Hope for the ICE lovers: https://www.carsguide.com.au/car-ne...4795-a314-77eb227667b6&utm_campaign=editorial
We're not dead yet
- Thread starter Kim Luck
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Problem with electric cars is not to do with the cars themselves but with the power available to recharge batteries. Some places like the EU could possibly tackle it given their extensive and efficient public transport network and power generation capacity but I don't see many other places where it would be feasible to have a majority of the transport switch to electric in the short term. Maybe Japan? Maybe the US (unlikely as it may be)?
So in my opinion ICE cars will continue until governments come up with more power generation. Which means there will be plenty of markets for these products. And I think pretty much every manufacturer has every reason to try and compete for a share of these markets if they want to make money.
So in my opinion ICE cars will continue until governments come up with more power generation. Which means there will be plenty of markets for these products. And I think pretty much every manufacturer has every reason to try and compete for a share of these markets if they want to make money.
I'm thinking that is exactly what my post was about. There will still be a market for ICE vehicles outside of the EU and the USA. Australia even!
I think the market will be quite a fair chunk of the world and it will include the US, Aus and Japan.
The RACQ have just released their monthly cost of owning various makes and models of cars. The cost of the cheapest electric is a good bit more than a medium size ICE SUV and the most expensive electric more expensive than a large ICE car. So electric will have to be cheaper to become affordable to the great unwashed. The fuel savings does not make up for the initial cost of the vehicle.
Without turning this into into an EV thread (they tend to have a limited lifespan on here
).I've read a few articles now where in the UK, US and some European countries (if you can't charge at home) just the electric "fuel" costs can exceed the cost of fueling up an equivalent ICE vehicle.
The RAC was pushing for the VAT to be lowered on public charging stations to make the cost of operating an EV more attractive to potential buyers. A shame they don't represent the vast majority of their members and push for a reduction in taxes on petrol and diesel as well.
Hi I am not surprised that people are planning on making ICE for some time. Indeed while I support the push to save the planet and our environment in any way we can, I just see so many ways people are dragging the chain and allowing big money to subvert the process.
When you look at how long it has taken 'us' to get onto some simple ideas and legislate for say, container recycling or banning single use plastic bags or even stopping clearing trees(while pretending to plant more ???), and observe the kick back on these 'easy' things it does not bode well for the big ideas.
We all need to step up and make our voice heard.
Jaahn
When you look at how long it has taken 'us' to get onto some simple ideas and legislate for say, container recycling or banning single use plastic bags or even stopping clearing trees(while pretending to plant more ???), and observe the kick back on these 'easy' things it does not bode well for the big ideas.
We all need to step up and make our voice heard.
Jaahn
I watched an article just yesterday that said just 13% of the plastics being collected for recycling in Australia are actually being recycled.
Too expensive to recycle compared to the low cost of making plastics from scratch.
That's precisely the key point for me. I'd like an EV but the cost simply doesn't work for us. I think they are mostly purchased by the affluent and the passionate, and good on them of course. Lower cost EVs are maybe coming (two Chinese brands come to mind). But low cost, secondhand EVs are not around yet, and then there's the issue of battery age. We don't do many high mileage trips (and most Australians are suburban, by a country mile, despite much noise about how big Oz is) so an EV would be ideal for most purposes for most people. Not all country folk can accomodate EV range and charging I agree.
However, we dispose of our cars rarely and on age not mileage and not on poor reliability either. Our #1 Scenic would logically be turned over at 20 years (in another 3-4 years perhaps) but there won't be a suitable second hand EV available I suspect. We'll see!
Right now the only current ICE vehicle that comes close to a Scenic is a Skoda Karoq!
There isn't an EV with a size and configuration that suits me at any price. Yet....
Interesting times.
Imagine if they battery makers paid the 'developing' countries a fair price for the raw materials so their workers could make a decent living and children could go to school
Global market mechanisms set the price of those materials. The folk in Oz who work for the mining industry (think lithium) are very well paid. So yes, I take that point very well but it isn't the battery makers who are necessarily to blame for exploitation in some developing countries. The battery makers are the consumers of the raw materials that other companies supply to the market (unless some of them are getting vertically integrated of course).Imagine if they battery makers paid the 'developing' countries a fair price for the raw materials so their workers could make a decent living and children could go to school
Who sets the global market and how is it set - rhetorical question.
I get your point John. Nevertheless if these people weren't exploited and the miners (look at them in Africa) wouldn't exploit and pass on their cost of fair adult workers wages then the price of batteries would naturally be more expensive.
Same goes for other commodities e.g. Cacao from west Africa etc.. Companies using the products e.g. Nestle blame others for the exploitation...
Perhaps she makes the point much clearer than i can:
I get your point John. Nevertheless if these people weren't exploited and the miners (look at them in Africa) wouldn't exploit and pass on their cost of fair adult workers wages then the price of batteries would naturally be more expensive.
Same goes for other commodities e.g. Cacao from west Africa etc.. Companies using the products e.g. Nestle blame others for the exploitation...
Perhaps she makes the point much clearer than i can:
Yes, no arguments there. We won't write what we might think of Nestle on this page..... Libel laws in Oz etc.
The greatest misfortune any poor country can have is to be blessed with rich natural resources. If its government tries to use its resources for the benefit of its people there will be no end of stories in western media about the horrible tyrant who rules and in no time a military intervention that causes massive deaths and puts the natural resources under the proper control of western companies. Iraq and Libya are fine examples. The people of Africa have had enough and are moving to throw western powers out and the South Americans are looking to control their own resources. Africa is rich in resources - that its people are so poor says something about exploitative economic relationships. Just because the western press declines to notice doesn't mean it doesn't happen. Internet is a great resource and gives voice to many alternative voices. The world is changing.
It's so hard to get the right combination of good governance and managing natural resources in a developing country. Dismally poor revenue from oil and gas in Oz is a perfect example in a way!!! Qatar gets far more revenue that we do and from a lesser export quantity. We are a developing country in some ways.
Mining, of which I have decades of experience in Oz and overseas, mostly requires the skills and capital resources of multi-nationals, not least to attract the necessary skilled personnel. Some mines in Indonesia really do use mostly local skills all the way up the organisation but many do not. Even if corruption were controlled, it's hard for such governments to use the resources, both as you suggest and as I'd like to see when the country's skills base is low, unless you can play a very long game indeed. China's done it well but might be going backwards at present.
Singapore's played the long game very well but they had a pretty good starting point, with a compact country and the largest naval dockyard in the southern hemisphere with management that didn't all leave at independence.
Not sure that Africa will be sanguine about the Chinese involvement instead of the traditional western colonial powers as time passes.....
Goodness, I could start a book ranting on this subject. Better stop and find some red wine.
Meanwhile in Eastern Europe and my Polish relatives must be laughing at the "Free World", more a certainty.
The mighty Fiat 126
With 4.5 million made and so many still on the road.
All parts still available.
80% of all auto pollution is in the manufacturing process.
This fact seems lost on politicians and environmentalists.
The whole idea of what is needed and sustainability is being ignored.
I used to put $15 or a couple of gallons a week to travel the 70 klms to work.
Grafted a Renault 10 distributor in and it went better still.
Yes I've had a couple of the mighty FSM Nikis.
My old job of 26 years was a 20km round trip on almost dead flat country roads.
The 650cc twins used less fuel than the motorbikes I had at the time.
A bit warmer in winter as well.
Would be interesting to post some links.Without turning this into into an EV thread (they tend to have a limited lifespan on here
I've read a few articles now where in the UK, US and some European countries (if you can't charge at home) just the electric "fuel" costs can exceed the cost of fueling up an equivalent ICE vehicle.
The RAC was pushing for the VAT to be lowered on public charging stations to make the cost of operating an EV more attractive to potential buyers. A shame they don't represent the vast majority of their members and push for a reduction in taxes on petrol and diesel as well.
There's a video channel on youtube (not sure, either Aging Wheels or Technology connections?) where you can watch a video about en entire trip across America in a Hyundai electric and they actually measure everything (energy used, etc and cost) and it's not higher than petrol. Many public charging stations used along the way, mostly fast chargers.
See here, minute 12 or so for statistics:
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