Perpetual Innovation

Category: EV

  • EV v ICE, What’s the Price?

    EV v ICE, What’s the Price?

     Every couple months something pops into my news feed or email about how bad or expensive Electric Vehicles (EVs) are compared to the olde Internal Combustion Engine (ICE machines).  (See cartoon from Yale Climate Connection Don’t be fooled: Electric vehicles really are better for the climate.)

    One that popped up was from a very biased web site (can’t call it a magazine or journal). The cost for EVs to operate were $17 per gallon, equivalent. It relied on an actual study, and then changed out all the facts.

    First, it assumed that you only charge away from home, never at home where it’s much cheaper. Some 99% of EVs are charged at home or (free? at the office) almost all the time. By this assumption, it would assume that the home did not use solar panels which would make the home charging costs even cheaper. Then, they added in all possible externalities for EVs including government subsidies. Wah-la, the magical cost per gallon for EVs is 5 to 8 times ICE machines. (non-news site intentionally not cited)

    Why then, wouldn’t the ICE machine side of the equation include government subsidies to oil and gas. Several studies show that coal, oil & gas get at least $1T in subsidies every year, and the equivalent of about $15T including indirect subsidies and extenalities. 

    If you really want to know the comparison between EVs & ICE vehicles, look at  SkepticalScience: https://skepticalscience.com/evs-really-better-climate.html  … they provide some of the best sources and best analysis. Because of the cost of production (an EV can weigh twice an ICE because of the batteries), it takes about 22 months before breakeven — emissions-wise. But after that the emissions are massively less for the EV. Figure about $1 per gallon equivalent.

    If you want to do an analysis of an EV and an ICE machine, consider how you will use the vehicle and check out these sources. 

    Total Cost of Ownership is a big question as well. The raw materials to make each type of car, where it is made, shipping, etc. There are a few sources that work on this. (Sites/sources on lifetime costs tend to be overly simplified or overly complicated.)

    Dealers don’t like EVs because there’s not really any maintenance. No urgent need to see the customer every 6 months to 1 year. No oil to change, no belts to replace. Only fill the windshield washer tank. The brakes have low usage because of regenerative power is used to slow the vehicle by generating power back to the batteries. The dealers will continue to lose touch with their customers, and the trade-in that comes with it.

    But the big reason for going EV is making a conscious and continuous effort to move away from fossil fuels. Fossil fuels are not sustainable. The air pollution from burning coal, oil and gas causes health issues and premature deaths of millions of people worldwide every year.  To move toward sustainable solutions, we have to move away from those that aren’t. 

    Two points that often come up is: 1) Renewable Energy (RE); and, 2) electric mix for the power grid and sources of materials like lithium & cobalt for EV. Renewable energy is growing at crazy rates and it is consistently far cheaper (even with battery augmentation) than coal, oil or nuclear. Battery technology (and such) will continue to improve, much like computer chips and hard drives. Products continue to be built with full life cycle designs so the materials in EVs will (soon) be completely recycled. 

    We need to electrify everything to reduce pollution and greenhouse gases. It took 120 years to build a world economy powered by coal, oil, gas, nuclear and hydro. Over time we need to completely replace fossil fuels. Many people thought we could simply wait until we started to exhaust the (readily available) supplies of fossil fuels and high prices would recalibrate the economy toward more sustainable methods of power and transportation. Waiting another 20, or even 5 years, to act is no longer an option.

    #EV #BreakingTheICE #Renewables #RE100 #CarbonEmmissions #CarbonFootprint

  • Earth Day 2022 Who Killed the Electric Car?

     Earth Day 2022 (April 22, ’22) Who Killed the Electric Car?

    The statistics and the forecasts for Global Warming and
    Climate Change are increasingly dire. The decision – and it is a decision – to do
    business as usual (buy big gas guzzlers) is becoming increasingly costly to the world. And the window to avoid
    the worst warming scenarios is closing. The CO2 and methane that we have been
    pumping into the atmosphere will persist for decades (centuries really)
    continuing to heat a warming world.

    On that note, a documentary is in order for Earth Day 2022, Who
    Killed the Electric Car     (2006). Read about it on Wikipedia,
    watch on many venues including IMDb and Prime Video. It pretty much describes the methods of
    Big Tobacco in its hay day, and the methodology adopted by oil companies for
    about a century. Lots of celebrities. Hard to find a single factoid that is not true.

    General Motors was starting to be very successful with its
    electric car in 2005, rolling it out to meet the aggressive zero emissions vehicle
    (ZEV) standards that California was phasing in at the time. The standard,
    appropriately call CARB, was suddenly watered down and phased out, with both
    the state of California (Schwarzenegger)
    and the Federal government (Bush) chasing after a shiny object: Hydrogen. Cool technology, but… Hydrogen is still not here, and will probably never be truly competitive for most applications.

    GM (and the other Big Autos) killed off their EVs. In GMs
    case, the recalled them all back from their leases (not renewing) and crushed
    them all (but 1). If GM had stayed with their EV program they would have been
    in the same market position as Tesla is now, only 15 years earlier.  GM bought controlling position in a wonderful
    battery technology that would have given the EV 200+ mile range (vs 60 for the antiquated
    lead battery technology they were implementing). But that battery was never
    utilized. This controlling stake in the battery company was later sold to …
    Chevron!

    The documentary investigates who were the murders of the EV
    and who were the accomplices. But the obvious victims are the general public
    and, of course, the environment! We continue to be addicted to oil. Ukraine is
    a stark reminder of what the power bought with oil revenues can do.

    For now, drive less. Plan for a small vehicle. Make sure
    your next vehicle is either electric of plug-in- electric hybrid.

    As we celebrate Earth Day of 2022, think about how easily
    the citizens can be manipulated away from objectives that are better for the
    world into paths that are only good for monopolies and the ruthless.

    Please let us know if there is anything that is factually untrue. Also, are the conclusions sound?

    #EV #PHEF #WhoKilledTheElectricCar #GlobalWarming #ClimateChange #EarthDay

     

  • The EV Hurricane Disaster: a 1-sided scenario, part 2

    Read  The
    EV Hurricane Disaster: a 1-sided scenario     on our sister blog
    ScenarioPlans.com (also DelphiPlan.com). The EV disaster article analyzes a viral email
    that talks about how horrible it will be when a hurricane is storming into a
    population center and the electric vehicles are all stuck on the road with no
    possibility for charging.

    The unauthored and undated email makes the implied conclusion
    that we shouldn’t go to EVs because they could be problematic in a disaster, stuck in a mass exodus from a hurricane with dying batteries and no place to charge.

    There are at least three scenarios for analysis in that
    ScenarioPlans article (part 1). One is related to disaster planning related to
    EVs. Two is related to insisting on comparisons with “business as usual”
    comparisons so the non-sustainable and broken business models do not somehow
    become the gold standard. Three is combating bias and taking away the power
    from misinformation.

    It would be interesting to work through the scenario of a
    future with mostly EVs. That may be at best 30 years from now because of the
    time to turn over the existing internal combustion (ICE) fleet of vehicles. The
    average age of cars on road is currently 11 years.  In 2022 there will probably be only 5% new electric.
    It will take decades, under any EV adoption rate for EVs to overtake ICE
    machines.

    You first have to envision what the infrastructure will be
    in the future. (This, as we currently are building lots of large gas stations
    for gas and diesel, phasing out the small gas stations.) It would be reasonable
    to assume that all gas stations would start to add in charging stations in a few
    years.

    But with millions of people and businesses having charging stations,
    there should be no reason that those charging locations could not be
    incorporated to the charging grid options.  If the businesses and homes had solar (and
    battery backup) the resilience could be impressive. With solar and wind, many
    areas could have plenty of electricity for personal and commercial EV use
    indefinitely. No oil tankers needed.

    I’m thinking of kind of an Air B&B for charging, maybe
    and Air Charge & Go (Air C&G). Any superstore or parking lot with
    charging stations could offer to charge (pun intended) the mass exodus of EVs.

    Of course, we might be trying to find a solution to a
    problem that does not exist. In 30 years, the batteries and the charging
    technology will be much better. So, it may only take 5 to 10 minutes to charge
    (say 70%), not that much longer than it takes a car to get gas. And
    transporting gas around during disasters has its own set of problems.

    About 8% to 10% of the world’s economy is embedded directly
    and indirectly in energy, most of which is fossil fuels. All this money funds
    countries that are ruthless and unfriendly to us, as well as companies that
    have generally demonstrated a disregard for people, society, and the
    environment. Plus, fossil fuels are unsustainable. Period. Somehow, we have
    come to think of the broken business model of fossil fuels as “normal”. If it
    is not sustainable, then “business as usual” is not a viable option; yet in
    scenario planning, you should probably consider fossil fuels the “base case”.
    Shell has been a leader in scenario planning, including the energy future
    (check out Scenarios
    and The Energy Future from Shell    ).

    Recession has winners and losers, destructive innovation.
    An energy revolution will have winners and losers. There will be lots and
    lots of good paying jobs (in hydro, wind and solar). But there will be ongoing
    pain to the fossil fuel economy. Workers in mines and on rigs will have to
    transition. Investors will lose money as oil companies go out of business.
    Governments will have to pick up the expenses of hundreds of years of mines,
    pipes, refineries, and tanks. Orphaned wells are already a huge problem; many,  if not most, are leaking or will leak in the
    future.

    Of course, fear and uncertainty is actually the point of
    many of the misinformation initiatives. Imagine what happens to Russia, Saudi
    Arabia and oil companies when (not if) we get off of our addition to oil. Russia
    could no longer do as much mischief around the world when the major source of
    government funding (oil exports) dries up. Iran’s funding for nuclear weapons
    and terrorism would dry up… etc…

    So, when a one-sided meme or email comes flittering across
    your screen that trashes a renewable, ask them where is the other half of the
    discussion. No one would send out only one side of a discussion or a one-sided
    debate. And certainly no one would want to perpetuate one-sided propaganda? Right?
    !:-)

    #ScenarioPlans #BrokenBaseCase #Sustainability #EVs #100RE

  • Sustainability and the Future of Self-Driving Cars and EVs

    IntellZine
    just wrote an article on how to     Invest in the Future of Self-Driving Cars
    and EVs (    https://www.intellzine.com/2020/12/invest-in-future-of-self-driving-cars.html).


    What’s not really covered is the
    Sustainability of EVs, self-driving cars etc. Internal combustion engines predominantly
    use fossil fuels but they can use renewable ethanol or biodiesel. Electric cars
    have the most promise because it is much easier to produce electricity from
    renewable sources like hydro, wind and solar. Plus, wind and solar have become
    the best and cheapest source of stationary electricity, even considering the impact
    of batteries.

    But one mobile power method that is
    not considered as much is hydrogen. In terms of stationary electricity, fuel
    cells can be used for emergency backup power (nearly instant on) and/or for
    continuous power. Although there are lots of ways to make hydrogen, all you
    really need is energy and water. (How to get hydrogen from Energy.Gov.)
    Currently, the most common method, by far is from NatGas or Ammonia.

    Fuel cell has interesting solutions
    to the battery problems, especially for range extension. Plus, hydrogen filling
    stations are being added along major routes, but nothing like electric charging and NatGas (see chart here). As the IntellZine article
    discussed, some of the fuel cell companies have gone up wildly over the last 6
    months, especially Plug. Plug (PLUG) built its business on fuel cell forklifts;
    a super clean and very efficient approach. Investors might be looking at the
    future markets for fuel cell and pricing for it. Or, they might simply be
    wrong.

  • EV on SB2020

    EVs, aka Electric Vehicles, were the big winners of the
    Super Bowl 2020. Everybody had an electric car for the occasion. Audi and even
    a new EV version of the gas-guzzling Hummer.
    Imagine the king of EVs, Tesla,
    jumping $130 per share on Super Monday! TSLA popped 20% up to almost $800 per
    share, nearing a $150B market cap firmly – 3 times the value of GM. Then on
    Super Tuesday, Tesla jumps another $100 to reach over $900 (to $164B market
    cap). Arguably, there are a few extra factors making Tesla’s stock pop: an
    upgrade and short squeeze. Maybe a little overpriced?
    Tesla has a market share of about
    1.5%, so… it does have room to run. But only if you believe that we have
    reached an inflection point where a shift to most or all cars will be electric.
    Fortunately, the charging stations are now pretty will established.
    But, the average age of cars on
    the road today are 11 years old. Even if we move to 50% EV in 10 years, it will
    take decades for half of the cars on the road to be electric. Longer, of course,
    for trucks because they are just now starting to ship.
    Still, the trend toward EVs is
    definitive. Everyone has a few. Some auto manufactures are no longer
    introducing new gas or diesel models.
    You would think that the drop of
    oil prices (down to $50 for WTI) this week on the corona virus scare might be a
    boost to gas models?
    Related to market cap, remember
    that Tesla bought sister company Solar City so it does solar systems and
    battery banks (PowerWall). Tesla GigaFactories crank out batteries (with
    partner Panasonic). With the cost of batteries dropping, both EV and storage
    become more and more affordable. The big thing to look for in battery
    technology is the move to safer and/or more powerful technology. Big break
    throughs in battery tech – cheaper, better, lighter – will be game changing.
    Tesla stands to win in every case, old lithium or new whatever.
    I could not bring myself to buy
    Tesla stock at $200 in June; over $900 is nose-bleed levels today. But, it does
    suggest a momentum shift to EVs in our future.