When you have enough outages to warrant it's own website, like the San Francisco street turd tracker ap?
You know that page was a warning of things to come ... things that didn't come.
That's the number of people out in the state for any reason, not brown outs or rolling blackouts. California is currently at 0.035% of customers out. Some other states:
- Louisiana 0.0525%
- Minnesota 0.0609%
- South Dakota 0.1053%
- New Hampshire 0.1015%
- Vermont 1.4833%
Only it's not going to be just poor people is it? It's going to be everybody.
Why do you feel like it's different to pay for electricity than it is to pay for gas? It's all dollars, buddy. If you can't afford $50 worth of electricity, you can't afford $50 worth of gas.
What about the people who don't like to fly but prefer to drive and enjoy the freedom of being able to get into the car and drive anywhere in the continental US without stopping every 50 miles to spend time recharging?
You mean every 250 miles. That's a special use case, anyway. I take more road trips than anyone I know, and only about 5% of the miles I drive any given year are road trip miles. It's stupid to spend $3,000 extra on fuel every year to avoid paying $250 for a rental once or twice a year.
Electric cars are just another movement control measure.
There's nothing about electric cars that makes them more easily controllable than gas cars. In fact, it's more difficult to control because anybody with solar panels can fuel up. How many people have refineries on their roofs?
"C'mon man! Who really needs to drive more that
25250 miles from home without stopping for 30 minutes!"
FTFY
I admire you continued enthusiasm. But I am also old enough to know better. I was one of the first to consider adopting an electric vehicle and have been watching this technology since it first started to become commercially mature as a serious commercial product for the non-niche consumer. I would really like for your rosy view of the energy future of the US to be true.
They have yet to sufficiently address the energy production/delivery/density problems sufficiently to put my concerns to rest. And, unfortunately, in the face of the current direction of energy policy in this country, it doesn't look like they are going to in time for this to be a viable alternative to IC in our lifetimes.
They have yet to sufficiently address the energy production/delivery/density problems sufficiently to put my concerns to rest. And, unfortunately, in the face of the current direction of energy policy in this country, it doesn't look like they are going to in time for this to be a viable alternative to IC in our lifetimes.
There is no single fuel that's the "best" for all use cases. Not for automobiles, no for trucks, not for power plants, not for trains, or anything else.
The average American drives 14,263 miles per year, which is 55 miles per weekday. They can buy a Nissan Leaf with 240 miles of range for $34k ($26,500 after federal rebate). Even if that person drives double the average mileage they'll only need to charge every 4 days and it will waste less time than getting gas because they'll just let it fill up at home while they sleep. They won't have to stop on their way somewhere to do it. They will pay half the cost on average for fuel than they would for gas, and they don't have to get oil changes or brake jobs if they drive right. There's no engine air filters or spark plugs to replace.
If you need to drive more than ~400 miles in a day on a regular basis then electric cars aren't going to work well for you.
"They can buy a Nissan Leaf with 240 miles of range for $34k ($26,500 after federal rebate)." Uh-huh. "They" meaning "who" exactly? Using what for money? Getting loans from who? Making payments with what? Maybe back on your planet everything is rosy, but down here on Earth? Retailers are bitching that nobody's buying anything for Christmas. Gee. I wonder why. If Joe Lunchbox isn't buying little Billy a new bike or Suzie a new dolly for Christmas, do you really think that he's running right out to take on the payments for a new car? I've got a 30 year old Chevy pickup that I get offers on every other day. And it aint for it's looks.
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