- mysteryhumpf@feddit.orgEnglish7 days
Burning gas is so extremely bad that even throwing away your old ICE car and buying a new electric car is better than driving the ICE car until it „falls apart“. This was the research finding in Switzerland, but this result was so unwelcome that the research got hidden away. https://www.republik.ch/2025/06/11/amtliche-selbstzensur
- GalacticRobot@lemmy.worldEnglish7 days
Everytime you bring it up, you get a whole lot of people with gasoline powered cars getting very angry. Sure batteries are not ‘perfect’, but they are a whole lot better in almost every way compared to gasoline powered vehicles.
- CADmonkey@lemmy.worldEnglish7 days
The anger is less about how bad EV’s are and more about being expected to buy a hilariously expensive EV when someone has a perfectly functional car. Make them cheaper and people will buy them, because other than the environmental aspect EV’s just require less maintenance overall, making them cheaper to run.
- AA5B@lemmy.worldEnglish6 days
Even in the US, there are now a handful of EVs that are price competitive. For example I believe Equinox EV is similar price to Equinox ICE
- kent_eh@lemmy.caEnglish6 days
But I don’t want the EV equivalent of an Equinox, I want the EV equivalent of a base model Corolla.
- AA5B@lemmy.worldEnglish6 days
Chevy Bolt? I don’t know anything about it and didn’t bring it up since there’s no direct comparison to highlight price competitiveness. However it’s a reasonably priced vehicle marketed as a value for basic transportation.
But yeah everyone wanted to follow the Tesla model of starting out with expensive models serving a small niche. That worked for Tesla when there was no market, but you can’t expect to copy the approach that established the market when you’re trying to break into an existing market. Legacy manufacturers were stupid for trying so of course never reached the scale for profitability. But then they gave up before pivoting to affordable vehicles, and politics broke everything …… we know there are plenty of affordable value-priced EVs in the world, just not in the US due to politics and legacy inertia.
- FiskFisk33@startrek.websiteEnglish7 days
oh wow I didn’t know that!
would make sense to give more a lot incentives for EV buying if so!
- fulg@lemmy.worldEnglish7 days
I wish they weren’t so expensive though.
IMO the biggest incentive of all is that the battery exists for the life of the vehicle and can be recycled at the end (the lithium inside does not disappear!), vs the gas which is literally burning money away.
- innermachine@lemmy.worldEnglish7 days
That and there’s only so much gas, once we burn it all up it’ll take millions of years to replenish. Yea, you could say the same about battery materials, but those get reused for what a decade before they start to degrade? And the actual energy is free once we have the means to harvest it (wind, solar etc are all “free” infinite energy so long as we have the panels and turbines)
- Yaztromo@lemmy.worldEnglish5 days
“Degrade” doesn’t mean “dead”. Once a battery pack has lost sufficient capacity to run your car, it will still have a ton of capacity for other applications. If you’re setting up some grid-scale battery storage, if you can get used packs cheaply enough why would you care that they only hold 70% of a charge? If you can buy two (or more) for the price of a single new battery pack you’re coming out way, way ahead.
And even if you then run those until they only hold 20% charge, it’s likely not all of the individual pack cells are evenly holding charge — some are likely going to be much better than others. So you can remove the “better” cells and reuse those in other applications. At once point in Japan Nissan was selling home power packs from reclaimed Leaf cells from “dead” battery packs.
It’s only once the cells get so bad they can’t be used anymore that you have to worry about recycling them. At that point recycling will likely become a closed loop (as it is with lead for lead acid batteries) — you no longer have to mine more lithium, as the cheapest source of lithium will be from dead cells.
We will eventually get to a virtuous cycle with these cells, but it’s going to take quite a while. Most of the EV cells manufactured to date are still in cars on the road. I wouldn’t expect to see significant recycling until maybe 2035 or 2040 at the current rate.
- innermachine@lemmy.worldEnglish5 days
Those are great points! My co worker had a beater prius he bought for 500 bucks a while ago, “dead battery”. He opened up the pack and found 1 or 2 bad cells, replaced them and had a sick commuter! (Granted it looked like previous owners slid cardboard boxes on every flat surface and paint was thrashed) He drove it for years before selling it. Goes to show how far a little elbow grease will go. Believe the previous owner was trading it in because of high cost of replacement pack since a lot of people couldn’t be bothered to open them up! I had not thought about using degraded packs as home storage, that’s an excellent idea. One of these days I want to set up some solar and a battery bank to reduce my grid dependency, and as a bonus have power if we loose grid in a storm. I actually just had a few days of no power due to a rare tornado around here …
- Yaztromo@lemmy.worldEnglish3 days
I firmly believe home battery is going to become much more prevalent as more and more used EV batteries become available. Based on current driving patterns and what we know about modern EV battery chemistries, packs should still have a lot of good life in them once the rest of the EV has rusted away. Even a pair of 75kWh battery packs that have lost 25% of their capacity (which is quite a lot) is enough to run my home for 6 days. Assuming they’re relatively cheap re-purposing batteries in this way becomes a no brainer.
One thing I’m curious to see is what the market is going to be like for used EV motors. While they can be put to a ton of industrial uses as motors, as they are also configured for regen you could do things like re-use them for power generation. If you live on a property with a decently flowing stream, you could pretty easily wire up an EV motor to generate electricity. Or maybe with the right gearing use them in a windmill. I suspect they’ll find way more uses as motors, but I’m hoping we see enterprising hobbyists find cool ways to re-use them for generating electricity.
Exciting times are ahead — better EV adoption could have a very long tail in terms of how it changes our society (for the better).
- brb@sh.itjust.worksEnglish7 days
Yea, you could say the same about battery materials, but those get reused for what a decade before they start to degrade?
Isn’t lithium infinitely recyclable?
- innermachine@lemmy.worldEnglish7 days
I have heard that! But it’s on the consumers to ensure they get the old packs to a place that can recycle them. Just like with existing car parts I imagine the suppliers could put a big core charge on replacement battery packs to ensure the old ones are returned for remanufacture.
- GalacticRobot@lemmy.worldEnglish7 days
That and there’s only so much gas, once we burn it all up it’ll take millions of years to replenish.
Umm, AFAIK, we actually can’t make more oil, so there isn’t going to be any more gas, just work harder to find what’s left. We absolutely should be moving to alternative energies to power civilization.
- innermachine@lemmy.worldEnglish7 days
When I say millions of years I mean the plankton and our decomposing bodies will eventually make some oil, but by then our planet will be gone anyways lol. I’m sure human civilization won’t make it to see any more oil produced
- innermachine@lemmy.worldEnglish7 days
Socialize losses, privatize gains. I don’t want my tax money incentivizing some rich asshole to buy an EV. Nobody that needs help buying a car can even consider an EV, their too expensive. The cheapest ev u can buy in USA is 30k, the cheapest ICE is 22k. And people that need help buying cars can’t afford either. Only middle class + people are buying these things, and they don’t need poor people’s tax money to subsidize their purchase from a private corp. I’m all for evs but let’s be honest the people buying them DONT need help buying them. Id rather see my tax money go toward renewable infrastructure or research on batteries and such! We can’t keep relying on the private industry to fund research, in technology or in medicine or any science imo. But that’s just my angry fist wagging opinion as somebody who refuses to spend more than 3k on a car because I’m not made of money. I’m not exactly poor, I’m a home owner under 30 and make around 60-70k a year depending on OT and bonuses. But if I went and got a loan on a Chevy bolt for 30k I would not be able to make my mortgage payments even with subsidies, so why should somebody who makes more get help buying a new car? Horseshit
- LincolnsDogFido@lemmy.zipEnglish7 days
Have you never heard of financing? I make $50,000 a year and bought a used EV. The only reason I was able to was because of rebates offered by IL-EPA. If not for the rebate, I’d still be driving an ICE vehicle and paying $50/wk on gasoline.
- innermachine@lemmy.worldEnglish7 days
I have heard of financing. My buddy is currently on his way to paying 32k for a 15k car lmfao. The bank already owns my house, they don’t need to own my transportation too. I spend 40 or so a week on gas during the winter, but in the summer I ride motorcycles every day so my fuel cost is 12-20 a week for 8 or so months of the year! No car payment is going to be cheaper than the transport I own cash right now, simple as that. I have too many bills and shits too expensive to incur another monthly payment!
- GalacticRobot@lemmy.worldEnglish7 days
This isn’t exactly correct or truthful. A new EV Bolt is only $4k more than a new Camry, and that difference is quickly made up from the gas saving, especially when gas is $4+ a gallon.
And when you want to accelerate adoption of something, you incentivize it. The US already spends $40+ billion in direct subsidies for oil (https://www.americanprogress.org/article/5-hidden-ways-the-government-rigs-the-market-in-favor-of-fossil-fuels/) Imagine instead of giving that to oil companies, you used that to accelerate the development of EV’s and their roll out.
- innermachine@lemmy.worldEnglish7 days
A comparison of subsidized oil would better be served by having the government subsidize clean energy production and infrastructure. It’s not like the government is handing out subsidies to buy gas cars 🤷♂️
- bequirtle@lemmy.worldEnglish7 days
I don’t want my tax money incentivizing some rich asshole to buy an EV
I mean… why not? I’d like if every rich guy had an EV instead of ICE. Less pollution is less pollution
- innermachine@lemmy.worldEnglish7 days
They have the money to buy an EV, rich people don’t need my tax money to subsidize their purchase. If the EV is that much less appealing than an ice car, then the EV is not ready for market yet! Subsidizing their purchase of a quasi luxury barge that happens to be electric is just giving money to the elite class on both ends at the expense of the proletariat. Encourage the production of affordable, cheap even EVs and infrastructure not 50k+ leather wrapped battery packs on tires lol
- ebc@lemmy.caEnglish7 days
“rich people” in your mind is who, exactly? Here in Canada only cars below a certain MSRP qualify for subsidies, so “luxury barges” are not subsidized. Also, a $50K car is not luxury anymore, have you seen car prices recently? New ICE cars are expensive as hell too!
- innermachine@lemmy.worldEnglish7 days
I’m talking about people making into the 6 figures, they don’t need help from subsidies to buy cars. That’s just giving well to do people money to give to rich corpos 🤷♂️ but ur absolutely right all new cars are getting too damned expensive!
6 daysDepends where you live, 6 figures is the minimum in some places for single income earners let alone households. For example im working for a company that has a lot going on in Boston, the only way the math maths for me to live there, within 30 minutes commute is about 200k a year, budgeting about $600 a month for a car payment. And about 5-6k in mortgage. Plus utilities are insane so there goes another 500-600 a month. (Probably depends a bit on neighborhood, but thats what some of my coworkers were complaiming about) and food is about 50-60% more expensive my spouse covers that so not sure the cost, id guess for the 3 of us round about another 600-700 in groceries plus say another 200 or so for eating out, so yeah… 6 figures doesnt mean much in terms of real purchasing power the rest going into repairs for cars, home stuff thats inevitably broken in those 70+ yr old houses selling for over a mil. Thats the napkin math, exact math, and budgeting for things like PCs, savings, etc… not included.
But point being 6 figures doesnt mean well off depending on where that 6 figures is being made. Sure id live like a walking middle age crisis on 100K in the middle of nowhere, but middle of nowhere isnt going to be offering 100k
- AA5B@lemmy.worldEnglish6 days
They do if you want to accelerate adoption. People who can afford to pay more have the same disincentives as you do. Why should they pay more? We know EVs are a huge improvement and worth it when the climate is considered, so need to encourage faster adoption.
Think of it more as exploiting them. Pay a little money for some rich assholeto spend more establishing the market for you. The biggest impediment to lower cost is scale: as long as legacy manufacturers can’t scale production they can’t lower prices enough to establish the market. Incentives are the way out
I’d recommend buying used over new. Before Iran war bolts were going for $12k
- innermachine@lemmy.worldEnglish7 days
That’s still 4 times more than I have spent on my last 12 cars with exception of one crazy nice Audi I had that ran me 7500 lol. And I regret spending that much on a car, despite loving the 400hp fire breathing V8 under the hood. I honestly mainly drive motorcycles, which has been the cheapest way for me to reduce my carbon footprint. I get over 50 mpg on my cruiser and near 80 on my dual sport, and both my motorcycles + my Subaru + my jeep all cost less than one POS chevy bolt LOL. I understand I’m a special case because I work on my vehicles so it’s very cheap for me to own a beater, if I didnt have the ability to make all my own repairs and have shop cost on parts and stuff i might consider an EV more strongly but its just way too expensive for now even factoring in what i spend on fuel and repairs.
- AA5B@lemmy.worldEnglish6 days
Seems like EV incentives would be a great help for a purchaser like you. As long as EVs are a niche product for the motivated few, there won’t be much of as used market. The fastest way to develop a healthy used market is higher growth for new cars, then wait a few years. Incentives goose the market for new, but also lay the groundwork for a larger used car market in a few years
- innermachine@lemmy.worldEnglish6 days
I suppose ur right about that. Of all the things for me to complain about my tax money going to, EV incentives should be pretty low on the list lol.
- feannag@sh.itjust.worksEnglish6 days
Where the heck do you live where you can get a car for 3-4k? Last car I bought was 10k for 130,000 miles on it and the one car I saw for 5k was high mileage, absolutely disgusting on the inside, and false advertised to the point that I could not trust it didn’t have major issues.
- innermachine@lemmy.worldEnglish6 days
If you want a good car under 3 grand it takes elbow grease. My current Subaru I bought for 3k, I used the proceeds from my previous vehicle to purchase. My previous vehicle was a 800$ Xterra, blown radiator but ran. Did water pump, timing belt, radiator, thermostat, valve cover gaskets and a set of tires + ac high pressure line. That was just under a grand, so into for 1800ish and sold for 2800. Before that I had a e36 that I bought for 2500 bucks needed cooling system work as well, put like 600 bucks of parts in it and beat the fucking brakes off it clutch kicking and drifting all over creation from 140k -> 200k miles and sold for 2500. My 87 jeep was 1500 bucks with a cracked head on a 4.2 carbed amc engine because somebody left water in it over winter, 3 speed automatic. Got a 70k miles engine, 5 speed manual and transfer case out of an 02 for 800 bucks (pulled myself out of a rotted tj, brought over the PCM and wiring harness as well and merged harnesses) and stabbed that in. Had to fabricate my own transmission mount and skid plate for it and after a set of used 33s, winch, etc I’m into it for about 4k. All of these vehicles have been rot free, and purchased all in New England! If you ever want tips on finding a good cheap vehicle, and tips on how to make repairs feel free to reach out. Shits too expensive to gate keep knowledge these days, and the only way to cheap transport is to buy broken and put some sweat equity in. Of course I enjoy this shit so it’s easier for me to spend weekends bruising knuckles and hanging parts than somebody doing purely out of necessity! I have owned 6 motorcycles, only one of them cost me more than 1k. All were purchased as heaps and revived then sold for a mint. If your able bodied and broke you have nothing but opportunity just gotta dial a skill in and get after it!
- AA5B@lemmy.worldEnglish7 days
There’s more reason to incentives than to “help people who can’t afford new”
- the faster we develop an EV market, the sooner and cheaper used EVs will be available
- the incentives get us to price parity sooner, so encourage people who don’t want to spend extra, whether they can or not
- the faster market transition encourages investment in chargers. If you couldn’t be confident in a fast growing market why would you invest in chargers?
- the faster market transition encourages and supports legacy manufacturers investing in new technology
EVs are inevitable, but we need to be encouraging a faster transition for environmental reasons. But the incentives were at least as much about trying to save legacy manufacturers as they were about encouraging consumers down that path.
Note that as soon as the US stopped incentives, legacy manufacturers withdrew from the EV market. Some were just reaching price parity, such as Chevy Equinox, but the few remaining choices will never have the volume to be profitable. Now they’re heavily protected, at the cost of less choice and much higher prices for all Americans, but that can’t last forever and they appear to be digging their own graves
- innermachine@lemmy.worldEnglish7 days
While I agree with you, roll back of regulations has also contributed. For example the hemi was going to get killed but now their coming back, diesel emissions have lightened up, and epa no longer cares about the Greenhouse Gas Endangerment Finding and repealed it. There has been a LOT of factors this administration has changed that made EV less appealing and shifted us back to high pollution combustion and shitty refrigerants. I’m not convinced ev subsidies are the way forward, we need better renewable infrastructure to properly fuel our EVs and i think that should be funded by our tax dollars rather than hoping that if more people have evs more private corps will build the infrastructure for it. That’s like encouraging building trains without any tracks to ride on! Plus renewable infrastructure isn’t just for evs, that will help make all our homes greener too!
- Hadriscus@jlai.luEnglish7 days
As long as both use tires that contribute 45% of the world’s microplastics, this is focusing on the wrong issue
https://pubs.acs.org/doi/10.1021/acs.est.3c05002
So I say, let’s not get distracted
- innermachine@lemmy.worldEnglish7 days
For personal transportation do you have an alternative to tires? I mean shit even bicycles contribute to this. I know the answer is better public transport, but for PERSONAL transport it’s pretty hard to avoid tires!
- VibeSurgeon@piefed.socialEnglish7 days
The amount of tyre wear pollution from a bicycle is negligible, to the point where they are not even worth mentioning in these types of conversations.
- innermachine@lemmy.worldEnglish7 days
Kind of like how it’s not worth mentioning tire micropalstics in a discussion about EV vs ICE emissions?
- Hadriscus@jlai.luEnglish7 days
I mean, it’s an existential threat. It doesn’t really matter what’s required to make it stop -it’s necessary.
Yes it does require a transformation of our infrastructure, of our culture, and that in turn means a transformation or our institutions, a big crackdown on lobbies and corruption, etc. It’s the biggest challenge of our lives. Not trying to give the impression it’s easy
- innermachine@lemmy.worldEnglish7 days
Yea people don’t like talking about problems that don’t have solutions, but to find the solution you must first talk about the problem!
- Leviathan@lemmy.worldEnglish7 days
In a properly urbanized environment owning a car would be both unnecessary and inconvenient. We should strive to properly urbanize our living areas.
Bringing back true suburbs would be good, too. People living a half hour train journey from the city by high speed rail would mean small walkable islands could form in small towns the way they used to.
To the bike tire point, let’s face it, if we replaced every car with a bicycle we would probably reduce the amount of microplastics by a massive amount because a bike tire could never contain the amount of plastic a car tire does, cars have four and weigh a lot more. It’s incomparable, but you compared it so I had to point that out.
- innermachine@lemmy.worldEnglish7 days
Oh ur absolutely right, bike tire pollution is probably so insignificant it doesn’t matter. But that comparison was in the spirit of the original comment talking about focusing on the wrong thing and bringing up tire pollution when comparing EV to ice as if EVs aren’t significantly reducing emissions. In the hunt for perfection people will sacrifice improvement. It’s ok to make things better without perfecting them, as long as we are moving in the right direction.
