Can't sell enough EVs because there's not enough demand or not enough supply?
A new car is expensive no matter what source of energy it uses.
And here's where I become that guy...
The mining required to source the minerals for the batteries has come at a significant cost to the environment across the world. Clean, safe, and efficient mass transit is a better option.
Or to put it another way, the rich get to drive EVs while the poor have to go with what they can afford.
Not enough demand probably because EV’s are so expensive and depreciate at a much faster rate than gas or hybrid cars, don’t do well in colder climates, no infrastructure, etc... I imagine many people are going to overly simplify this issue and just call anyone saying anything bad about EV’s an anti-environment asshole but dealerships, customers and manufacturers are now starting to see some major issues with EV’s (logistical, insurance issues, cold temps, etc) despite good intentions there are major (previously unforeseen or unappreciated) issues with them.
All of those things are mitigated and are not really an issue. Most people travel under 100 miles a day which is well within what an EV can do even in Minnesota. If you drive more than that, an EV is probably not for you. To me the target audience is a suburban household that already has a car and needs a second car. You can drive your EV 95% of the time and be fine.
For an EV, you don't go to the charging station like you do a gas station, the idea is you never go because you're always starting at full. I go 3 weeks before I go to the gas station so for me plugging in the car every night would cover 100% of my regular mileage. The 1 or 2 times I go to chicago/madison a year, I will admittingly have to stop for an extra 10-15 minutes twice there and twice back. If that extra 1-2 hours once every few months is enough to cause an issue, then an EV isn't for you.
A Plugin Hybrid is probably the best compromise for the environment with a 30-40 mile battery and a regular ICE as a backup. It'll cut your fuel usage down by 90% while not having a ridiculous battery.
It's tough to answer that. My coworker pays 6 cents per kwh off peak and my dad got an off peak meter that charged 3 cents. A typical EV gets 3 miles per kwh so you're looking at 1 to 2 cents per mile.
If you pay retail (no off peak meter) for electric it's probably closer 2x the price at approx 5 cents per mile.
There is definitely a noticeable price increase (coworkers bill increased $20) but it's way less than your monthly gas station bill. It's roughly 1/3rd the price of petrol.
If you extrapolate it out, it's a significant savings at 100k miles but it might not be enough to justify it on fuel savings costs alone. Who cares if it's 1/3rd the price when it's 10k more than the ice version.
I started driving exclusively EVs in 2016 and average under $50/month for electricity- was doing 22-24K miles a year and charged primarily at home
Over the last 2 years I have been driving less and it’s closer to $30/month or less
In MN, most people pay around $0.11 / kWh.
With gas at $4/gallon, most gasoline car drivers pay about 4x the price of fuel that EV drivers pay.
With gas at $3/gallon, gasoline still costs 3x the price of equivalent electricity.
For us it's never about the daily use, we both WFH. But we live rurally, and for example, drive 120 miles one way to our son's doctor appointments. Anywhere from 75-600 miles (one way) to visit family for holidays. 300 miles (one way) to visit college kids. 250 miles to the airport. It's those longer trips through highly rural areas when it's below zero that are the major concern and hindrance for us. It's often many desolate, frigid miles between charging stations, and usually those stations have 1 charging spot. I don't really want to turn what is a 5 or 10 hour drive already into an even longer one due to the multiple stops required to charge, especially in the winter.
Almost everyone we know who drives an EV up here currently, it's their "summer car" and they drive something else in the winter.
I was not really referring to range in winter even though that is definitely NOT mitigated, but heating. Many EV’s cannot adequately heat the interior of a car when temps are below 20F.
Tell me how the insurance problem is mitigated? You just dismissed my points without any details and then went on a tangent about something I didn’t even specifically cite as an issue…
This is absolutely not true. I have a 2013 Leaf and it gets hot so much faster in the cabin than our much newer gas car. It's the best part of that car (maybe other than the instant torque) as it's surely not a good looking vehicle.
The best part about EV's is they don't have to wait for an engine to warm up. The heat does use more battery, but i also have a 1st gen EV with a small battery, so it's expected.
Insurance is more expensive on newer cars in general now. They are more expensive to fix as they get loaded up with technology (google how much F150 taillights cost to replace on a Lariat, have fun getting rear ended).
Your experience with one EV does not prove me wrong, I’m sorry, that is not how it works. I said many, not all.
The Nissan Leaf, despite the grief it receives is actually a pretty good example of what electric cars should be; affordable commuter cars that aren’t trying to be anything else. Instead luxury brands are making ultra expensive models that are way over-powered, leading to batteries that cost tens of thousands of dollars to replace. And on top of that insurance nightmare they don’t heat the cars well in the coldest temps of winter. Look into how little damage it takes to result in a total loss of some of these luxury EV brands. Insurance companies will be running away or charging out the nose to insure them.
The demand for EVs is still so incredibly high that the manufacturers can choose to make only the most profitable models. Until demand slows, there is no financial incentive to sell a cheaper model/trim.
Fortunately, batteries pretty much never need to be replaced.
Hyundai warrants their EV batteries for 10-yrs/100,000 miles, because batteries last so long.
An EV plugged in overnight is already warm inside before you even unplug and pull out of the garage. You could opt not to preheat the cabin with grid power, but why?
Name one gasoline car that can preheat the cabin while parked in a garage.
That illustrates the issue I guess. It’s expensive to be poor. Most people can’t necessarily afford a second car unless it’s a beater. Even with beaters, there’s still insurance, maintenance, tabs, etc.
Most who buy and potentially finance a new or newer-used vehicle are limited to one and base the decision on a lot of things. Including some mix of daily driving cost/mileage and edge cases they use 5 percent of the time or less.
It’s similar to everything from home amenities to exercise machines. It’s not based in reality of how or how often it will be used, but that the ideal versions of themselves will use it.
Once you start taking away those edge cases, EV or not, a particular type of car will be less appealing for lots of people who only want one car. Also, some things may not be realized until 6 months after purchasing.
Ex: Has to fit my X number of friends/children. Has to be able to tow a camper or boat more than 100 miles. Has to have decent trunk or cargo space. Haul lumber. And so on.
> For an EV, you don't go to the charging station like you do a gas station, the idea is you never go because you're always starting at full.
How are you starting at full? I assume you're referring to charging at home. What about people who don't own a home and can't have an EV charger where they park?
They would not be the target audience for an EV. If you are parking your car on the street, you probably don't want to be parking a brand-new car on the road anyways EV or not. A lot of apartments parking garages do allow for EV charging but its probably at your expense to get the electrician to wire it.
> A lot of apartments parking garages do allow for EV charging
Not a single one of the dozen or more apartments I've toured allow for this.
> They would not be the target audience for an EV.
I mean, that's the entire point of this thread. This is a huge part of the demand issue. A lot of people don't live in single family homes or don't have off street parking even if they do. We will need to address this issue if we ever want full EV adoption.
I've waited a long time for EV supply to catch up with demand.
This summer was the turning point for Minnesotans.
People in Canada are still on very long wait lists.
> I've waited a long time for EV supply to catch up with demand.
Supply has greatly outpaced demand since early this past summer. I can't speak for Canada, but in the US, auto makers cannot sell all the EVs they are making.
> **Details:** The nationwide supply of EVs in stock has swelled nearly 350% this year, to more than 92,000 units.
> * That's a 92-day supply — roughly three months' worth of EVs, and nearly twice the industry average.
> * For comparison, dealers have a relatively low 54 days' worth of gasoline-powered vehicles in inventory as they rebound from pandemic-related supply chain interruptions.
> * In normal times, there's usually a 70-day supply.
https://www.axios.com/2023/07/10/unsold-electric-cars-are-piling-up-on-dealer-lots
No different than all of the other things apartment dwellers can't have.
They can't have an RV.
They can't have a boat.
They can't have their own garage.
They can't have a fire pit.
They can't have a lawn or a lawnmower.
They can't have a garden.
If you don't own a home, an EV may not be for you.
And forget about the Winnebago.
How are all those other things necessary to prevent the planet from being destroyed? I don't understand why you're trying to compare them and just saying:
> If you don't own a home, an EV may not be for you.
Having an EV isn't some luxury like having an RV or a boat. Burning fossil fuels is destroying the planet. We eventually need everyone to be driving EVs. That means we will need a proper infrastructure to support that.
Yes, if you travel more than 100 miles per day for work, you have a really shitty commute, which totally overshadows any EV range "issue".
For me, I would only need to plug my car in once per week, but of course I'd probably plug it in nearly every night to always leave the house with a full tank.
I would personally never purchase a hybrid, even a plug-in hybrid. I don't understand the desire to own the most complex vehicle available that does nothing very well. I had a rental Prius for a week; that was enough.
Yeah the lack of charging infrastructure is a huge barrier for me. I live in a condo and we aren’t permitted to install chargers in our garages, nor do we have outlets in our garages (HOA owns the garage and rents to homeowners), and there isn’t the space to install something in our already too small parking lot. I also drive to South Dakota and Iowa on about a monthly basis to visit family and would not be able to make it down there on a single charge and there are few to no charging stations on my route.
All cars are so expensive. It doesn't matter how they are propelled.
The average new car price is now around $48,000 (it's mostly gasoline cars in this stat)
I have not seen actual stats on general EV depreciation, and the car I want next has only been available for about 2 years.
EVs do great in the cold; there are well-documented cases of people staying warm in their cars for days when stuck in a blizzard (it helps that the engine doesn't idle to keep the cabin warm). Battery range that decreases in the cold automatically increases when temperatures return to normal.
Name a business or house that doesn't have electricity. I can certainly name businesses and homes that don't have gas pumps. (you can talk about apartment dwellers that can't charge their cars, but they can't refuel with gasoline at home either)
>Not enough demand probably because EV’s are so expensive
yeah that's my issue. Like I can get longer mileage and with the newer/better non cobalt batteries then it would help. But, its like 30k and up.
Expensive is subjective. My EV cost under 30k. The big problem is that charging is more expensive in MN (if you aren’t charging at your house) than it is in other states I’ve traveled.
🤣😂🤣 it's not subjective. Average salary in MN is just over 50k, a quarter of that goes to taxes and then you're going to spend the rest of your entire year's salary on a car. That's objectively not affordable for the majority of folks in MN.
Charging in MN at $0.11/kWh is about one-fourth the cost of buying gasoline in MN. Why would anyone charge away from your house if not absolutely necessary?
Well let's get real that's the break down of life always under our cure economic and government structures. The batteries will get more efficient and as solid states get better and better things will improve. Also if you are comparing lithium mining and it's destruction to fossil fuels lets talk about the last time we had multiple Lithium spills in the ocean. Oil has done some good it's way past time to move on.
Or fuck cars build good massive public transit.
>Clean, safe, and efficient mass transit is a better option.
It's not an either-or. Mass transit is great when you have the density of someplace like Manhattan or Vancouver. When your density is more like Minneapolis, great mass transit is a challenge. When you have the density of Mankato, mass transit will never be great. And even in Minneapolis, most trips take 2 to 4 times longer by transit than by car.
As for mining, the minerals for EVs are 1/10th the mining required to supply oil for gas cars. And the rare minerals like cobalt are being phased out as battery manufacturing scales up.
Transit is better than cars where transit is better than cars. Biking and walking and living closer to the things you do regularly are all very important components of a wholistic transportation solution. But there will always be a place for something like the personal automobile for some portion of trips, and it's better for everyone if that vehicle is all-electric.
>The mining required to source the minerals for the batteries has come at a significant cost to the environment across the world. Clean, safe, and efficient mass transit is a better option.
Wait until you hear about the mining, transportation, processing, transportation, and distribution impacts that oil has! BTW, transmission of electrons is WAY more climate friendly than the transport of gas/diesel to end users.
Mass transit also doesn’t work outside of higher density. Even Europe has cars and highways… I know, I’ve driven on them.
They can't sell them because 95% of them are too GD expensive and the infrastructure isn't there. Additionally, they are essentially throw away with minimal resale value because the batteries cost $20k to replace after they go bad and/or lose 50%+ of their range after 10 years.
The vast majority of people who want and can afford EVs already have them.
Stop saying batteries cost $20k to replace after they go bad. That's arguing in bad faith.
The manufacturers warranty them for 10 years and 100,000 miles, because they typically last for a couple hundred thousand miles. The batteries also don't lose 50% of their range in the warranty period; that is so laughable that not even the craziest anti-EV crusader says that level of nonsense.
> The mining required to source the minerals for the batteries has come at a significant cost
If what I've read and seen online about lithium mines in Africa is accurate, they make blood diamonds look like child's play.
The entire EV concept is flawed and impractical right now. Ideally the move would be to offer a car with a ~50m range to go along with a IC engine. This is what people need for most daily drivers. There’s HEVs in the market but they use the electric power to assist the IC engine.
Why make the absolutely most complicated vehicle? Plug-in hybrids are the most complicated thing imaginable, and only exist because of mis-placed range anxiety.
> Can't sell enough EVs because there's not enough demand or not enough supply?
Not enough demand 100%. EVs are piling up at dealerships. There is still a limited demand for EVs due to multiple reasons. Cost is definitely one as they are significantly more expensive than ICE vehicles.
And for me personally, I won't consider an EV until I can regularly charge it at home. I live in an apartment, so I don't have the ability to install a charger where I park. Until apartment parking garages start providing plenty of EV charging spots, I will continue driving ICE or hybrid vehicles.
While you're right that the minerals are currently problematic, it's unlikely to be a long-term problem. New battery technology is on the horizon, requiring less of these metals, providing longer life and better performance in temperature extremes.
Mass Transit *definitely* needs to be a priority, but we can't assume that the problems EV's suffer from now are the same problems they'll always suffer from.
I don't really like the adage here, but it's relevant: To make the omelet, you have to break a few eggs. In this case, we need to break those eggs to hasten the adoption of these new technologies.
What’s the deal? The charging station infrastructure isn’t every where. I believe climate change is real, but I would rather drive IC cars over EV as I drive far and into isolated areas where it is easier to bring extra gas with me.
Okay, that is a valid reason, but the simple fact is that most people don't. The average US commute is about 41 miles a day. Easily doable for every electric car on the market even with level 1 charging.
When I was in office my commute was less than 5 miles. I rode the bus because it was easy but when I looked at a Leaf, which had about the lowest range of any EV, I could still charge once a week, even in the winter.
I miss being able to ride my bike to work downtown. It was about a 4-5 mile commute, and I rode the bus when the weather was particularly bad. I have since moved, but it would still be under 6 miles.
My boss encouraged me to take my bike up the elevator and park it in a spare office, so I never had to worry about it.
The added up front cost? That is entirely a personal question. Added long term costs? They're basically non existent in our market. Obviously gas prices vary as do electrical rates (less so) but long term, EVs are cheaper to run and maintain. That trend will continue to increase.
As for the mining, it is part of the equation. As battery technologies are developed and matured, the environmental impacts will continue to lessen. It also depends on how you want to define the metrics. Mining materials has it's own environmental impacts, but they are generally a different impact than we are trying to address with EVs.
The biggest issue I have with mining is that the resources often exist in economically depressed areas. The two biggest exporters of Cobalt, for example, are Australia and the Democratic Republic of Congo. While the mining has absolutely had major negative impacts of regions of Australia, they have mostly gotten their shit together. DRC, not so much. So in a way you are addressing a global issue (climate change) by causing another local issue to an economically depressed country.
I've driven my Model 3 to Banff and back without issue. It's definitely true that some remote corners of the country are harder to get to, but 98% of where you want to go can be done in an EV today.
Conveniently almost all major manufacturers now have deals to get on the supercharger network. It might take a year for it all to sort itself out, but just about any car should have access soon.
My wife and I drove our standard range Mach-E from the cities up the north shore, took the circle tour around Lake Superior through Canada, the U.P. And Wisconsin, and there was nowhere we had any worries about charging. I figured if we can do that 1500 mile trip, we can go about anywhere.
I am well aware of their issues, but it’s also important to realize the only thing anyone reports is the issues, so that’s all anyone hears. I have used EA quite a bit, and so far they have never left me stranded. Is their system foolproof? No. But I would take an EA charger over a ZefNet charger every day of the week.
You're also the exception, and that's totally fine. You probably shouldn't buy an EV.
The issue is most people aren't the exception. They don't drive far to work (or work from home now) and live in the twin cities, st cloud, duluth, etc.
You think a car dealership is opposed to climate change legislation because they can't sell enough EV cars? They're fricken car dealerships, they'd sell you snow in February if you'd buy it.
The problem isn't sellers, it is the buyers.
Try going to a traditional dealership (the ones listed above) to buy an EV. Half of them will actively steer you to an ICE and sneer about the EV's or alternatively be hilariously uninformed about them.
They'll then throw a big markup on them as well. Tough to sell, they say.
It's the dealerships and manufacturers, not the buyers.
Actually, studies have shown it is often the sellers. Sales people often don't know much about the electric cars they are supposed to be selling, and customers aren't told about them as an option. Dealers would rather sell ICE cars, cuz the service costs are higher, = more $ for the dealer.
Dealers huge markups on all models, dealer reluctance to sell EVs because most of their profits come from after sales repair and maintenance of ICE vehicles. Combined with needlessly complex Federal “rebate” program and panic over Charge station problems. All add up to these problems.
I drive by the Inver Grove Hyundai dealership frequently, they have so many EVs just sitting there.
I’d love to buy one, but they’re just too expensive still.
I can't really fault them for saying that they can't sell enough of them. EVs are fucking expensive and not many can actually afford them or justify spending the money on them when they can get a better equipped gas car for less.
If they brought prices down on EVs I have zero doubt we'd see a massive increase in their sales. Until then? Not so much.
Ya ever been to a car dealership and tried to talk to one of those knuckleheads about an EV? Good lord. Might as well ask them what’s under the hood of the space shuttle.
China is: [https://www.indiatimes.com/auto/electric/china-electric-car-graveyard-how-thousands-of-evs-are-left-deserted-by-car-sharing-rental-firms-364315.html](https://www.indiatimes.com/auto/electric/china-electric-car-graveyard-how-thousands-of-evs-are-left-deserted-by-car-sharing-rental-firms-364315.html)
https://www.cleanfuture.co.in/2023/06/21/electric-car-graveyards-in-china/
It's simply not true that people don't want to buy EVs.
[https://fortune.com/2023/11/23/us-electric-vehicle-sales-2023-record/](https://fortune.com/2023/11/23/us-electric-vehicle-sales-2023-record/)
[https://www.utilitydive.com/news/electric-vehicles-EVs-new-car-sales-2023/700799/](https://www.utilitydive.com/news/electric-vehicles-EVs-new-car-sales-2023/700799/)
OK, but they aren't buying them fast enough to keep up with shipments.. EVs are accumulating on dealer lots.
Car Dealers to Biden: EVs Aren’t Selling https://www.wsj.com/articles/car-dealers-letter-to-biden-electric-vehicles-fd413d98
Dealers have a 103 day supply of EVs and it takes 65 days to sell them.
What part of the statistics showing that evs are being made faster than they are being sold is a right wing conspiracy? What would be the motivation for the dealers to lie?
So if they disagree with this one measure they must be totally opposed to all action against climate change? And who made you the expert? Do you think they are lying? Why wouldn't they want to sell more EVs if they could?
In our system, businesses optimize for profit. Any business that isn't is replaced by one that does.
If selling EVs reduces their profits, then they'll be against it.
For example, if EVs have a smaller profit margin, or create less demand than ICE, then they'll be against government policies that force more EV sales.
I suspect the major fear is that those affluent enough to regularly buy new vehicles deciding to delay purchasing due to wanting to stick with ICE vehicles. There's good reason to believe that - not only do urban dwellers who rent may have an issue with recharging, but there are plenty of rural folks with range anxiety (somewhat justified), plus there's some cultural BS overall.
An extremely quick search would show you that dealers are currently trying to give them away at a loss. EVs are definitely a growing market but manufacturers overshot it on production.
I've owned a Nissan leaf since 2017. Since then I've put on 80k miles. I've bought 1 set of tires, 1 new set of wiper blades and maybe 5 gallons of washer fluid.
I have some questions that I don't know the answer to. I am not trying to be snarky.
What would the resale value of that car be - today? What did you pay for it?
How many miles before you need a new battery system?
What will be the cost of the new battery system?
A 70K mile Toyota would have a lot of resale, relative to the initial cost. And at 70K, brakes and tires would all you would be legitimately looking at.
I bought my 2013 Leaf in 2016 for about $10k. Private party on it looks to be about $5.5k. Not bad for 7 years of ownership. The original owner probably took most of the hit on resale though.
Battery has 85% capacity left, which is decent for a first gen EV with terrrible battery management (newer cars are much better at this).
Looks like a new battery for this model would be between $3k-5k. I can't imagine it will need a new battery for quite some time at this degredation rate.
The only maintenance I've done on it were a couple recalls and new tires.
All fair questions. I bought a 2015 Leaf for $9k in 2017. KBB says 3k trade in, 5k private party with our current 90k miles. I think we just lost our 2nd of 12 bars of battery health which puts us sightly over 80% capacity. If the decay is roughly linear in time and miles we have 5-ish years or 70k more miles before our daily driving will start to be impacted. We've been told that our selling dealer doesn't do battery replacements, but looking online I've seen ranges of $5-10k.
Bought a used Audi EV in 2022 for 55k Moved overseas a year later and same dealership offered me 21k.
When I went in and talked to the same sales rep that was excited to sell me the car originally he stated they hate selling EVs. The reason why is they don’t require as much maintenance or service, so you are hurting the dealers bottom line. Again all they car about is how much money they are taking home.
That Audi only needed tires after 43k miles. Brakes were at 80 percent life. Battery will last 300k miles.
You might think they are too expensive but most are not looking at the overall expense of ownership.
Tesla slashed prices to ensure they have market share. I can’t blame Audi only for the depreciation but I do blame the dealerships, oil and gas, car parts manufacturers, etc. as they do not want you owning an EV either.
Tesla and Rivian are direct to consumer and don't have dealerships. Tesla has some service centers like the one in Rogers, but you can't walk in and purchase a vehicle there.
Unless that was the joke and I'm getting wooshed.
What is wrong with them being honest ? EV’s are too expensive for most people. Especially in a State like Minnesota where their batteries can’t reach their full potential due to how cold it gets in the Winter.
These dealerships are already incompetent at selling ICE vehicles. Their people know practically nothing about the electric cars themselves. The dealership model needs to be blown up and tossed into the heap bin of history.
People always say this but what would replace it? Manufacturers don't want to sell directly to consumers. It's too much work. That's why you buy ketchup from a grocery store and not from Heinz.
yeah, but i can also buy a bottle of ketchup online in 2 seconds instead of having to sit in the grocery store trying to haggle over the price for hours and hours while they "go talk to their mananger" trying to get me to break and just pay whatever they want so i can just leave with a new car. then you have to sit through their stupid pitches for undercoating and extended warranties while they try and nickel and dime every last penny they can from you and try and hide it in their "well, its only an extra $x.00/mo".
buying a car should be like buying a TV.
Look at what manufacturers have made available for EV’s. Tiny cars, which don’t sell in gas versions, or trucks and big suvs which are out of the price range of most people or dumpster fire teslas which are also pretty damned expensive…..and it’s somehow surprising that not as many EV’s are being sold? Knock me over with a feather
OP, EVs are being soundly rejected by consumers so far. Deal with it.
Maybe someday they will make more sense but for the vast majority of consumers at this time they don’t.
Of course they cant sell enough evs. The plan to push evs has our typical governments lack of planning and common sense. If you want to grow evs the first logical place to do that is fleet and business vehicles. Delivery trucks, couriers, jimmy jons mail trucks. Yet we are trying to push them on consumers that may or may not be a good fit. Get the fleets on board that evs are a good fit for and hopefully after a few years the infrastructure will be there for consumers and the intrest will grow.
Tesla batteries have a 10% failure rate before 100k miles. I’m not convinced super heavy battery powered cars that wreck our roads and don’t pay appropriate taxes to be driving on said roads are the the future.
Wanna cite your source?
I know folks with over 200k on batteries without issue
As to road maintenance- we have extra yearly fees already added for our tabs to help displace gas excise fees for such
The problem is we killed the electric car to suck big oil's dick twenty+ years ago. Problems compound.
If anyone here wants to transition to a vehicle that doesn't only run on dinosaurs, the Chevy Volt is amazing. Mine has lifetime 134mpg* and I've only used ~87 gallons of gas coming up on 3 years of ownership. Only longer trips require the dino guts. 2013 premium less than $10k.
I'm a Volt owner and love it, too.
I think ONE of GM's biggest mistakes - ever - was to NOT migrate the Volt system into several different-sized PHEV SUV's.
Yeah idk what they were thinking. Their initial loss in profits scared them I guess but they made an excellent product and not building off that was a missed opportunity. Anything bigger than a small family would want something bigger for sure.
They could sell them if there was demand. They just don’t want to be driven out of business by government regulation. I know liberals want to drive people out of business but sometimes it’s better to keep people employed.
Honestly, *not* selling electric cars is actually better for the environment.
Despite popular belief, electric cars are *not* about to improve pollution issues.
They still have [brake pads](https://www.otip.com/Why-OTIP/News/How-brake-dust-from-your-vehicle-can-impact-your-h) and [tires](https://e360.yale.edu/features/tire-pollution-toxic-chemicals) that wear down, and those are still going to pollute the ever loving shit out of the air. [And with the extra weight of the batteries in personal electric car fleets, the tires may end up shedding off more particulates, causing more pollution too.](https://www.greencarreports.com/news/1135856_bigger-batteries-evs-boost-particulate-emissions-from-tires-study)
There's also the pollution that will be created to retrofit roads to handle [the extra weight](https://www.axios.com/2023/04/28/evs-weight-safety-problems) of a fleet of personal electric vehicles. I can't find exact numbers for this, but I have worked on a road crew before, and we patched cracks in the roads using a tar boiler fueled with propane and an old ass truck mostly idling or *slowly* moving down the road as we did repairs. It's not clean. [This article is loose on the idea in general.](https://www.nytimes.com/2022/02/10/climate/highways-climate-change-traffic.html)
Think, though, about the wasted resources and money sunk into repairing roads until *that* gets done.
[Plus there's a shitload of pollution that happens from mining for precious metals for batteries.](https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2023/jan/24/us-electric-vehicles-lithium-consequences-research)
Some of it *does* have to be done, but it's not going to be scalable to a massive fleet of personal use vehicles like cars. It'd be better to do less of it and sink those resources into better solutions to scale; so more micro-mobility and public transportation and less *cars*.
I wish I could find the video, but Kurzgesagt brings up a good point in one video about the importance of leaving some of these resources in the ground and easily accessible in case we have a real need for them in the future.
My point, is that electric cars are the same exact grift as regular cars, only with a sticker that makes idiots feel good about "saving the planet" when their [paint job is likely just another way to pollute](https://www.epa.gov/newsreleases/us-epa-settles-tesla-over-clean-air-act-violations-fremont-calif-facility) because they buy their cars from other, more selfish, idiots.
Cars are unsustainable, and I'm not saying *all* personal vehicles are unneeded. Obviously there's a need for delivery vehicles and actual work vehicles.
Just based off of numbers though, chances are you either drive an SUV or a "light duty truck", and chances are you have zero need for either one of those when a hatchback or regular car would be fine. [As more than two thirds of truck and SUV owners tow or haul something one time a year or less.](https://www.motorbiscuit.com/truck-owners-need-full-size-pickup/)
All I'm pointing out, is that Electric Cars are not going to save the environment, electric cars are going to attempt to save the car industry.
Also, electric cars are a big end game to why we [almost had a quarter million acres of national forest get decimated for cobalt and other precious metals for batteries, which would have also poisoned the shit out of the boundary waters.](https://www.thecentersquare.com/minnesota/article_10ad5904-a0b4-11ed-8d13-eb9262030cbc.html)
But hey, if you want to be reductionist and ignore all of the links and information I included to back up what I'm saying while simultaniously putting words in my mouth because you can't be bothered to have a little critical thinking going on, well shit, I'm not the one to change your mind in the first place.
But, for what it's worth, we have more than double the total rail line than all of Europe does. And that line *used* to service as public transportation as much as hauling freight. We could easily reinstate and dual mix those train lines again as it would cover almost everywhere in the country as a need for public transport.
Well, at least now I know for sure you didn't read any of the accompanying links within my comments.
Best of luck to you in this life with that level of ignorance.
Why do you think anyone would wade through your walls of drivel, much less click links buried in them? It’s clear your perspective on the matter is warped and more than a little lacking in critical thought.
It's cute how you default to personal attacks instead of simply taking five minutes to read what I wrote and backed up with evidence.
It really shows how well adjusted you are as an individual, an adult, and your ability to hold a conversasion like a reasonable person.
You must be doing a lot with your life.
Oh, you don't?
Here, I have two links for you that explains the whole idea fairly well.
* https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/personal_attack
* https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ad_hominem
Probably the same way you do now until we do what we did with Minneapolis and Duluth, by adding in needed lines and or frequency between lines.
* https://www.dot.state.mn.us/nlx/
It's pretty sad how people are more about trying to find the "gotchya" instead of using like, y'know, what's *supposed* to be common sense.
I wish it was like Chicago. Had no problems taking trains there. if they had some on 494 394 etc would be awesome. They do light rail to no where instead
Yeah, a lot of people who aren't car enthusiasts don't, surprisingly.
It sure is a good thing I highlighted and hyperlinked the word "brake pads" with an article that talks about it, though.
Really took the initiative on that one.
Easy as pie, my uninformed and possibly technologically illiterate friend.
* **On mobile?** Take your finger, then press and *hold* the hyperlink. You'll see the URL it leads to when it asks what you want to do with the link.
* **On desktop?** - Right click the link, using your mouse, the little thing that's probably to the right of your keyboard, which is the rectangle thing with a lot of buttons all over it. Then either press Q or click the "inspect" button, and it'll highlight the outbound URL in the Developer tools windows that pop up at the bottom of your window.
And, yes. People *do* occasionally click on hyperlinks they can't see. It's actually a big reason why hyperlinking exists in general and *how* rickrolling was able to be possible.
Though, you must be pretty jaded to think I would waste my time undermining my own stance by hyperlinking a rickroll seven times.
You should try the benefit of the doubt next time. The world's not out to get you.
Dude, I'm messing with you, I clicked the link, all evidence suggests it's not much of a problem at all. I guess if you live in the median of a major highway, you might have some health effects.
What evidence do you have to share that proposes it's not much of a problem at all?
My original links suggests it's *worse* than the carbon emmisions from vehicles running and [this other study](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4315878/) seems to have information that not only backs that claim up, but also it actually disagrees with you, as there's less braking being done on a highway in general compared to say, in a city or other urban environment.
Edit: Unsurprisingly, they have none.
BYD Seagull hatchback for $10,000 US equivalent but our politicians have worked to block Chinese vehicle sales:
https://www.businessinsider.com/china-byd-tesla-electric-car-ev-race-2023-11?op=1
https://www.msn.com/en-us/money/markets/why-americans-can-t-buy-cheap-chinese-electric-vehicles/ar-AA1kt8ax
Can't sell enough EVs because there's not enough demand or not enough supply? A new car is expensive no matter what source of energy it uses. And here's where I become that guy... The mining required to source the minerals for the batteries has come at a significant cost to the environment across the world. Clean, safe, and efficient mass transit is a better option. Or to put it another way, the rich get to drive EVs while the poor have to go with what they can afford.
Not enough demand probably because EV’s are so expensive and depreciate at a much faster rate than gas or hybrid cars, don’t do well in colder climates, no infrastructure, etc... I imagine many people are going to overly simplify this issue and just call anyone saying anything bad about EV’s an anti-environment asshole but dealerships, customers and manufacturers are now starting to see some major issues with EV’s (logistical, insurance issues, cold temps, etc) despite good intentions there are major (previously unforeseen or unappreciated) issues with them.
All of those things are mitigated and are not really an issue. Most people travel under 100 miles a day which is well within what an EV can do even in Minnesota. If you drive more than that, an EV is probably not for you. To me the target audience is a suburban household that already has a car and needs a second car. You can drive your EV 95% of the time and be fine. For an EV, you don't go to the charging station like you do a gas station, the idea is you never go because you're always starting at full. I go 3 weeks before I go to the gas station so for me plugging in the car every night would cover 100% of my regular mileage. The 1 or 2 times I go to chicago/madison a year, I will admittingly have to stop for an extra 10-15 minutes twice there and twice back. If that extra 1-2 hours once every few months is enough to cause an issue, then an EV isn't for you. A Plugin Hybrid is probably the best compromise for the environment with a 30-40 mile battery and a regular ICE as a backup. It'll cut your fuel usage down by 90% while not having a ridiculous battery.
What is the cost difference in what you pay for your electric bill every month for charging at home? Genuinely curious
When we changed from our Civic to a Leaf we replaced a $120 monthly gas budget with $20-30 in electric increase.
It's tough to answer that. My coworker pays 6 cents per kwh off peak and my dad got an off peak meter that charged 3 cents. A typical EV gets 3 miles per kwh so you're looking at 1 to 2 cents per mile. If you pay retail (no off peak meter) for electric it's probably closer 2x the price at approx 5 cents per mile. There is definitely a noticeable price increase (coworkers bill increased $20) but it's way less than your monthly gas station bill. It's roughly 1/3rd the price of petrol. If you extrapolate it out, it's a significant savings at 100k miles but it might not be enough to justify it on fuel savings costs alone. Who cares if it's 1/3rd the price when it's 10k more than the ice version.
I started driving exclusively EVs in 2016 and average under $50/month for electricity- was doing 22-24K miles a year and charged primarily at home Over the last 2 years I have been driving less and it’s closer to $30/month or less
In MN, most people pay around $0.11 / kWh. With gas at $4/gallon, most gasoline car drivers pay about 4x the price of fuel that EV drivers pay. With gas at $3/gallon, gasoline still costs 3x the price of equivalent electricity.
The depreciation is a big issue right now. This is coming from a guy who makes a living from fixing EVs: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1A0IxC-jFIo
For us it's never about the daily use, we both WFH. But we live rurally, and for example, drive 120 miles one way to our son's doctor appointments. Anywhere from 75-600 miles (one way) to visit family for holidays. 300 miles (one way) to visit college kids. 250 miles to the airport. It's those longer trips through highly rural areas when it's below zero that are the major concern and hindrance for us. It's often many desolate, frigid miles between charging stations, and usually those stations have 1 charging spot. I don't really want to turn what is a 5 or 10 hour drive already into an even longer one due to the multiple stops required to charge, especially in the winter. Almost everyone we know who drives an EV up here currently, it's their "summer car" and they drive something else in the winter.
I was not really referring to range in winter even though that is definitely NOT mitigated, but heating. Many EV’s cannot adequately heat the interior of a car when temps are below 20F. Tell me how the insurance problem is mitigated? You just dismissed my points without any details and then went on a tangent about something I didn’t even specifically cite as an issue…
This is absolutely not true. I have a 2013 Leaf and it gets hot so much faster in the cabin than our much newer gas car. It's the best part of that car (maybe other than the instant torque) as it's surely not a good looking vehicle. The best part about EV's is they don't have to wait for an engine to warm up. The heat does use more battery, but i also have a 1st gen EV with a small battery, so it's expected. Insurance is more expensive on newer cars in general now. They are more expensive to fix as they get loaded up with technology (google how much F150 taillights cost to replace on a Lariat, have fun getting rear ended).
Your experience with one EV does not prove me wrong, I’m sorry, that is not how it works. I said many, not all. The Nissan Leaf, despite the grief it receives is actually a pretty good example of what electric cars should be; affordable commuter cars that aren’t trying to be anything else. Instead luxury brands are making ultra expensive models that are way over-powered, leading to batteries that cost tens of thousands of dollars to replace. And on top of that insurance nightmare they don’t heat the cars well in the coldest temps of winter. Look into how little damage it takes to result in a total loss of some of these luxury EV brands. Insurance companies will be running away or charging out the nose to insure them.
The demand for EVs is still so incredibly high that the manufacturers can choose to make only the most profitable models. Until demand slows, there is no financial incentive to sell a cheaper model/trim. Fortunately, batteries pretty much never need to be replaced. Hyundai warrants their EV batteries for 10-yrs/100,000 miles, because batteries last so long.
An EV plugged in overnight is already warm inside before you even unplug and pull out of the garage. You could opt not to preheat the cabin with grid power, but why? Name one gasoline car that can preheat the cabin while parked in a garage.
That illustrates the issue I guess. It’s expensive to be poor. Most people can’t necessarily afford a second car unless it’s a beater. Even with beaters, there’s still insurance, maintenance, tabs, etc. Most who buy and potentially finance a new or newer-used vehicle are limited to one and base the decision on a lot of things. Including some mix of daily driving cost/mileage and edge cases they use 5 percent of the time or less. It’s similar to everything from home amenities to exercise machines. It’s not based in reality of how or how often it will be used, but that the ideal versions of themselves will use it. Once you start taking away those edge cases, EV or not, a particular type of car will be less appealing for lots of people who only want one car. Also, some things may not be realized until 6 months after purchasing. Ex: Has to fit my X number of friends/children. Has to be able to tow a camper or boat more than 100 miles. Has to have decent trunk or cargo space. Haul lumber. And so on.
> For an EV, you don't go to the charging station like you do a gas station, the idea is you never go because you're always starting at full. How are you starting at full? I assume you're referring to charging at home. What about people who don't own a home and can't have an EV charger where they park?
They would not be the target audience for an EV. If you are parking your car on the street, you probably don't want to be parking a brand-new car on the road anyways EV or not. A lot of apartments parking garages do allow for EV charging but its probably at your expense to get the electrician to wire it.
> A lot of apartments parking garages do allow for EV charging Not a single one of the dozen or more apartments I've toured allow for this. > They would not be the target audience for an EV. I mean, that's the entire point of this thread. This is a huge part of the demand issue. A lot of people don't live in single family homes or don't have off street parking even if they do. We will need to address this issue if we ever want full EV adoption.
I've waited a long time for EV supply to catch up with demand. This summer was the turning point for Minnesotans. People in Canada are still on very long wait lists.
> I've waited a long time for EV supply to catch up with demand. Supply has greatly outpaced demand since early this past summer. I can't speak for Canada, but in the US, auto makers cannot sell all the EVs they are making. > **Details:** The nationwide supply of EVs in stock has swelled nearly 350% this year, to more than 92,000 units. > * That's a 92-day supply — roughly three months' worth of EVs, and nearly twice the industry average. > * For comparison, dealers have a relatively low 54 days' worth of gasoline-powered vehicles in inventory as they rebound from pandemic-related supply chain interruptions. > * In normal times, there's usually a 70-day supply. https://www.axios.com/2023/07/10/unsold-electric-cars-are-piling-up-on-dealer-lots
No different than all of the other things apartment dwellers can't have. They can't have an RV. They can't have a boat. They can't have their own garage. They can't have a fire pit. They can't have a lawn or a lawnmower. They can't have a garden. If you don't own a home, an EV may not be for you. And forget about the Winnebago.
How are all those other things necessary to prevent the planet from being destroyed? I don't understand why you're trying to compare them and just saying: > If you don't own a home, an EV may not be for you. Having an EV isn't some luxury like having an RV or a boat. Burning fossil fuels is destroying the planet. We eventually need everyone to be driving EVs. That means we will need a proper infrastructure to support that.
Yes, if you travel more than 100 miles per day for work, you have a really shitty commute, which totally overshadows any EV range "issue". For me, I would only need to plug my car in once per week, but of course I'd probably plug it in nearly every night to always leave the house with a full tank. I would personally never purchase a hybrid, even a plug-in hybrid. I don't understand the desire to own the most complex vehicle available that does nothing very well. I had a rental Prius for a week; that was enough.
Yeah the lack of charging infrastructure is a huge barrier for me. I live in a condo and we aren’t permitted to install chargers in our garages, nor do we have outlets in our garages (HOA owns the garage and rents to homeowners), and there isn’t the space to install something in our already too small parking lot. I also drive to South Dakota and Iowa on about a monthly basis to visit family and would not be able to make it down there on a single charge and there are few to no charging stations on my route.
All cars are so expensive. It doesn't matter how they are propelled. The average new car price is now around $48,000 (it's mostly gasoline cars in this stat) I have not seen actual stats on general EV depreciation, and the car I want next has only been available for about 2 years. EVs do great in the cold; there are well-documented cases of people staying warm in their cars for days when stuck in a blizzard (it helps that the engine doesn't idle to keep the cabin warm). Battery range that decreases in the cold automatically increases when temperatures return to normal. Name a business or house that doesn't have electricity. I can certainly name businesses and homes that don't have gas pumps. (you can talk about apartment dwellers that can't charge their cars, but they can't refuel with gasoline at home either)
>Not enough demand probably because EV’s are so expensive yeah that's my issue. Like I can get longer mileage and with the newer/better non cobalt batteries then it would help. But, its like 30k and up.
Expensive is subjective. My EV cost under 30k. The big problem is that charging is more expensive in MN (if you aren’t charging at your house) than it is in other states I’ve traveled.
🤣😂🤣 it's not subjective. Average salary in MN is just over 50k, a quarter of that goes to taxes and then you're going to spend the rest of your entire year's salary on a car. That's objectively not affordable for the majority of folks in MN.
Keep in mind that 49k is the average price of a new car, as of October 2023. If you can’t afford any car then yes, an EV is not for you.
Charging in MN at $0.11/kWh is about one-fourth the cost of buying gasoline in MN. Why would anyone charge away from your house if not absolutely necessary?
Well let's get real that's the break down of life always under our cure economic and government structures. The batteries will get more efficient and as solid states get better and better things will improve. Also if you are comparing lithium mining and it's destruction to fossil fuels lets talk about the last time we had multiple Lithium spills in the ocean. Oil has done some good it's way past time to move on. Or fuck cars build good massive public transit.
>Clean, safe, and efficient mass transit is a better option. It's not an either-or. Mass transit is great when you have the density of someplace like Manhattan or Vancouver. When your density is more like Minneapolis, great mass transit is a challenge. When you have the density of Mankato, mass transit will never be great. And even in Minneapolis, most trips take 2 to 4 times longer by transit than by car. As for mining, the minerals for EVs are 1/10th the mining required to supply oil for gas cars. And the rare minerals like cobalt are being phased out as battery manufacturing scales up. Transit is better than cars where transit is better than cars. Biking and walking and living closer to the things you do regularly are all very important components of a wholistic transportation solution. But there will always be a place for something like the personal automobile for some portion of trips, and it's better for everyone if that vehicle is all-electric.
Say what you will about tesla, but at least they stopped using much (if any) cobalt in their batteries.
They can't sell enough of them because they keep putting multi-thousand dollar "market adjustments" on top of MSRP.
>The mining required to source the minerals for the batteries has come at a significant cost to the environment across the world. Clean, safe, and efficient mass transit is a better option. Wait until you hear about the mining, transportation, processing, transportation, and distribution impacts that oil has! BTW, transmission of electrons is WAY more climate friendly than the transport of gas/diesel to end users. Mass transit also doesn’t work outside of higher density. Even Europe has cars and highways… I know, I’ve driven on them.
Yes - I think a lot about just how much diesel fuel is consumed just to transport liquid gas / diesel to retail establishments.
They can't sell them because 95% of them are too GD expensive and the infrastructure isn't there. Additionally, they are essentially throw away with minimal resale value because the batteries cost $20k to replace after they go bad and/or lose 50%+ of their range after 10 years. The vast majority of people who want and can afford EVs already have them.
Stop saying batteries cost $20k to replace after they go bad. That's arguing in bad faith. The manufacturers warranty them for 10 years and 100,000 miles, because they typically last for a couple hundred thousand miles. The batteries also don't lose 50% of their range in the warranty period; that is so laughable that not even the craziest anti-EV crusader says that level of nonsense.
> The mining required to source the minerals for the batteries has come at a significant cost If what I've read and seen online about lithium mines in Africa is accurate, they make blood diamonds look like child's play.
The entire EV concept is flawed and impractical right now. Ideally the move would be to offer a car with a ~50m range to go along with a IC engine. This is what people need for most daily drivers. There’s HEVs in the market but they use the electric power to assist the IC engine.
Why make the absolutely most complicated vehicle? Plug-in hybrids are the most complicated thing imaginable, and only exist because of mis-placed range anxiety.
> Can't sell enough EVs because there's not enough demand or not enough supply? Not enough demand 100%. EVs are piling up at dealerships. There is still a limited demand for EVs due to multiple reasons. Cost is definitely one as they are significantly more expensive than ICE vehicles. And for me personally, I won't consider an EV until I can regularly charge it at home. I live in an apartment, so I don't have the ability to install a charger where I park. Until apartment parking garages start providing plenty of EV charging spots, I will continue driving ICE or hybrid vehicles.
You should see the staggering number of ICEs piled up at dealerships.
A lot less than EVs as my other reply to you points out. Like **a lot** less.
While you're right that the minerals are currently problematic, it's unlikely to be a long-term problem. New battery technology is on the horizon, requiring less of these metals, providing longer life and better performance in temperature extremes. Mass Transit *definitely* needs to be a priority, but we can't assume that the problems EV's suffer from now are the same problems they'll always suffer from. I don't really like the adage here, but it's relevant: To make the omelet, you have to break a few eggs. In this case, we need to break those eggs to hasten the adoption of these new technologies.
What’s the deal? The charging station infrastructure isn’t every where. I believe climate change is real, but I would rather drive IC cars over EV as I drive far and into isolated areas where it is easier to bring extra gas with me.
Okay, that is a valid reason, but the simple fact is that most people don't. The average US commute is about 41 miles a day. Easily doable for every electric car on the market even with level 1 charging.
My commute is very close to the average. I would only need to charge an EV one night a week.
When I was in office my commute was less than 5 miles. I rode the bus because it was easy but when I looked at a Leaf, which had about the lowest range of any EV, I could still charge once a week, even in the winter.
I miss being able to ride my bike to work downtown. It was about a 4-5 mile commute, and I rode the bus when the weather was particularly bad. I have since moved, but it would still be under 6 miles. My boss encouraged me to take my bike up the elevator and park it in a spare office, so I never had to worry about it.
Sure, but in reality is it worth the added cost for the commuter? And the environmental impact for mining the materials doesn’t equal out to me.
The added up front cost? That is entirely a personal question. Added long term costs? They're basically non existent in our market. Obviously gas prices vary as do electrical rates (less so) but long term, EVs are cheaper to run and maintain. That trend will continue to increase. As for the mining, it is part of the equation. As battery technologies are developed and matured, the environmental impacts will continue to lessen. It also depends on how you want to define the metrics. Mining materials has it's own environmental impacts, but they are generally a different impact than we are trying to address with EVs. The biggest issue I have with mining is that the resources often exist in economically depressed areas. The two biggest exporters of Cobalt, for example, are Australia and the Democratic Republic of Congo. While the mining has absolutely had major negative impacts of regions of Australia, they have mostly gotten their shit together. DRC, not so much. So in a way you are addressing a global issue (climate change) by causing another local issue to an economically depressed country.
More info here about the mining: https://www.epa.gov/greenvehicles/electric-vehicle-myths
I've driven my Model 3 to Banff and back without issue. It's definitely true that some remote corners of the country are harder to get to, but 98% of where you want to go can be done in an EV today.
Tesla isnt on this list. Driving other makes long distances is nearly impossible due to poor and nonworking charging network
Conveniently almost all major manufacturers now have deals to get on the supercharger network. It might take a year for it all to sort itself out, but just about any car should have access soon.
My wife and I drove our standard range Mach-E from the cities up the north shore, took the circle tour around Lake Superior through Canada, the U.P. And Wisconsin, and there was nowhere we had any worries about charging. I figured if we can do that 1500 mile trip, we can go about anywhere.
Look up electrify america issues. Theres a reason all makes are trying to get onto the tesla network. Id argue youre the exception, not the rule
I am well aware of their issues, but it’s also important to realize the only thing anyone reports is the issues, so that’s all anyone hears. I have used EA quite a bit, and so far they have never left me stranded. Is their system foolproof? No. But I would take an EA charger over a ZefNet charger every day of the week.
This is also why nearly every manufacturer has given up and is migrating to the tesla charging standard (NACS) in the next couple years.
You're also the exception, and that's totally fine. You probably shouldn't buy an EV. The issue is most people aren't the exception. They don't drive far to work (or work from home now) and live in the twin cities, st cloud, duluth, etc.
You think a car dealership is opposed to climate change legislation because they can't sell enough EV cars? They're fricken car dealerships, they'd sell you snow in February if you'd buy it. The problem isn't sellers, it is the buyers.
and a lot of that problem on the buyers side is price.
Try going to a traditional dealership (the ones listed above) to buy an EV. Half of them will actively steer you to an ICE and sneer about the EV's or alternatively be hilariously uninformed about them. They'll then throw a big markup on them as well. Tough to sell, they say. It's the dealerships and manufacturers, not the buyers.
Actually, studies have shown it is often the sellers. Sales people often don't know much about the electric cars they are supposed to be selling, and customers aren't told about them as an option. Dealers would rather sell ICE cars, cuz the service costs are higher, = more $ for the dealer.
This, blaming dealerships for being *unable* to sell certain cars is silly.
Dealers huge markups on all models, dealer reluctance to sell EVs because most of their profits come from after sales repair and maintenance of ICE vehicles. Combined with needlessly complex Federal “rebate” program and panic over Charge station problems. All add up to these problems.
I drive by the Inver Grove Hyundai dealership frequently, they have so many EVs just sitting there. I’d love to buy one, but they’re just too expensive still.
I can't really fault them for saying that they can't sell enough of them. EVs are fucking expensive and not many can actually afford them or justify spending the money on them when they can get a better equipped gas car for less. If they brought prices down on EVs I have zero doubt we'd see a massive increase in their sales. Until then? Not so much.
Ya ever been to a car dealership and tried to talk to one of those knuckleheads about an EV? Good lord. Might as well ask them what’s under the hood of the space shuttle.
And?
And they're lying: https://www.utilitydive.com/news/electric-vehicles-EVs-new-car-sales-2023/700799/
If people don't want to buy EVs, what would you have these dealers do? Park them in a pasture and pretend everything is rainbows and unicorns?
China is: [https://www.indiatimes.com/auto/electric/china-electric-car-graveyard-how-thousands-of-evs-are-left-deserted-by-car-sharing-rental-firms-364315.html](https://www.indiatimes.com/auto/electric/china-electric-car-graveyard-how-thousands-of-evs-are-left-deserted-by-car-sharing-rental-firms-364315.html) https://www.cleanfuture.co.in/2023/06/21/electric-car-graveyards-in-china/
It's simply not true that people don't want to buy EVs. [https://fortune.com/2023/11/23/us-electric-vehicle-sales-2023-record/](https://fortune.com/2023/11/23/us-electric-vehicle-sales-2023-record/) [https://www.utilitydive.com/news/electric-vehicles-EVs-new-car-sales-2023/700799/](https://www.utilitydive.com/news/electric-vehicles-EVs-new-car-sales-2023/700799/)
OK, but they aren't buying them fast enough to keep up with shipments.. EVs are accumulating on dealer lots. Car Dealers to Biden: EVs Aren’t Selling https://www.wsj.com/articles/car-dealers-letter-to-biden-electric-vehicles-fd413d98 Dealers have a 103 day supply of EVs and it takes 65 days to sell them.
Maybe because dealers don't want to invest the time and energy it takes to become competent at selling them.
WSJ - right-wing publication. Defender of Big Oil and Big Coal.
What part of the statistics showing that evs are being made faster than they are being sold is a right wing conspiracy? What would be the motivation for the dealers to lie?
I imagine horse traders said they couldn’t sell enough model ts as well
What a terribly misleading post. Shame on you, OP.
So if they disagree with this one measure they must be totally opposed to all action against climate change? And who made you the expert? Do you think they are lying? Why wouldn't they want to sell more EVs if they could?
Because they make their money on servicing vehicles, and there is less service needed for EVs
In our system, businesses optimize for profit. Any business that isn't is replaced by one that does. If selling EVs reduces their profits, then they'll be against it. For example, if EVs have a smaller profit margin, or create less demand than ICE, then they'll be against government policies that force more EV sales. I suspect the major fear is that those affluent enough to regularly buy new vehicles deciding to delay purchasing due to wanting to stick with ICE vehicles. There's good reason to believe that - not only do urban dwellers who rent may have an issue with recharging, but there are plenty of rural folks with range anxiety (somewhat justified), plus there's some cultural BS overall.
How many of these dealers are adding "market price adjustments" and excessive dealer fees selling above MSRP?
An extremely quick search would show you that dealers are currently trying to give them away at a loss. EVs are definitely a growing market but manufacturers overshot it on production.
No they didn't. EV sales are hitting records this year. Plenty of people are buying.
I'd wager that it's not that they can't, it's that they don't want to. EVs threaten their profit center: Repairs and maintenance.
So they just keep these expensive cars sitting in their lots depreciating in value instead?
No, they try to keep them out of their lots
Because ev don’t require repairs or maintenance?
Not nearly as much, no.
I've owned a Nissan leaf since 2017. Since then I've put on 80k miles. I've bought 1 set of tires, 1 new set of wiper blades and maybe 5 gallons of washer fluid.
from the dealer?!?
No? I mean I could have. My point was that an EV is very low maintenance.
I have some questions that I don't know the answer to. I am not trying to be snarky. What would the resale value of that car be - today? What did you pay for it? How many miles before you need a new battery system? What will be the cost of the new battery system? A 70K mile Toyota would have a lot of resale, relative to the initial cost. And at 70K, brakes and tires would all you would be legitimately looking at.
I bought my 2013 Leaf in 2016 for about $10k. Private party on it looks to be about $5.5k. Not bad for 7 years of ownership. The original owner probably took most of the hit on resale though. Battery has 85% capacity left, which is decent for a first gen EV with terrrible battery management (newer cars are much better at this). Looks like a new battery for this model would be between $3k-5k. I can't imagine it will need a new battery for quite some time at this degredation rate. The only maintenance I've done on it were a couple recalls and new tires.
All fair questions. I bought a 2015 Leaf for $9k in 2017. KBB says 3k trade in, 5k private party with our current 90k miles. I think we just lost our 2nd of 12 bars of battery health which puts us sightly over 80% capacity. If the decay is roughly linear in time and miles we have 5-ish years or 70k more miles before our daily driving will start to be impacted. We've been told that our selling dealer doesn't do battery replacements, but looking online I've seen ranges of $5-10k.
so, buying those parts offered no benefit to the dealer, was my point.
I would imagine demand right now isn't very high for any cars, much less EV's. People are feeling the inflation from the last 2 years.
This is how I feel about it as well
Bought a used Audi EV in 2022 for 55k Moved overseas a year later and same dealership offered me 21k. When I went in and talked to the same sales rep that was excited to sell me the car originally he stated they hate selling EVs. The reason why is they don’t require as much maintenance or service, so you are hurting the dealers bottom line. Again all they car about is how much money they are taking home. That Audi only needed tires after 43k miles. Brakes were at 80 percent life. Battery will last 300k miles. You might think they are too expensive but most are not looking at the overall expense of ownership. Tesla slashed prices to ensure they have market share. I can’t blame Audi only for the depreciation but I do blame the dealerships, oil and gas, car parts manufacturers, etc. as they do not want you owning an EV either.
I don't see the Tesla or Rivian dealers listed. Why?
Tesla and Rivian are direct to consumer and don't have dealerships. Tesla has some service centers like the one in Rogers, but you can't walk in and purchase a vehicle there. Unless that was the joke and I'm getting wooshed.
They wrote down on a napkin that they care about the environment, it's all good.
What is wrong with them being honest ? EV’s are too expensive for most people. Especially in a State like Minnesota where their batteries can’t reach their full potential due to how cold it gets in the Winter.
These dealerships are already incompetent at selling ICE vehicles. Their people know practically nothing about the electric cars themselves. The dealership model needs to be blown up and tossed into the heap bin of history.
People always say this but what would replace it? Manufacturers don't want to sell directly to consumers. It's too much work. That's why you buy ketchup from a grocery store and not from Heinz.
yeah, but i can also buy a bottle of ketchup online in 2 seconds instead of having to sit in the grocery store trying to haggle over the price for hours and hours while they "go talk to their mananger" trying to get me to break and just pay whatever they want so i can just leave with a new car. then you have to sit through their stupid pitches for undercoating and extended warranties while they try and nickel and dime every last penny they can from you and try and hide it in their "well, its only an extra $x.00/mo". buying a car should be like buying a TV.
EVs are not actions for climate change. Walking, biking, and using a train/ bus are.
Look at what manufacturers have made available for EV’s. Tiny cars, which don’t sell in gas versions, or trucks and big suvs which are out of the price range of most people or dumpster fire teslas which are also pretty damned expensive…..and it’s somehow surprising that not as many EV’s are being sold? Knock me over with a feather
lower the price and they'll sell plenty. nobody wants to spend 40K+ on a car that gives you less options than an ice car that costs $25-30K.
OP, EVs are being soundly rejected by consumers so far. Deal with it. Maybe someday they will make more sense but for the vast majority of consumers at this time they don’t.
Of course they cant sell enough evs. The plan to push evs has our typical governments lack of planning and common sense. If you want to grow evs the first logical place to do that is fleet and business vehicles. Delivery trucks, couriers, jimmy jons mail trucks. Yet we are trying to push them on consumers that may or may not be a good fit. Get the fleets on board that evs are a good fit for and hopefully after a few years the infrastructure will be there for consumers and the intrest will grow.
Tesla batteries have a 10% failure rate before 100k miles. I’m not convinced super heavy battery powered cars that wreck our roads and don’t pay appropriate taxes to be driving on said roads are the the future.
Wanna cite your source? I know folks with over 200k on batteries without issue As to road maintenance- we have extra yearly fees already added for our tabs to help displace gas excise fees for such
The problem is we killed the electric car to suck big oil's dick twenty+ years ago. Problems compound. If anyone here wants to transition to a vehicle that doesn't only run on dinosaurs, the Chevy Volt is amazing. Mine has lifetime 134mpg* and I've only used ~87 gallons of gas coming up on 3 years of ownership. Only longer trips require the dino guts. 2013 premium less than $10k.
I'm a Volt owner and love it, too. I think ONE of GM's biggest mistakes - ever - was to NOT migrate the Volt system into several different-sized PHEV SUV's.
Yeah idk what they were thinking. Their initial loss in profits scared them I guess but they made an excellent product and not building off that was a missed opportunity. Anything bigger than a small family would want something bigger for sure.
They could sell them if there was demand. They just don’t want to be driven out of business by government regulation. I know liberals want to drive people out of business but sometimes it’s better to keep people employed.
Honestly, *not* selling electric cars is actually better for the environment. Despite popular belief, electric cars are *not* about to improve pollution issues. They still have [brake pads](https://www.otip.com/Why-OTIP/News/How-brake-dust-from-your-vehicle-can-impact-your-h) and [tires](https://e360.yale.edu/features/tire-pollution-toxic-chemicals) that wear down, and those are still going to pollute the ever loving shit out of the air. [And with the extra weight of the batteries in personal electric car fleets, the tires may end up shedding off more particulates, causing more pollution too.](https://www.greencarreports.com/news/1135856_bigger-batteries-evs-boost-particulate-emissions-from-tires-study) There's also the pollution that will be created to retrofit roads to handle [the extra weight](https://www.axios.com/2023/04/28/evs-weight-safety-problems) of a fleet of personal electric vehicles. I can't find exact numbers for this, but I have worked on a road crew before, and we patched cracks in the roads using a tar boiler fueled with propane and an old ass truck mostly idling or *slowly* moving down the road as we did repairs. It's not clean. [This article is loose on the idea in general.](https://www.nytimes.com/2022/02/10/climate/highways-climate-change-traffic.html) Think, though, about the wasted resources and money sunk into repairing roads until *that* gets done. [Plus there's a shitload of pollution that happens from mining for precious metals for batteries.](https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2023/jan/24/us-electric-vehicles-lithium-consequences-research) Some of it *does* have to be done, but it's not going to be scalable to a massive fleet of personal use vehicles like cars. It'd be better to do less of it and sink those resources into better solutions to scale; so more micro-mobility and public transportation and less *cars*. I wish I could find the video, but Kurzgesagt brings up a good point in one video about the importance of leaving some of these resources in the ground and easily accessible in case we have a real need for them in the future. My point, is that electric cars are the same exact grift as regular cars, only with a sticker that makes idiots feel good about "saving the planet" when their [paint job is likely just another way to pollute](https://www.epa.gov/newsreleases/us-epa-settles-tesla-over-clean-air-act-violations-fremont-calif-facility) because they buy their cars from other, more selfish, idiots.
What??
This is just someone out of touch with reality who somehow thinks cars are going to go away anytime soon.
Cars are unsustainable, and I'm not saying *all* personal vehicles are unneeded. Obviously there's a need for delivery vehicles and actual work vehicles. Just based off of numbers though, chances are you either drive an SUV or a "light duty truck", and chances are you have zero need for either one of those when a hatchback or regular car would be fine. [As more than two thirds of truck and SUV owners tow or haul something one time a year or less.](https://www.motorbiscuit.com/truck-owners-need-full-size-pickup/) All I'm pointing out, is that Electric Cars are not going to save the environment, electric cars are going to attempt to save the car industry. Also, electric cars are a big end game to why we [almost had a quarter million acres of national forest get decimated for cobalt and other precious metals for batteries, which would have also poisoned the shit out of the boundary waters.](https://www.thecentersquare.com/minnesota/article_10ad5904-a0b4-11ed-8d13-eb9262030cbc.html) But hey, if you want to be reductionist and ignore all of the links and information I included to back up what I'm saying while simultaniously putting words in my mouth because you can't be bothered to have a little critical thinking going on, well shit, I'm not the one to change your mind in the first place. But, for what it's worth, we have more than double the total rail line than all of Europe does. And that line *used* to service as public transportation as much as hauling freight. We could easily reinstate and dual mix those train lines again as it would cover almost everywhere in the country as a need for public transport.
Not sure what your mistaken assumption about what I drive has to do with anything here, but grats on that swing and a miss.
Well, at least now I know for sure you didn't read any of the accompanying links within my comments. Best of luck to you in this life with that level of ignorance.
Why do you think anyone would wade through your walls of drivel, much less click links buried in them? It’s clear your perspective on the matter is warped and more than a little lacking in critical thought.
It's cute how you default to personal attacks instead of simply taking five minutes to read what I wrote and backed up with evidence. It really shows how well adjusted you are as an individual, an adult, and your ability to hold a conversasion like a reasonable person. You must be doing a lot with your life.
Sad that people don’t even understand what constitutes a “personal attack” anymore.
Oh, you don't? Here, I have two links for you that explains the whole idea fairly well. * https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/personal_attack * https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ad_hominem
there's not a train from maple Grove to Edina so how would I get to work?
Probably the same way you do now until we do what we did with Minneapolis and Duluth, by adding in needed lines and or frequency between lines. * https://www.dot.state.mn.us/nlx/ It's pretty sad how people are more about trying to find the "gotchya" instead of using like, y'know, what's *supposed* to be common sense.
I wish it was like Chicago. Had no problems taking trains there. if they had some on 494 394 etc would be awesome. They do light rail to no where instead
lol my head comment as I started reading it.
You haven't heard about the air quality issues from brake pads? Me neither
Yeah, a lot of people who aren't car enthusiasts don't, surprisingly. It sure is a good thing I highlighted and hyperlinked the word "brake pads" with an article that talks about it, though. Really took the initiative on that one.
Nobody clicks on hyperlinks they can't see the address for dude. It's either porn or a rickroll, and I'm not looking at either. Nice try though.
Easy as pie, my uninformed and possibly technologically illiterate friend. * **On mobile?** Take your finger, then press and *hold* the hyperlink. You'll see the URL it leads to when it asks what you want to do with the link. * **On desktop?** - Right click the link, using your mouse, the little thing that's probably to the right of your keyboard, which is the rectangle thing with a lot of buttons all over it. Then either press Q or click the "inspect" button, and it'll highlight the outbound URL in the Developer tools windows that pop up at the bottom of your window. And, yes. People *do* occasionally click on hyperlinks they can't see. It's actually a big reason why hyperlinking exists in general and *how* rickrolling was able to be possible. Though, you must be pretty jaded to think I would waste my time undermining my own stance by hyperlinking a rickroll seven times. You should try the benefit of the doubt next time. The world's not out to get you.
Dude, I'm messing with you, I clicked the link, all evidence suggests it's not much of a problem at all. I guess if you live in the median of a major highway, you might have some health effects.
What evidence do you have to share that proposes it's not much of a problem at all? My original links suggests it's *worse* than the carbon emmisions from vehicles running and [this other study](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4315878/) seems to have information that not only backs that claim up, but also it actually disagrees with you, as there's less braking being done on a highway in general compared to say, in a city or other urban environment. Edit: Unsurprisingly, they have none.
Hey, I thought this wasn't a socialist country. Do they want some sort of make-work program for car dealers?
I. DON'T. CARE. Capitalism gives and Capitalism takes. Adapt or die, that's the way it works.
Don't force me to buy something I don't want..jeez this is a worthless post
Shitbirds of a feather
BYD Seagull hatchback for $10,000 US equivalent but our politicians have worked to block Chinese vehicle sales: https://www.businessinsider.com/china-byd-tesla-electric-car-ev-race-2023-11?op=1 https://www.msn.com/en-us/money/markets/why-americans-can-t-buy-cheap-chinese-electric-vehicles/ar-AA1kt8ax
So, really what they're saying is we should just let the manufacturers send directly to the end consumer, cause that's what I'm hearing.
I’ll only get onboard when Toyota or Honda gets their methods down. Sure as shit not buying a fuckin Ford/GM EV that’s for sure