RE: All good things come to an end in 2035

[VeeFource]

kiseca said:

VeeFource said:

Equus said:

VeeFource said:

There's a reason people pay £50 odd for their family to ride on a steam train. Despite outclassing a steam train I can't ever see that happening with one of these...

Last time I paid to ride on one of those, it cost me a fair bit more than £50 for the privilege, and that was just for me on my own.

I'm guessing you were using it to get somewhere rather than riding up and down the line for the fun of it?

There are only a handful of steam trains left in operation today. Most people have never travelled on one, and it has an attraction of being a new, novelty or just unfamiliar experience.

Back when steam trains were normal, people just rode them to get where they're going, much like they do today, and the (then) new electric trains were the novelty everyone wanted to try. Just like prop driven airliners like the Constellation have a romantic aura around them nowadays - I'd love to experience a flight in one - they were noisy, vibrating beasts. Jet airliners were simply faster, much smoother, quieter, and a more pleasant experience. The only thing that changed that is cheap flights and high density passenger packaging.

If Virgin offered a regular steam train service alongside every electric service they currently run, same price, same accommodation, I'd say that the steam train would be far more popular with outside observers than with passengers, and tickets for the faster, quieter and less smelly electric option would outsell the steam engine by miles.

EVs are similar. An electric motor is much more suited to motivating a car than a petrol or diesel engine is. It's more reliable. It's more efficient. It's faster. It doesn't need gears. It hardly needs brakes. It's smaller and easier to package. It's the energy source - the batteries - that are less suited to a car than a tank of fuel - and part of that is familiarity and infrastructure, where fossil fuel is far more developed than battery charging.

Even EVO said it on their review of the Tesla 3. It's still fun, just fun in different ways. This whole idea that as soon as you put an electric motor and battery in a car it has to be as dull as a milkfloat is just closed-minded nonsense.

Your argument has pulled this out of context. Yes the typical driver is of course going to find an electric car more appealing in many ways, just as a typical passenger would prefer a modern train. But we're not typical drivers, we're enthusiasts that will spend a great deal more money on a car just because it makes a great noise.

Of course some of us will love the torque an EV has to offer and not be too bothered about the switch to EVs. But others of us (myself included) love the sound of an ICE and all the gear changing etc that goes with it. Whilst still offering some enjoyment, an EV is not going to be anything like as fun for people like me which was the point of the post.

[kiseca]

VeeFource said:

kiseca said:

VeeFource said:

Equus said:

VeeFource said:

There's a reason people pay £50 odd for their family to ride on a steam train. Despite outclassing a steam train I can't ever see that happening with one of these...

Last time I paid to ride on one of those, it cost me a fair bit more than £50 for the privilege, and that was just for me on my own.

I'm guessing you were using it to get somewhere rather than riding up and down the line for the fun of it?

There are only a handful of steam trains left in operation today. Most people have never travelled on one, and it has an attraction of being a new, novelty or just unfamiliar experience.

Back when steam trains were normal, people just rode them to get where they're going, much like they do today, and the (then) new electric trains were the novelty everyone wanted to try. Just like prop driven airliners like the Constellation have a romantic aura around them nowadays - I'd love to experience a flight in one - they were noisy, vibrating beasts. Jet airliners were simply faster, much smoother, quieter, and a more pleasant experience. The only thing that changed that is cheap flights and high density passenger packaging.

If Virgin offered a regular steam train service alongside every electric service they currently run, same price, same accommodation, I'd say that the steam train would be far more popular with outside observers than with passengers, and tickets for the faster, quieter and less smelly electric option would outsell the steam engine by miles.

EVs are similar. An electric motor is much more suited to motivating a car than a petrol or diesel engine is. It's more reliable. It's more efficient. It's faster. It doesn't need gears. It hardly needs brakes. It's smaller and easier to package. It's the energy source - the batteries - that are less suited to a car than a tank of fuel - and part of that is familiarity and infrastructure, where fossil fuel is far more developed than battery charging.

Even EVO said it on their review of the Tesla 3. It's still fun, just fun in different ways. This whole idea that as soon as you put an electric motor and battery in a car it has to be as dull as a milkfloat is just closed-minded nonsense.

Your argument has pulled this out of context. Yes the typical driver is of course going to find an electric car more appealing in many ways, just as a typical passenger would prefer a modern train. But we're not typical drivers, we're enthusiasts that will spend a great deal more money on a car just because it makes a great noise.

Of course some of us will love the torque an EV has to offer and not be too bothered about the switch to EVs. But others of us (myself included) love the sound of an ICE and all the gear changing etc that goes with it. Whilst still offering some enjoyment, an EV is not going to be anything like as fun for people like me which was the point of the post.

Yes you're right, from the EVO bit onwards I wasn't responding about the train comparison, I was just in general responding to the whole thread. I would say though that EVO are enthusiasts similar to the average person on PH, but individually I believe there is a wide spread among enthusiasts even on PH, when it comes to things about cars that we enjoy. For most, the noise is important, but for many it's not a deal breaker, and the vast majority of new cars available at any era don't sound that great anyway. For others, it's handling, roadholding, performance, feedback, and, as you say, working a gearbox. They all mix in different levels for different people, and apart from noise, EVs have potential advantages in all of those categories apart from (natural) noise and gearbox.

Even with the noise it has an advantage over the modern piped engine sound trend... you can make an EV sound like a Tie fighter if you wanted to. No need to hide nor enhance a throttled ICE note.

Evo like the 3 and found it an appealing car to the driver. Chris Harris felt the same years ago when he tested a Tesla Roadster, though his opinion on EVs cooled an awful lot by the time he got himself into an S.

There's potential there, not simply for the average buyer but for those of us who love to drive, too. At least, if any manufacturer decides to service that side of the market. Then it's just up to us to not dismiss it offhand as a milkfloat.

[marky911]

kiseca said:

Even EVO said it on their review of the Tesla 3. It's still fun, just fun in different ways. This whole idea that as soon as you put an electric motor and battery in a car it has to be as dull as a milkfloat is just closed-minded nonsense.

There’s always a barbed comment on the end of the pro-EV comments.
Anyone who doesn’t agree automatically subscribes to “close-minded nonsense”.
Funny.

For the record though, although no longer EVO staffers, Harris and Jethro both agreed in their recent podcast that unfortunately EVs are very much one trick ponies as far as exciting drivers cars go.
You get one and do the 0-60 in 2.5 seconds thing, then you’re left thinking, “What now?”

So I’m onboard regarding EVs being smooth, quiet forms of transport, but any argument for them not being dull is equally “nonsense” in my view.
Who wouldn’t be impressed by 0-60 in 2.5 seconds but how many EVs actually do that?
Apart from that though, then I can’t see any positives as far as driving for pleasure goes.

Transport, yes. Driving as an enthusiast, nope.

[Alextodrive]

warch said:

uncleluck said:

We need less people on the planet.

Are you volunteering to be one of them?

This made me laugh. And not at the OP for the record.

We all need to do so much more but these holier than thou parents with 3/4 kids in tow... wish that comment could be directed to them haha. Such a hypocritical situation when I hear people having more kids outnumbering themselves preaching.

Theyre a huge cause of the problems we face. More people is more resources, is more damage. Even if you’re vegan and walk everywhere, the damage we each do is vast.

Knock the population back to levels 100 years ago and you have a potentially manageable climate emergency. At current trends we have no almost no hope.

[Fittster]

Alextodrive said:

warch said:

uncleluck said:

We need less people on the planet.

Are you volunteering to be one of them?

This made me laugh. And not at the OP for the record.

We all need to do so much more but these holier than thou parents with 3/4 kids in tow... wish that comment could be directed to them haha. Such a hypocritical situation when I hear people having more kids outnumbering themselves preaching.

Theyre a huge cause of the problems we face. More people is more resources, is more damage. Even if you’re vegan and walk everywhere, the damage we each do is vast.

Knock the population back to levels 100 years ago and you have a potentially manageable climate emergency. At current trends we have no almost no hope.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Birth_rate

The problem with population isn't so much the birth rate as the attitude and actions of the old.

[jjwilde]

National Grid, tired yet again of the myths being posted by idiots have made ANOTHER post about how the grid will not collapse and that they can handle EVs.

https://www.nationalgrid.com/5-myths-about-electri...

[kiseca]

marky911 said:

kiseca said:

Even EVO said it on their review of the Tesla 3. It's still fun, just fun in different ways. This whole idea that as soon as you put an electric motor and battery in a car it has to be as dull as a milkfloat is just closed-minded nonsense.

There’s always a barbed comment on the end of the pro-EV comments.
Anyone who doesn’t agree automatically subscribes to “close-minded nonsense”.
Funny.

For the record though, although no longer EVO staffers, Harris and Jethro both agreed in their recent podcast that unfortunately EVs are very much one trick ponies as far as exciting drivers cars go.
You get one and do the 0-60 in 2.5 seconds thing, then you’re left thinking, “What now?”

So I’m onboard regarding EVs being smooth, quiet forms of transport, but any argument for them not being dull is equally “nonsense” in my view.
Who wouldn’t be impressed by 0-60 in 2.5 seconds but how many EVs actually do that?
Apart from that though, then I can’t see any positives as far as driving for pleasure goes.

Transport, yes. Driving as an enthusiast, nope.

It's hardly a reasoned, unbarbed comment to dismiss every electrically powered car, whether driven or not or even been designed yet or not, as a "milkfloat". If you simply cannot enjoy a car without any cylinders, I'm fine with that. But I didn't start with the barbs and insults.

[Scootersp]

M4cruiser said:

Harry H said:

Why would I care what the condition of the battery is as I'd be swapping it for another one 150 miles later. It wouldn't be "my battery" just "a battery"

Yes, that's the whole point of the "swappage" scheme - the battery has to be leased.
... and that's the problem, in the UK anyway, most buyers want one deal for the whole car, particularly when it comes to second hand ones, and they want to own the battery, either from the start of their used-car-ownership, or at the end of their HP deal.

If you can legislate out ICE powered cars then you could legislate for swappable batteries, or perhaps at least a universal add on type system, so you could get a top up battery (30miles or so) at a 'petrol' station and hop between these to get you home in an emergency?

[jamoor]

jjwilde said:

National Grid, tired yet again of the myths being posted by idiots have made ANOTHER post about how the grid will not collapse and that they can handle EVs.

https://www.nationalgrid.com/5-myths-about-electri...

I have to know who perpetuated these myths, they don't come out of nowhere.

The national grid literally have nothing to gain/lose by publishing that on their website.

[lotuslover69]

Problem is that lithium is a finite resource and whilst lithium production is set to triple by 2035 that simply isnt enough to keep up with demand. Lithium batteries will become far more expansive actually resulting in an increase in the price of Lithium based EV cars like Teslas. There are companies looking at alternative sources but the bottom line is that the 2035 date is a pipe dream. Not to mention the average owner of a tesla today needs to keep that car for a minimum of 5 years to offset the carbon footprint of a brand new ICE vehicle. If that person buys a new EV every 3 years they are actually creating more pollution.

Mining lithium is an extremely dirty process. Most likely some politicians have shares in a few lithium mining companies.

[TheOrangePeril]

lotuslover69 said:

the average owner of a tesla today needs to keep that car for a minimum of 5 years to offset the carbon footprint of a brand new ICE vehicle. If that person buys a new EV every 3 years they are actually creating more pollution.

Not really, as the used market then becomes less polluting as three year old Teslas take the place of three year old [insert marque here]'s.

A few people have mentioned shipping/aviation etc here. Of course it's an utter scandal how inefficient and polluting these sectors are allowed to be, dwarfing road emissions, but road traffic (cars/buses/LGVs/HGVs) account for about half of all oil use. If shipbuilders and aerospace companies are unable/unwilling to innovate quickly enough to reduce their astronomical emissions, regulating road traffic will will drastically reduce oil demand. Given that oil producers are finding it more and more expensive to extract the stuff, investment will drop with demand. Saudi Arabia are already pivoting away from their reliance on petrochemicals, more countries will follow. The over-extraction will fall away and gradually (and perhaps counterintuitively) prices will begin to rise in the same way that coal prices have since the turn of the millennium.

[RDMcG]

I worry that we will get into social acceptability before that...accusations of ruining the planet etc. Younger people as a whole seem to be less interested in cars, flock to cities, socialize on the web and so on. Walk to the pubs if they want to get smashed...no worries about a car. Cities continue to make driving miserable, cameras in lots of countries now, lots of green parties.

I have loved cars since childhood, could not wait to drive. My son drives but it is a functional experience. I have some sports cars, and he is utterly bored by them. I suspect that if he has a child the interest will be less.

SO...if there are regarded as smelly polluters, not thrilling to experience, and coming to the end of their innovation lives with gradually less investment from manufacturers, the ICE cars will decline themselves.

I still have the opportunity ( in non-pandemic times) to wander the long distances of North America, to go the the tracks, drive the autobahns, off-road in canyons, experience the sheer pleasure and satisfaction of driving vehicles made for their purpose. But it will not continue,.

Of course it may not be 2040, but even if it slips ten years it will be there. I am so glad of the cars I have owned and driven over decades, the great cars, the dreadful sheds, rust monsters, ghastly rentals, the trucks and so on. Things change. The car is 125 years old. 125 years before that it was about 1760 and George III ascended the throne...so I have no doubt that this is just another turn of history.

PH will be SolarHeads or the like.

[alishutc]

lotuslover69 said:

Problem is that lithium is a finite resource

Unlike, say, petrol?

There is not that much lithium in a lithium battery and right now as far as I know it is not considered economically viable to extract and reuse it when a battery reaches end of life. Presumably if it was in shorter supply that would change, it's not like it is actually consumed by the battery.

[Numeric]

I never really see myself as being part of a minority group, but I am.

It was almost the majority who used to smoke and were therefore treated lightly - but as the % declined and they became a clear minority it became acceptable to target them with legislation (rightly I feel) but it is the acceptability of the legislation that was the difference.

As car ownership has become general, that strange little core of us who 'enjoy' driving has become a much smaller %. Imagine everybody with a car was a car enthusiast legislation would have to be adapted - but they are not. Most tolerate driving and therefore want a vehicle that isolates them as much as possible from the experience (and allows them to text without the police seeing - sorry kidding but from my motorbike it sometimes looks that way)

So when us 'enthusiasts' write on sites like this that it is awful and the research is wrong and the use of speed is OK, its inappropriate use that causes trouble etc. etc - well it is the warbling of a minority that can be ignored be they right or wrong - so we will be ignored! The cars we drive may become automated travel pods and the sound of my BMW 6 reaching the red line a thing of the past. In a way we are like the smoker saying the effects of passive smoking are overplayed and why do they have to stand in the rain.

But it doesn't mean I don't get a tear in my eye as I look out at my little black beast...

[Niffty951]

Numeric said:

well it is the warbling of a minority that can be ignored be they right or wrong - so we will be ignored! The cars we drive may become automated travel pods and the sound of my BMW 6 reaching the red line a thing of the past.

I'm not sure great post is the right response for something that doesn't make me happy to read bot I agree with all you say.

I'm taking up smoking too

[Dannyf355]

Hopefully everyone on the forum will respond to the consultation.
I have, and have put my argument forward based upon
- The Environment (the lifecycle impact of EVs to produce and also what happens to the battery at its end). Sustainable power still has environmental impacts
- The Economy (the cost of new EV to high for most, too soon to tell on repair costs and what happens to the local garage trade
- A car enthusiast (buys a car is about head and heart and EVs are not addressing the heart yet)
- Choice (no one bans other significant carbon generators by: reducing the number of children, making us go vegan, stopping container and cruise ships, stopping flights other than for business)

if enough of people put their argument forward, it may have an impact, if we won't it will go ahead unchallenged.

[Rumblestripe]

I think we are already seeing the end of the ICE as personal transport. Look at the way in which ranges are being "rationalised". All this is doing is arguing over the date of the funeral.

I don't see any evidence to suggest that ICE vehicles will be banned from roads indeed as usage drops it may be permitted to run into central London once more? Like the steam engine before it, the ICE personal transport is headed for the museum and the enthusiast tinkerer. Places like Beaulieu and Beamish will have them polished and lined up and on high days and holidays they will start a few up so that parents can explain to their kids that these stinky old things were cool back in their day.

The world moves on.

[Gecko1978]

Niffty951 said:

Numeric said:

well it is the warbling of a minority that can be ignored be they right or wrong - so we will be ignored! The cars we drive may become automated travel pods and the sound of my BMW 6 reaching the red line a thing of the past.

I'm not sure great post is the right response for something that doesn't make me happy to read bot I agree with all you say.

I'm taking up smoking too

Its a bit like cycling, some people go on line read reviews debate 27inch v 29inch tyers shimano v Sram, hardtail or full mtb etc and yet most people just buy the red one in the shop that had 20% off.

Same with cars

[anonymous-user]

Dannyf355 said:

Hopefully everyone on the forum will respond to the consultation.
I have, and have put my argument forward based upon
- The Environment (the lifecycle impact of EVs to produce and also what happens to the battery at its end). Sustainable power still has environmental impacts
- The Economy (the cost of new EV to high for most, too soon to tell on repair costs and what happens to the local garage trade
- A car enthusiast (buys a car is about head and heart and EVs are not addressing the heart yet)
- Choice (no one bans other significant carbon generators by: reducing the number of children, making us go vegan, stopping container and cruise ships, stopping flights other than for business)

if enough of people put their argument forward, it may have an impact, if we won't it will go ahead unchallenged.

er, the problem is that as arguments go, yours simply doesn't hold water.....

1) a pure BEV, has a significantly lower overal carbon footprint than an ICE, both in terms of manufacture (when compared in like-for-like volumes) and in terms of in-use emisisons and consumption. In the UK, an BEV will reduce your transport carbon emissions by between 2.6 and 3 times right now, for NO OTHER CHANGE IN YOUR HABBITS OR MOVEMENTS. that is more than significant it's totally game changing.

2) If the alternative is to completely BAN private passenger cars (and it could be that this is the alternative when /if global warming starts to hit home at the "man-in-the-street" level then producing BEVs is very good for the economy, and certainly no worse than producing ICEs

3) Buying a car with your heart is fine, but irrelevant. We are talking about the future of mass public mobility, not the 0.001% of people who buy say an lotus elise. Once most private cars are EVs, you'll still be able to drive your elise for fun, just like you can drive a steam traction engine today or ride a horse if you want too.

4)It's an eroneous argument to suggest we shouldn't do something because something else happens. We worry about children being run over in our streetsdespite the fact that children also die of other causes, and likewise, we can't ignore the small (relatively) but significant impact private passenger cars make to our global emissions and enegy consumption.

[anonymous-user]

lotuslover69 said:

Problem is that lithium is a finite resource and whilst lithium production is set to triple by 2035 that simply isnt enough to keep up with demand. Lithium batteries will become far more expansive actually resulting in an increase in the price of Lithium based EV cars like Teslas. There are companies looking at alternative sources but the bottom line is that the 2035 date is a pipe dream. Not to mention the average owner of a tesla today needs to keep that car for a minimum of 5 years to offset the carbon footprint of a brand new ICE vehicle. If that person buys a new EV every 3 years they are actually creating more pollution.

Mining lithium is an extremely dirty process. Most likely some politicians have shares in a few lithium mining companies.

I feel than in a few years, posts like this ^^^ will be looked back upon and joked about. Like people posting "who needs a smart phone" or "that internet thing, pointless"....

It's also so hypocritical to be ridiculous. An BEV using a lithium based battery does indeed require lithium, but that lithium is not in anyway consumed by the process of actually using that battery. Your ICE uses a very finite resource (oil) and unlike the lithium in an battery, once you've burnt it, it's gone, for ever (and we increasingly understand that the rapid release of that carbon stored for hundreds of thousands of years is more likely than not going to have an impact on our enviroment)

And lets also get the silly "EVs have a higher manufacturing footprint" out of the way too. This is simply untrue because:

1) The early studies that suggested this were generally biased, and failed to include the entire chain of manufacturing steps for the ICE. If you think it's somehow more intensive to make battery (a highly parallel, fundamentally simple device with zero moving parts, ) than make an internal combustion engine (massively complex, ultra high grade materials, lots of complex processing and machining (you can make a battery in your kitchen, have a go at making say a crankshaft and get back to me....) then you are mistaken.

2) Studies compared low volume battery manufacturing with volume ICE manufacture. Needless to say the armotisation of overheads is totally volume dependant, as battery production has ramped up it has a lower overal footprint

3) It's easy to build a renewable powered battery factory than an renewably powered ICE factory because the battery processes are "Low level" they can be run at a lower power density, meaning solar and wind energy can be used to drive those processes. Something massive and high intensity such as an engine block casting factory is much harder to run from renewables because it requires much high power density

4) A buyer keeping a car for "X" years is irrelevant, it's the total useable life of the car that matters, and here the mechanically simply, easy to refurbish BEV has an huge advantage over the compex ICE. A 10 yo ICE with 150k miles on the clock is effectively worthless because it is worn out, or in fact even because it MIGHT be worn out, and the cost to refurbish it far outweighs it's value. A couple of roller bearings and a refurbished battery pack and the average EV will do another 150,000 miles.

5) we are in the early stages of BEV development. Unlike for heat engines, we are nowhere near the fundamental physical limits of the technology (a chemical battery can, thoretically be around 9 times more energy dense than it currently is for example) And whilst that technology will indeed take time to mature, it is POSSIBLE for it to mature.

6)a BEV is completely agnostic to where it's electricity comes from. Electricity is Electricity. You can charge your car from a coal powerstation, from solar, from wind, hell you could couple a generator to a bike and charge it yourself if you really wanted too! And as our electrical energy network "Greens" then every single BEV greens as well (unlike your ICE that gets (significantly) dirtier as it ages and wears out) Buy and BEV today, and in 10 years time and at 150,000 miles it'll have a lower environmental impact that it did the day you bought it!