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Elon musk.....


stmitch

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I can see tax revenue being an issue - ~25% of cost of gasoline here in Alberta is "road tax" (Was 33% before UCP repealed the "carbon tax"). That's a lot of money to be losing. I consider gasoline tax, a fair tax as it is based on consumption - if I'm driving more, I'm wearing out road more so should be paying more. But someplace I believe gov't sidetracked that road tax into general tax.

How does gov't appropriately charge EV users a "consumption" tax? Adding $500/yr, based on average driver, to EV costs really hurts their breakeven point.
It varies by state, and usually depends on the type of vehicle. Indiana charges hybrids and PHEVs $50 more when registering each year. A fully electric BEV is charged $150.
Here's a state by state breakdown:
 


85_Ranger4x4

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Road tax is about $.30/gal in Iowa. Figuring on a average 20gal tank I put $6 of road tax in my truck per fill, about $156 a year.

Of course nothing for EV's in Iowa (they are not popular either though) but for states charging around $150/year they are not far off... unless they have stupid amounts of road tax on gas. Looking at the map most are well below $150 though if they even have it.
 

don4331

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Road tax up here is $0.28/litre = $1.04 US gal! But our population density is lower, so more road/person to maintain, and the extreme temperature between summer and winter means more maintenance - not that I am happy about it given the condition of the roads.

$156/yr is based on about 50% of national average driving distance isn't it? $300/yr is probably reasonable amount in US.
 

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They could just stop spending 4 trillion dollars a year on pens, or hire compenant road crews that do the job for a reasonable cost and not just hire the first shady jackass who slips them a bribe to approve their bid of $57,000 dollars to fill in a pothole.

That might help lower fuel taxes and improve roads?
Exactly, the problem is not they they are not collecting enough tax money. The problem is that they waste it. I'm a States rights guy and think the Federal government should be cut in half or at least have all of the BS agencies and departments not provided for in the Constitution shut down.
 

8thTon

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I'm not sure why you have a problem with this. Swapping batteries enables those people who want to make long trips to do so without having to stop and wait for their batteries to recharge. You swap out the discharged batteries for fully charged batteries and go. Meanwhile, the batteries they left at the recharge station get recharged, then swapped into another customer's vehicle, and the cycle continues.

As far as running vehicles on electricity, I disagree with you. It can be done and there are multiple ways to do it beyond batteries, and for the average American who doesn't do much more than going to work and the grocery store, the present options are more than viable, with the exception of cost for some people. At some point, the decreasing cost of electric vehicles will intersect with the rising cost of gas-powered vehicles. When that happens you will suddenly see a lot more electric vehicles on the road. At the rate new cars are increasing, this might happen sooner than we think. The commercial solution might be powered by catenary or third-rail. Freight has been moved in this country with electric locomotives in the past and is currently used in several cities around the world to reduce local air pollution. It probably will not be used between Denver and Sacramento where there are long distances of rural land, but it would certainly work up and down the urbanized regions of the East Coast. Also, trucks and buses can be powered this way too.

https://www.trucker.com/trucks/mack-trucks-shows-ehighway-electrified-tractor

And the possibility that super capacitors may make battery technology obsolete

https://www.iflscience.com/technology/graphene-based-supercapacitors-could-eliminate-batteries-electric-cars-within-5-years/
You've missed my point entirely - it has nothing to do with battery technology at all. Of course I understand the intent of battery swapping, and as I said really nice electric cars have been around since the dawn of the automobile age. Look up a Detroit Electric. My dad has a very nice Focus electric, as did a coworker.

The issue is trying to extend that to the entire automobile system Go to one of those large gas stations and watch how many cars fill up in a day - each one of those is going to be hours. When do you catch up? each of those batteries still needs a huge amount of energy put back into it, which will take a lot of time. If you want to decrease the time you must have an incredibly high instantaneous power, using higher voltages and higher currents. The equation for power loss is amps squared x resistance, so increasing current greatly increases losses. So the whole efficiency thing goes out the window if you want to charge fast.

So everyone will charge at night is the usual answer, and we can do this because the power grid has excess capacity then. This sounds great to MBAs
who get taught to believe in something for nothing, but in the real world that translates to pushing an antique, poorly maintained power grid to a greater percentage of it's capacity all the time. This leads to something called catastrophic failure. Transformers and lines cool down during off-peak, etc.

You might think then that we'll increase capacity, though we've been unable to afford that for decades now. This is what the "smart grid" was all about - we can't afford to add capacity, so instead we've overlaid a high speed communication grid so we can push the old pig harder. Just more neglected infrastructure.

Also, electric rail is not at all the same issue, as it isn't "automotive" - it doesn't carry a stored energy source, it runs on an extension cord (catenary). This is and has always been quite viable. If we built this out, small EV's and electric bikes would be a fine way to get from home to the local station.

Just for reference, I'm an electrical engineer who's spend over 30 years designing products for the electric utility industry, including switch mode power supplies and battery chargers.

I wonder what would happen to the grid if everyone plugged in at night?
See above. Trying to push any system to capacity all the time leads to failures - doesn't matter what kind of system, be it highways, or plumbing or engines, when you push it to max capacity all the time things break in spectacular fashion.

Last hydrogen is the most abundant element on Earth. There is no free hydrogen on Earth. You must put energy into breaking molecular bonds to release the hydrogen, so it is just another form of battery. OK, I'll quit now.
 

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Bought a Tesla Model 3 about 2 months ago and put 8500 miles in that time. It's a pretty amazing vehicle. We got the Dual motor long range so range is about ~300 miles. We have a Nema 14-50 outlet installed in our garage to charge overnight. We get about 30 miles per hour charging this way. There's 2 superchargers on our commute route. Range anxiety is not a thing, at least with the long range model. Trips would be no issue as long as you are traveling down a major route or plan ahead to have charging where you park. With RV parks all over it's not hard to find a place to charge. The vehicle is simply incredible. We were choosing between a new Ranger for 48k or this model 3 for 52k. It was a no brainer. the price difference is only because we got the Advance autopilot. Wife drives the model 3, I'm now driving her mini cooper which gets 40 mpg. We are saving $750/month on gas by owning a tesla, even after the ~$700/month tesla payment
 
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G8orFord

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@8thTon That part of my post was mostly rhetorical, but the hydrogen part is more serious. You said it yourself, the most abundant element on Earth. All I'm saying is someone should be working on a way to maximize the hydrogen output verses the energy needed to produce it. You have to put energy into producing gasoline and diesel, so I guess they are just another form of battery as well.
 

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dude. you never cease to amaze. 300 000 is cake for an electric engine.




i cant wait till hub motor technology is cheap enough to put on my ranger.



yeah....see me tow 30 k and have turn table steering with my diesel electric hybrid ranger that runs 10 second 1/4 mile times....
 

bobbywalter

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and probably only gets 10 mpg equivalent because of the 54 in tires....but....you will have that when you can park on traffic.
 

Ranger850

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Hydrogen powered vehicles will solve the problem, but then create a new one. The Automotive petroleum industry will get crushed by this, to me, this is why it will never happen. Too many people make BILLIONS of dollars off GAS. Greed keeps them from researching for a viable propulsion resource. R&D is expensive and risky.
 

8thTon

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@8thTon That part of my post was mostly rhetorical, but the hydrogen part is more serious. You said it yourself, the most abundant element on Earth. All I'm saying is someone should be working on a way to maximize the hydrogen output verses the energy needed to produce it. You have to put energy into producing gasoline and diesel, so I guess they are just another form of battery as well.
To get hydrogen you must put a set amount of energy in to break the chemical bonds of whatever it's bound up with now - no way to get around it. You can never get more out of it than you put into getting it, so the net energy return is always negative.

That's the difference - the energy is already stored in fossil fuels, and the one's we built our world on cost very little additional energy to access (very high net energy). The one's we have left cost much more energy to get (low net energy return), which is what is really killing our economy, but they are probably still marginally positive.
 

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I dont see why we can't just use nuclear plasma fusion reactors to power everything... oh right cause just one of them could cripple the fossil fuel industry overnight.
 

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Humanity cannot progress without intensive, expensive, and unquestioned devotion to the scientific expansion of our knowledge of dicks.
 

85_Ranger4x4

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I dont see why we can't just use nuclear plasma fusion reactors to power everything... oh right cause just one of them could cripple the fossil fuel industry overnight.

 

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