware that people in apartments or without off street parking are different. As to your charger, you'd probably hardwire an outdoor safe model and hang it on the outside of the garage like a garden hose. The shortest hardwire units are generally 25" long. The eGolf people (and Leaf and Focus EV) are special use cases that only work if they have charger access at their house. The ranges for those models are simply too short to be useful except as a 3rd car in the household and it being dedicated to a specific route and charging pattern. However, as more models like the high range Teslas, Fiskers, Hummers, Bolts, F-150s, and Rivians come out, the use case looks remarkably similar to an ICE vehicle. Plug it in at night and go about your normal daily routine. Heck, I've got 50% of the action down right now without having an EV in the household. Ever since it got cold here, the Toronado gets put on the battery tender every time it gets parked.

East Coast Costcos, Sams, and BJs, generally don't carry diesel. I've driven the entire east cost from Boston to Key West and West to Detroit, MI.. not saying my survey was exhaustive, but I make it a habit to fill up at Costco as much as possible because they have the lowest prices for the top tier gas. I've never seen a Costco with diesel.