When an animal catches rabies, in the end stages, it manifest bizarre, aggressive behavior. A normally shy raccoon will charge a human, growling and frothing at the mouth.
There is only one treatment for a rabid raccoon.
How about humans afflicted with the disease called “environmentalism”?
It is a form of rabies – and much more dangerous.
California Assemblywoman Autumn Burke, for instance. This “environmentalist” (what’s the credential, exactly?) is pushing legislation that would require 15 percent of all new cars sold in California be “emissions free” by model year 2025.
This means electric cars, as only electric cars qualify as “emissions-free”… notwithstanding that they also most definitely produce emissions.
Just not at the tailpipe.
This also means catastrophe for the car industry – for car buyers. For buyers of cars that aren’t electric cars.
The price of which will skyrocket – in order to offset the losses imposed on car companies forced to manufacture and then give away vast fleets of electric cars in order to be allowed to sell any cars at all.
Electric cars only being “salable” when subsidized or “sold” at a loss.
In the past, there was a dodge.
A con, actually.
It’s the one that helped make the rent-seeking Andrew Carnegie of our time, Elon Musk – purveyor of the Tesla electric car – a very wealthy man. He sells carbon credits to other car companies. These credits serve as flim-flam-than-you-ma’am proxies for not building electric cars. GM, for instance, avoids wasting money and time designing, manufacturing and then attempting to sell (at a loss) an electric Edsel (like the ’90s-era EV1) by purchasing carbon credits from Elon for the tailpipe emissions not produced by the cars he makes. In order to offset the tailpipe emissions of the cars GM makes.
In this way, Elon gets rich and the regulatory fatwa is obeyed – with relatively minimal fuss and muss for those engaged in actual productive endeavors rather than rent-seeking.
But the California nomenklatura, of which Burke is a high muckety-muck, is unhappy. The nomenklatura does not like that manufacturers of non-electric cars skate around the “zero emissions” sales quotas by buying carbon credits from Elon. They want the electric cars made, as many as possible. 
“That’s why we need to reform the rules to require that 15 percent of all new cars sold in California have (sic) zero emissions by 2025,” says Burke. “This is about clean cars, not credits.”
Who is “we,” by the way?
Elon’s surely unhappy. If the carbon con goes away, his rent-seeking operation will suffer. But then, he’s already fat and happy on the taxpayer dime.
Besides which, the object of this exercise is not to make Elon rich. It is to make us poor.
To make driving ever more expensive. Such that hopefully – from the point of view of “environmentalists” – we (the peonage) will not be able to do much driving at all.
California Governor Jerry Brown – another “environmentalist” – has already laid down the “ambitious goal” (says Burke, sounding like a Komsomol or Junior Anti-Sex League harridan) of getting 1.5 million electric cars on the road by 2025, a little more than eight years from now.
The problem is that there are only about 200,000 electric cars registered in California right now; about 4 percent of the desired 15 percent.
There are only so many suckers.
Who else pays upwards of $30,000 for a car that can’t compete, functionally or economically, with a car that costs $15,000?
Yes, battery technology has improved. It is still not cost-competitive with gasoline.
Yes, range has improved. It is still far less than even the worst gas-guzzler’s.
And the gas guzzler can be refueled and back on the road in less than five minutes. There isn’t an electric car available that takes less than half an hour to recharge – and that’s if it’s hooked up to a high-voltage “supercharger.” Of which there are not very many, due chiefly to the very high cost of each one.
An entire “refueling” infrastructure for electric cars would need to be built in order to make electric cars somewhat practical.
Emphasis on somewhat.
We live in a fast food nation. Does anyone not afflicted with environmental rabies really believe other than a small minority of also-rabid electric car fanatics will put up with waiting for half an hour to recharge a car that will then travel maybe 100 or so miles before it needs to be plugged in for another half hour?
Again, that’s if you can find a high-voltage “supercharger.” If not, the wait will be hours.
Still, Autumn Burke and her fellow raccoons cannot seem to grok why electric cars haven’t gone mainstream.
Possibly it is because she – like most people who buy electric cars – is both an “environmentalist” and in a position, financially, to contemplate the purchase of a $30,000-plus toy.
Which is what these things are, once you strip away the unctuous prattle about “zero emissions” (they’re not; I’ll explain below).
Porsches are also toys.
They are terrible in winter, have small trunks and some of them only carry two people. No one considers them practical or economical – and most people would think the idea of subsidizing their purchase (and mandating their manufacture) at least slightly tetched in the head.
Why is it any less tetched in the head to subsidize electric cars and mandate their manufacture?
They are not economical to own when their cost to buy is taken into account – or practical to drive for most people. Most people not having the time to wait for 30 minute minimum recharges and needing a car that can travel more than 100 miles before needing to recharge.
Those are facts beyond dispute.
It’s why electric cars are a hard sell. Even the Teslas, which at least have looks and performance (not battery, acceleration) going for them. But – again – why are we forced to subsidize looks and performance? 
Oh. Yes. This “zero emissions” business. Because Global Warming and all.
But electric cars are not emissions free. Their emissions are simply emitted elsewhere. During their manufacture, for one. To extract from the earth the toxic elements (in large quantities) needed to make several hundred pounds of also-toxic battery pack per car.
The heavy equipment used to extract the ores and so on are not powered by batteries, either.
Nor the factories where the battery packs are made.
And even if they were, charging batteries requires electricity. It is produced, not by the energies of “environmentalists” but by the burning of oil and coal.
Emissions are emitted at the smokestack rather than the tailpipe.
Given the extremely low – literally almost nonexistent – tailpipe exhaust emissions produced by any new car, vs. the plumes of fumes generated by smokestack utilities, it’s hard to grok how the environment benefits from increasing the demand for electricity by mandating the manufacture of millions of electric cars, which means more Bad Stuff emanating from smokestacks and factories and also diesel-powered heavy equipment.
But then, I am not an “environmentalist.”
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One topic rarely discussed regarding EVs is energy transmission loss between the power plant and the car.
“Generating electricity, we lost 22 quadrillion Btu from coal, natural gas, nuclear and petroleum power plants in 2013 in the U.S. – that’s more than the energy in all the gasoline we use in a given year.”
http://insideenergy.org/2015/11/06/lost-in-transmission-how-much-electricity-disappears-between-a-power-plant-and-your-plug/
Even before I sprouted hair on my gonads, I remember the likes of Connie Kalitta and Caroll Shelby coming to our shop on 8 mile and talking about the scam of CAFE.
At the time I thought that it was weird that so many men had girl names. But my mom assured me that Archie Bunker’s real name was Caroll so I let it go. Besides, I had my Hot Wheels Mongoose and Snake race set. Life was good.
A few years later, and after I found out that Shelby and Kalitta were famous in their own right, but still at a point in time where I couldn’t believe the government would scam the volk, I did a little research.
Much to my surprise and chagrin, I learned that adding an air compressor to pump clean air into the exhaust would allow a car to pass the government tests. I also learned that adding an air compressor made the engine work harder and required more gas to be used when covering the same distance.
So about 35 years after Locke coined the phrase “unintended consequences” I got my first real lesson in how to reduce air pollution (the government way). To reduce air pollution, you create more pollution.
So in a day an age where girls have names like Bruce Jenner, I’m not surprised that a company like Tessla is glorified for (re)introducing technology that reduces pollution by creating even more pollution.
Eric asked “How about humans afflicted with the disease called “environmentalism”?”
Is that what one catches when exposed to SSO’s? The EPA tells us that “occasional unintentional discharges of raw sewage from municipal sanitary sewers occur in almost every system. These types of discharges are called sanitary sewer overflows (SSOs)…EPA estimates that there are at least 40,000 SSOs each year. ”
Wouldn’t want to catch that “environmentalism” Eric mentions, doesn’t sound like a good thing, IMHO.
I’m just glad I live in a country where the government protects me from the ill effects of raw sewage by discharging raw sewage into the environment at an average rate of 4-5 times every hour.
Elon Musk craps GOLD NUGGETS and farts ROSE-LILAC PERFUME! He invented the subway way back in the 19th century and fellates Al Gore regularly. He has a ManBearPig in a solid Diamond (carbon, get it) Cage. He is a master Jedi who merely waves his hand to get his Eel Lek Trick Mazzy Ratty all charged up.
ALL BOY TO THE GOLDEN BOY!
Any transition from the petroleum internal combustion engine, no matter the alternative will require at least a decade and tens of billions of dollars for the support structures for the new technology, all the while maintaining the old one. Certain options are ridiculously expensive as the new support structure does not exist at a usable level. although the technology is ubiquitous. The perferred option talked about in this article, electric cars, is decades and hundreds of billions of dollars off into the future. We have none of the requisites, not the generationing, transmission, nor distribution capacities to even dream of the conversion of all transport to electric even if we burn all the coal on the planet.
Excellent article.
I don’t own an electric car.
Yet I help my neighbors to buy theirs, trough the maximum government direct subsidy of $7,500 per vehicle. Nice!
And those friendly-sounding carbon credits that you mentioned which the vehicle manufacturers pay to Elon Musk, that has to come from somewhere, and yes, it comes hidden in the price of every gas vehicle sold. I pay for my neighbors Tesla yet again. Nice!
Since the electricity needed to charge those toxic batteries comes mainly from coal fired power plants, I would love if someone could do the math on the comparison of the actual total emissions (not just at the tailpipe) of an average gas vehicle versus an average electric vehicle.
Zero emissions my @ss
Grim, a few years ago I read a comparison of cost of electricity. That oh so cheap nuclear power was more expensive than any other. Not hard to realize when you consider few have been built without massive over-budget problems just in the initial building phase. Then the constant flow of trucks hauling huge amounts of everything needed to keep them running, the unholy maintenance costs not only in parts but manpower too. Then there’s the cost of attempting to safely store spent rods, lost coolant and everything else that needs to be disposed of. All that makes coal, petroleum and natural gas look like the best deal ever……which they are. There’s no political scam being run by oil companies on people in places like Andrews county Tx. to store highly toxic residue with half-life’s longer than man is likely to be around, a disposal area that is already leaking and sending that material into the water table that will pass through the entire southern part of the state before getting into the ocean so it can be spread around the world. You can say that for every country using them. The spills in the US and various other fuckups are never told out loud, esp. since being too vocal and accurate will simply get your movement stopped no matter how many people need to be silenced. Follow the money.
Nuclear might be more practical if there wasn’t a gunvermin monopoly on design and inspection.
The costs and safety would plummet if they didn’t insist on making bomb material……as if the US needs more. No matter what, it always come back to the same old saw, follow the money.
IIRC, some of the nuke plants in Europe use what our plants call ‘spent rods’ as fuel. Recycling, donchaknow? That cuts both fuel costs and disposal costs.
For many years I had serious doubts about nuclear energy because of all the well-publicised waste and radiation problems. But in the last ten years after learning a lot more about it, I am now 100% pro NE, especially the newer reactor designs that can “burn” used fuel which still contains 95% of the energy. There are also reactors that can burn the mountains of tailings that are left over from the enrichment process that produced the fuel that has been used. These technologies are not even new. They just have not been used much or developed. The “fast” neutron reactors that can burn waste are a proven technology. Several have been built and Russia is currently building several new ones The same is true for the molten salt reactors that operate at atmospheric pressure and are “walk-away-safe”. The safety is built into the design. There are also plans to build small reactors in a factory which can be transported by anywhere by truck. I have no doubt that NE is the future. Wind and solar cannot produce base load and therefore cannot compete with nuclear or coal. Natural gas is perfect for home heating, back-up generators, peak load generators, and many other uses including the production of fertilizer. There are some very smart people who say that nuclear is the cleanest and they wipe the floor with the anti-nukes. Another advantage is an unlimited supply of fuel, at least a billion years worth.
Free-market environmentalism argues that the free market, property rights, and tort law provide the best means of preserving the environment, internalizing pollution costs, and conserving resources.
Free-market environmentalism
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Free-market_environmentalism
Markets and Ecosystems are Spontaneous Orders
Recent arguments in the academic literature have used Friedrich Hayek’s concept of a spontaneous order to defend a broadly non-interventionist environmental policy.
Hayek originally used the concept of a spontaneous order to argue against government intervention in the market. Like the market, ecosystems contain complex networks of information, involve an ongoing dynamic process, contain orders within orders, and the entire system operates without being directed by a conscious mind.
On this analysis, species takes the place of price as a visible element of the system formed by a complex set of largely unknowable elements. Human ignorance about the countless interactions between the organisms of an ecosystem limits our ability to manipulate nature.
Since humans rely on the ecosystem to sustain themselves, it is argued that we have an obligation to not disrupt such systems. This analysis of ecosystems as spontaneous orders does not rely on markets qualifying as spontaneous orders. As such, one need not endorse Hayek’s analysis of markets to endorse ecosystems as spontaneous orders.
SHAME ON YOU ERIC!! I DIDN TKNOW YOU HAD A LAZER THAT POWERFUL TO EXPLODE THOSE LITHIUM ION BATTERIES ON ELONS ROCKET.AND THATS WHAT EXPLODED AND CAUSED THE BIG EXPLOSION WAS NT IT?? THEY ARE SUSCEPTIBLE TO A LAZER.BUT MORE TO THE POINT ERIC.I RACE YOUR VETTE WITH MY TESLA S FOR 10 M.
Hi Richard,
I’ve never denied that Teslas are quick; quite the opposite. But if quickness is the criteria, why not subsidize Porsches? Impose production quotas mandating they be built and sold in large numbers?
Again (and again)… the problem with electric cars isn’t that they’re not quick or quiet or look great … or even that they aren’t as “green” as often touted. It is that they are not economical to buy and operate. They can (and do ) outperform high-performance IC cars in terms of acceleration. But they also cost a fortune, rendering whatever you “save” on fuel a moot point.
And they have definite functional liabilities such as a very limited (vs. an IC car) range and very lengthy (vs. an IC car) recharge times. Their range is also dramatically affected by variables such as temperature and use of accessories, whereas these affect an IC car to a much lesser degree.
So, in sum, what you’ve got is a vehicle that’s very compromised as transportation, not unlike owning a jacked-up 4×4 with a huge V8 that gets 6 MPG and handles like a UPS truck. It excels at certain other things – like crawling rocks and bullying through deep mud.
But it is an inherently impractical vehicle.
Just like electric cars. Only no one is insisting the government force people to subsidize jacked-up 4x4s so affluent people can go off-roading…
PS: Please turn off the ALL CAPS!
Congratulations Folks ,I am going to be rich ,I have just leased the drilling rights for the Abiotic oil that is accessible from my property,not to mention all the money I will obtain in consulting fees from Japan and other zero oil countries (when I show them where to drill)(anywhwere- beware the faults though ).
A guy from Texas,bought a farm near here and setup a rig I’m told,the anticlines looked right so He sank a hole,nothing but maybe a little brine,(I guess Dr Gold wasnt in vogue yet )According to some of the posters here Germany could have won the war if they had just drilled deeper,can you imagine all the deep wells around Berlin?.
I am sorry but I still go with the Phd ‘s on this one,in my world Abiotic oil,resides with Pixie dust.
The pictures were nice,why didnt you include a few of mountain top removal and the Kuwaiti oil fields and the deep Horizon puking out millions of gallons of ick?
Be fair ,there is enough blame on both sides to go around(BTW ,people lie about gas mileage too) Put an Impact and ab 80’S era gas powered car in a fair sized auditorium and run them around and see which one causes you to turn the ventilation first .
Hi Kevin,
The thing is – I submit – that it’s like religious stuff. No one really knows. There are without question some interesting questions that need answers, such as why oil has been found at such great depths. There may and probably are processes in operation that we don’t fully grok.
It’s also clear that the “peak oil” hypothesis of 50 years ago was way off. Even if the general idea of limited (non-renewable) supply is correct, it seems at least possible that recoverable reserves are still vast. Certainly, we are not on the brink of running out of economically recoverable oil.
On the GM electric car vs. the ’80s-era gas-engined car in a closed-in space:
Well, for one, it’s 2016 (almost 2017) and the emissions of a modern IC car are virtually nonexistent. And while it’s true that if if you ran the 2016 in an enclosed space, it would eventually choke you out, this doesn’t negate the fact that emissions (and toxic waste) are also produced during the manufacture of electric cars and that the electricity on which electric cars depend is for the most part produced by emissions-producing utilities. For the comparison to be fair, as you say, we should compare the two on the basis of their total impact on the environment, not merely tailpipe exhaust emissions.
Right?
What answer do these people who call oil “Fossil Fuels” have for all the oil found in the arctic, or buried under the ocean floor many miles under the surface? Did millions of dinosaurs along with jungles inhabit the arctic? Did all the sea life from millions of years all die in a few places on the earth, where oil is found under the sea? So, oil comes from dead plant and animal matter that dies millions of years ago, and miraculously all of this organic matter transformed into oil, and moved to the arctic and under the sea bed? Really? Think about it. Do you know how asinine that theory sounds? It is obvious oil comes from something else besides dead dinosaurs and plants. Maybe we should not bury people in caskets and just bury them in the ground. In a few million years, you can use your great, great, great, great grandpa to fill up your new Ford.
Hi Rush,
I hear you – and agree. I’ve pointed out the same to others who hit me with the “Peak Oil” thing and (supposed) imminent scarcity…
Not very good points the crust has moved around a lot on the the Earth,My backyard used to be a sea beach ,now its high and dry about 1800 feet above sea level and some 250 miles inland,I find a lot of ancient coral reefs in Highland county very fossil rich (crinoids and the like at over 3000 ft elevation ,.
There is currently no scarcity of petroleum ( but we are burning the stuff like its going out of style {maybe save a little for our kids ?}.The fact is in the foreseeable future ,there may be hybrids coming in heavy equipment ,I just dont see big earthmovers being powered solely by electricity there has to be an energetic ,energy rich power source to turn the dynamos. Cars and bikes could run on electricity,but as has been pointed out (pardon my grammar) here so many times ,its too dang expensive for the poor people(no matter how much they would like ) to afford.That is one thing that would keep me from buying an electric car,the range is good enough now,I could live with one very easily,but there is no economic justification for buying one ,but if they keep on with the problems with adultrated gasoline( remember when they said they will get rid of old cars one way or the other?) its another minor justification for going electric.But I want people to realize there will be road taxes galore on electric vehicles when they become numerous.
When you can buy a Mirage for under 10 grand and gas is under $3 a gal,how could you justify buying a new “Leaf ” ? Unless you already had excess hydro or solar on your property ?
I will be the first to admit the advantages of well engineered electric products ,but from an economic standpoint ,for the average person ?I cant see it .
I’ve worked with this geology while working on oil exploration technology, and you’re mistaken.
While hydrocarbons can form geologically (the moon Titan is made from hydrocarbons), we know that the oil we extract on earth comes from organic life, and we know it because it’s full of the fossils of phytoplankton which are its source – things like algae diatoms. The ocean is full of these things and they’re responsible of producing about 3/4 of the earth’s oxygen, despite things like jungles being the poster children for environmentalism.
When these organisms die, they settle on the bottom of the ocean, get covered by silt, and over tens and hundreds of millions of years, plate tectonics moves the crust around and traps them in reservoirs where they can develop into oil. Plate tectonics is the reason you find oil under the arctic, because that crust used to be at much lower latitudes.
Just because you can’t imagine something, it’s arrogant to assume that it’s wrong. Most geologists aren’t trying to sell you some environmentalist religion, but are trying to understand the structure of the earth.
I don’t believe peak oil is imminent or even an issue, though it will happen one day. The Earth has a lot of oil, and we extract the easy stuff first. It gets more expensive as the easy stuff runs out. Shale oil is far more expensive to extract than traditional oil deposits. As oil gets expensive, the market will find alternatives, and we may stop burning it for energy, since it’s critical for manufacturing things like plastics and medicines.
(Also, ugh, I typed up a much better description, but it got eaten due to Javascript error when I pressed “Post Comment”, so this is the abbreviated version).
Peak oil was correct for the very specific thing for which it was created. US oil output of specific grades of oil with the available technology of the time. Others then stretched it for the purposes of agenda where the truth doesn’t matter.
Well,I have to concede how clean modern ICEs are(with pollution controls) My brother had a pressure washer running over the weekend and it stank up the whole neighborhood,but a modern car hardly registers on the olfactory nerves.
Above all you seem to at least consider both sides of an argument( most people either side wont do that,so kudos to you {plus you have an inordinate amount of common sense}.
We must not forget the subsidies that were given on the huge gas guzzling SUVs either .(I seen business people gobbling those things up when they figured out the “sweetheart”deal on those things( a V10 Expedition cant really be very fuel efficient hauling around one person .can it ?)
Maybe its an anomaly,but this is the hottest summer I have had to work outside in in over four decades ,thankfully I wont have to do it much longer.
Hi Kevin,
To me, what’s tragic is that technology – affordable technology – would allow 60-plus MPG average cars… right now. Today. That produce even less emissions than the already negligible emissions output of a current-year car. By dint of burning half or less the fuel over the same distance traveled.
If Uncle would quit issuing “safety” fatwas that bloat the curb weight of cars. Which is at odds with efficiency and emissions.
I am not opposed to “safety.” But – unlike exhaust emissions – it is no legitimate concern of the government’s if I wish to drive a car that hasn’t got air bags and maybe would not “protect” me to the extent it deems appropriate in the event I crash. Because I – as an adult human – have the right to make such risk-benefit calculations for myself. No one else has the right to do so.
If I wish to buy a 1,500 pound car that may not survive an impact with a tree as well as a 3,800 pound car… but my car gets 60 MPG (and costs $8,000) then that is my business, no one else’s.
Mind, I am not suggesting that “safe” cars are a bad idea. I am all for “safe” cars being sold and people being free to buy cars as heavy as they feel “safe” in and which have as many air bags and so on as they feel necessary to feel “safe” in.
But others should be free to choose what best suits them.
“Safety” is none of the government’s business.
Play fair indeed.
While Eric The Author has a good artistic way with the keyboard, and Eric The Commenter seems to be one of the few commenters who actually does stop and look at both sides, many of the other commenters just pick a side, top up with ammo, and unload. The instant internet communications seems to have brought out the worst in many people. Their brains get taken over by their emotions, and everyone suffers.
Hi BDev,
We all have our biases – but so long as we’re open to facts (and reason) rational debate is possible. That’s what I shoot for here.
I couldn’t just post the link (good spam filter), so I’ll try it again with these added words (http://www.ufunk.net/wp-content/uploads/2013/03/thumbs-and-ammo-5.jpg)
Hey we need a way to upvote commentors on this site(make it darn near perfect )
That is a capital idea! I will ask the computer dude about this…
Why would oil formed with or by the earth have nice even distributions? We don’t expect the same of gold or iron or anything else. However oil from long dead plants, bacteria, and animals however should be much more evenly distributed, because they have been everywhere at one point or another.
Based on the picture of the lithium “mine” and first hand knowledge of the one near where I live(rendered pointless with the South American discoveries) a bit of irony raises its head.
When the “environmental movement” first got started one of their biggest efforts was to stop strip mining of coal. Now they want a battery powered society that depends on strip mining.
Makes sense to me.
You don’t get lithium for EV batteries from a strip mine like in the picture.
You flood salt flats rich in lithium and suck up the brine to be refined.
And there’s nothing “toxic” in a lithium-based EV battery pack – don’t know where anyone gets that from. Maybe from NiCad cells? (Cadmium is a toxic heavy metal)
Nor does making EVs require “rare earths” – Tesla doesn’t use any in their EVs.
Hi Bill,
You make it sound innocuous; it’s not. These are large-scale industrial operations that involve earth rape akin to strip mining operations.
Lithium itself is nasty stuff. It’s corrosive and contact with moisture produces caustic lithium hydroxide. It can leach into water supplies (as from a leaking battery).
But perhaps more relevant, there may not be enough of the stuff to make mass-market electric car batteries.
It’s another fail. Functionally and economically.
Probably, environmentally as well.
You’re confusing lithium-ion batteries with lithium metal batteries.
And there’s plenty of lithium – the primary constraint would be how quickly a factory can turn it into lithium-ion battery packs.
They remain very expensive, compared to the cost of gasoline, but again, there’s no need for strip-mining to obtain lithium for battery packs.
Hi Eric;
Good article.
An electric vehicle MAY possibly work for someone in my position. First, I live in Arizona, and could have a solar power unit installed on the house. And my wife’s car could be an electric vehicle, which we would charge off the solar panels, since she only drives a few hundred miles a month.
However, that does not include the cost (to taxpayers) of subsidized solar panels….Even so, between the cost of the electric vehicle, and the cost of the solar panels, it might actually be more expensive for me to “be environmentally friendly” and “reduce my carbon footprint”.
But my question is, as Jerry Seinfeld would ask, “Who ARE these people?”
Hi Paul,
The irony – as I see it – is that electric cars might be viable… if government got out of the way. But instead of ultra-lightweight/basic electric cars designed for maximum cost efficiency and range, we get government-subsidized luxury-performance electric cars like the Tesla.
PS: Good to hear from you! It’s been awhile… 🙂
Eric
Agree with your article except for one wee detail. Porsches, especially the rear engined ones are AOK in winter. Plenty of traction. Good heater. Reliable starting every single time- even the old air-cooled one with carbies (an old-schooler 911 sure, but winter is not a problem for it). Wonderful braking performance.
I don’t know that any of that can be said about Elon’s Teslas though. My understanding is that the batteries are not so keen on cold winter days. Also I understand that part of the reduction in range they encounter on cold days is not just down to battery chemistry and related thermal effects on the battery, but also due to the extra aero and tyre drag caused by increased air density on cold days (something GM discovered with the EV-1). In a gasoline powered car, on the other hand, we just do not notice the air density effect since standing on the gas pedal a little more is un-noticable and the engine likes the increased air-density from cold air anyhow (the extra drag effect due to cold air is all but cancelled by its effect in improving engine performance). Of course, heating a battery car has a huge effect on range. It has absolutely no effect whatsoever on a gas or diesel car…
So, spare a thought for Dr Porsche’s cars. they go just fine in winter- toy or not. Besides which, the old guy left us an exciting surprise present in his cars. You can find out about it if you lift off the throttle in a fully-committed fast corner. Hope you are quick with steering and throttle correction (911 is one of life’s sensational cars to drive if you are!).
Siotu
Well-said, Siotu
There is a reason Teslas and other electric cars are for the most part California (and AZ, etc.) cars. That reason is winter. The effect of a 20 degree day on an electric car’s range would surely be dramatic – and not only because of the need to use the heater, which draws a lot of power (see, for example, the effect on your home utility bill of using a room space heater). In addition to that, the days are shorter. One burns the headlights for longer. Add these extra loads to the equation; now factor in the effect of these on a battery pack weakened by the very cold ambient air temp.
I’ve yet to test an electric car under such conditions myself. Because they never send me one in winter.
I wonder why….
I worked with some people who had Leaves (plural?), and their range dropped into the 40-45 mile area, when cold temps came around (20 degree F).
Now that you mention it, I don’t see too many of them out and about when the temp drops to -20!
Funny, that cold factor. A big rig starts the day on cold pavement, cold tires, cold engine air and cold driveline. It heats up during the day and if the day remains cold, not much difference. When it gets hot..and the hotter it gets, that load you hauled this morning and topped that hill at 60 might be down to 45 when the pavement get really hot, the tires get really hot, the charge air gets really hot, the gearboxes get really hot and the fuel gets really hot. I’ve noticed in nearly 50 years of doing this stuff that late in the hot day, a small amount of fuel left that’s really hot and the power is down. Even though everything else stays hot, you fuel up with cold fuel and some of that power returns. I’ve also noticed that when it’s 100% diesel it doesn’t lose power like those 10 and 15% blends.
I used to run from 2500 feet altitude during the day with nearly no humidity and mighty hot, get to the coast middle of the night, temps are way down, humidity is way up and that old rig feels like it’s got another 40 hp or more. Maybe it does. Dense, humid, cool air and cool everything else.
Maybe what’s good for electrics suck for ICE’s.
The fuel is a big factor. When I went to University we ran a Volkswagen turbo V6 in a testbed with different blends.
The absolute best result was with old pre-1990 diesel. I can’t remember the exact figures but it was an improvement in the 10% range.
Now this was in Sweden, I don’t know what kind of blends are used in the States or when you swirched to them.
Hi Fredrik,
Ultra Low Sulfur (ULS) diesel has been mandatory in the U.S. for road-going diesel-powered vehicles for several years. My understanding is this fuel is inherently less lubricating and also results in a significant MPG drop as well.
I saw a Tesla S on Friday. He pulled into a fast food joint near home so I decided to quit being a pussy and stop and have a conversation with him about his Tesla (I think this kind of thing is necessary…I certainly didn’t change his mind but hopefully planted a couple seeds and some things to give him pause).
He didn’t really like my point of these things being subsidized and how we are all being forced to help the purchase of car for the wealthy via taxation. He did say it was a state by state issue and that there is no federal tax benefit. He said there are some states that give no tax break for the purchase either. I’ve never looked that deep into what the tax breaks are (I didn’t want to get into the whole taxation is theft thing). Anyway, he liked glossing over this fact and I believe said something along the lines of it being necessary to hash out the technology if you will. I reminded him that should be up to the market and private capital. I said I have no problem with the technology itself but let if fail or succeed on it’s own merits. You can almost see it in their eyes as they gloss over when one says things like this. They just don’t want to accept it the business practices of Musk and Tesla Motors.
I also brought up the issue about what happens to the grid when more of these cars are on the road. He did make a good point about most of these things are being charged at night when demand is down. But even then, as they become more prevalent (lets hope not), it’s going to put more strain on the grid. So now the grid will be strained 24/7 instead of just part of the time. Not to mention that not everyone will be charging at night necessarily. Anyway you slice it, the grid as it stands now is not capable of the demand that will be put on it if electric cars become more prevalent.
His answer to my claims of his emissions being produced elsewhere and not the tailpipe is that even if they’re charged with electricity produced by coal burning power plants is that his emissions are still less than that of my i.c.e. car. I find that dubious at best but maybe there are others who can take him to task on that. I reminded him that most of what comes out of an i.c.e. car is water vapor and Co2. And that the exhaust from i.c.e. cars are extremely clean, upwards of 95% or so.
I talked with him about the range also. This surprised me and maybe he’s lying, but he said he gets upwards of 270 miles on a charge. And that the A/C doesn’t really effect it much in the summer but the heat actually effects more in the winter. And that his range only dropped slightly in the winter due to the heater running. That range seemed way high to me and have never heard of anyway going that far in a Tesla S. There is a supercharger (oddly enough) near me and he said sometimes he uses that. But even Tesla themselves advises against supercharging frequently as it reeks havoc on a battery pack.
I did get a few jabs in there about Musk and his little SpaceX oops (this was a day after that happened I believe). These guys really are fanboi’s and think Musk is some sort of visionary. Not my words, he actually called him a visionary. No worries, I was able to control myself from vomiting right then and there in the parking lot.
c_dub250
He’s bullshitting you about the range. These guys have no idea what it really is. They recharge early and often. They are indeed quite careful and conservative in matters pertaining to range. The huuuuge range story is repeated over and over, but none actually trust their own story. If they did they’d go cross country. Few ever do. And if they do, there is a lot of planning involved. A rigid plan is demanded. They can’t just up and go.
These chappies are either willfully ignorant or willfully dishonest about most of the facts pertaining to their cars, for instance those relating to manufacturing, raw materials, politics, taxation, finance, economics,….. When they start with the sanctimonious bullshitting I just point out that they have small penises for which they are unable to compensate, since if they really were onto the facts they’d not need to bullshit and if they were properly endowed they’d not need to bullshit. Teeny tiny weenies. Always trying to compensate for their known shortcomings by projection and silly demands for undeserved recognition.
Siotu
Hi Siotu,
Last spring, I test-drove the new (2017) Chevy Volt (see here: http://ericpetersautos.com/2016/06/08/2017-chevy-volt/ ) which is effectively an electric car that carries around an IC engine for generator back-up. It was the best of the bunch – so far – in that it did manage to travel about 50 miles before the battery pack depleted – at which point, the gas engine came on (and stayed on) to generate electricity to keep the electric motor turning and the car moving.
Point being… 50 miles of range.
After that, if it were not for the onboard IC engine, you’d be stuck. Or, waiting for at least half an hour to recharge (assuming a fast charger station is available).
The Volt – uniquely – can keep on going, but now you are averaging about 33 MPG.
Granted, if your driving is usually less than 50 miles per day, you can probably operate the thing on the batteries most of the time and so greatly reduce the amount of money you spend on gas.
But electricity isn’t free – and the Volt itself isn’t cheap.
Even at a giveaway price (and massively subsidized) it still costs in the low $30k range, rendering any economic case for it ridiculous unless gasoline prices double, at least.
I’ve overheard Roadster owners at Cars and Coffee openly admitting their range would drop by more than HALF if he got anywhere near the throttle, but also stated they managed over 200 miles before on a “cruise”.
As far as I know, all those guys no longer own a Roadster and have all gone back to I.C. cars.
Hi AJ,
Tesla touts the 0-60 and quarter-mile performance of their cars – and it is impressive. However, if you access that performance the range plummets. It is like having a Porsche 911 with a two gallon tank… that you refill with a syringe!
Sounds great, where do I sign up?
And re: Volt, has the gas mpg really gone to 33 ish now? I remember demoing a 2012 that did 40 mpg, which wasn’t bad in my opinion, but low 30’s sounds kind of crap.
Well, that’s with me driving… 🙂
eric, the gap between haves and have nots continues to grow as I’m sure your aware. The other day I saw a new Polaris off-road thingy with all sorts of stuff on it, winch, 4 doors, gun racks built-in stereo system with remote speakers for calling varmints, a golden commode so it wouldn’t corrode(I’m guessing here) and too many things for me to even know of their existence. It was about the size of a 4WD pickup, not sure why you just wouldn’t use one of those and it was over $25,000 and that one was probably more than that.
This is so you can go into the woods, shoot the trophy(fill-in-the-blank)and bring it back to “base camp” to show all those other guys with their $20,000 rifles and $10,000 binocs(I’m not exaggerating any of this stuff).
My point being, so why should those guy’s wives not want a Tesla, esp. since you and I have to pay for it? If it inconveniences it, they can just rent a car and let somebody haul the Tesla in and if all it needs is charge, they can deliver it back home or bring an upscale model they haven’t tried.
There is a serious disconnect here. About 9:30 yesterday morning I walked my coffee cup, all by myself, no help from a maid or anything, across the kitchen to the sink and was rinsing it out when I spied a doe grazing in the yard. We have a portion of the yard that’s been hairy vetch since before the house was here, dating from the first broadcasting of it in 1962……or a couple year before…..I forget. I asked the wife if she wanted some venison although it was an immature doe. The wife said we were having venison roll-ups for supper so I just enjoyed watching it graze. No telling how far I could have scared that doe off with one of those big whatchamacallits. Then I’d have needed that $20,000 rifle with the new computerized, hooked to the cloud and your smart phone or i pad or laptop, $23,000 scope that locks on automatically and fires and fires the gun once you have made the final decision and takes a photo of the shot that’s store in the cloud and If you bobble or weave it won’t fire until it’s locked back on.
I’m so stupid and pore I was merely thinking of easing into the barn and shooting the deer in the eye with my .22 single shot. I’m probably not the guy Tesla has its sights on….so to speak.
My wife knows a couple that fits this “profile.” Multi-millionares.
Naturlich, they have a Tesla.
And a BMW SUV, too.
Society For The Prevention Of Cruelty To Long Haired Men
http://metro.co.uk/2016/01/11/watch-david-bowies-first-tv-appearance-at-age-17-to-defend-long-hair-reminds-us-how-cool-he-always-was-5616093/
Do gooders gotnna do good
The term “fossil fuel” was coined in the 1950s when not much was known about the nature of naturally-occurring hydrocarbon products. Environmentalists have used this misconception about naturally occurring oil to their advantage; hence, the now-discredited concept of “peak oil”.
Oil is abiotic in nature, being produced deep within the earth by yet-unknown processes. Russian oil interests have been drilling deep wells, as much as 30,000 feet deep and coming up with oil deposits–far deeper than that of decayed plant and animal materials.
It turns that many of our depleted oil wells are “filling back up”; oil is migrating from deep within the earth, upward to many of our present drilling sites.
There are certain interests that do not want to see oil as a plentiful natural resource–FOLLOW THE MONEY…
As to vehicles, it’s about CONTROL. The powers that be want us OUT of our vehicles, relegated to high-rise, soviet-style apartments using bicycles, trains or buses for transportation–limiting us to certain areas. Of course, the pristine “wilderness” would be restricted to the “elite” with their “dachas” would be reserved for the “elite” environmentalists and their ilk…
Quoting something very important,
“Oil is abiotic in nature, being produced deep within the earth by yet-unknown processes. Russian oil interests have been drilling deep wells, as much as 30,000 feet deep and coming up with oil deposits–far deeper than that of decayed plant and animal materials.
It turns that many of our depleted oil wells are “filling back up”; oil is migrating from deep within the earth, upward to many of our present drilling sites.”
This is absolutely critical to know about and understand. It bears repeating time and time again.
Siotu
Hi Siotu,
The abiotic thing is fascinating – scientifically as well as politically.
I remember when it was discovered, years ago, that there are oceans of liquid hydrocarbons on Saturn’s lifeless moon, Titan. I thought to myself: Wait a minute. All my life, I’ve been told hydrocarbons are the result of the decay of organic matter… but there is no plant or animal life on Titan…
The Deep Hot Biosphere by Dr. Thomas Gold explains it as best it can be…
https://www.amazon.com/Deep-Hot-Biosphere-Fossil-Fuels/dp/0387985468
Abiotic or not, if far cleaner and cheaper ways of creating and storing energy are created, would you not want that? The free market sure will. (http://peterdiamandis.tumblr.com/post/149936753278/disrupting-energy)
Fossil fuels will be a much smaller niche market for plastics and whatnot. And motor hobbyists who enjoy ICEs and the fun they provide can continue on to their heart’s content, also as a niche market. Hell, eventually there will probably be a new way for you to create the needed hydrocarbon fuels from your yard scraps and kitchen waste. And you will eventually be able to 3-D print most if not all of the parts necessary to build your own.
In any case, no one will take away your toys. But things will change… big time. That’s how it works. Might as well gear up towards a different future, while maintaining your passion.
” if far cleaner and cheaper ways of creating and storing energy are created, would you not want that?” Of course. But they have not yet, not by a long shot. The watermelons are intent on forcing on us sources that art questionably cleaner and definitely not cheaper.
People talk about 3D printing things like it’s easy, but it’s really not. It requires a lot of skill just to have the 3D printer operable, and then you need to have a knowledge of how the part is made in the first place and how to account for tolerances and errors in the printer itself.
On paper it sounds good, in practice it’s more complicated than simply casting and turning a part in a machine shop yourself.
I’m so sick of the 3D printing term. Rapid prototyping or additive manufacturing are better. But it’s just not going to be an economical or fast way to make parts in high volumes. Properties continue to be lagging.
The place where it really works best is to make a few things without tooling or make the patterns or molds to make a few of the things.
Sure there are desktop home FDM machines now but it is no where close to injection molding even with the 100K commercial machines.
Agreed, 3D, or whatever you want to call it, is primarily for prototyping. As it continues to develop, it will probably become a somewhat practical way to make ‘one-offs,’ like replacement parts for ‘obsolete’ machines, and thereby a way to keep the classics running.
One method is to use the SLS process to make the ‘wax’ for the investment casting process. Another is to create the sand mold mold for sand casting.
Enter my fictional device .I dreamed up many years ago(of course I didnt copyright it ) The “Macgruder extruder ” feed in the proper parameters and feedstocks and it will spit out anything,need a new grill for that 33’Ford?why just enter the dimensions and assays for the metal and make sure the duplicating fluid stocks are full and let er’ go to work,presto ,chango in a few hours the parts for Henrys ol ‘pride is conceived factory fresh.
Actually these things are becoming closer to reality all the time,So maybe there is hope to keep the old iron going .
Hi BDev,
If then yes.
But they are neither!
And that’s the problem.
My back gets up because of the unctuous prattling about the superiority (not) and inevitability (very questionable) of electric cars as other than toys for the affluent elites.
The fact that EVs have to be subsidized and forced on the market is telling… is it not? That Tesla has to sell cars based on “tech appeal” and quickness and luxury and glamor.
But – so far – no one has been able to design and build an EV that is cheaper to buy and operate than a low-cost IC car. They simply do not make economic sense.
Add to this the fact that the range/convenience of the EV is more than a little bit inferior to that of the IC car. That the EV is affected (negatively) by such things as use of accessories and by changing temps to a degree that an IC car isn’t.
So… why bother with these EVs?
If the object is other than economy of operation, then the exercise is about performance or style or some other thing that people have every right to want, if that’s what they want. But they also should pay full freight for it – without “help” from you and me.
I mean, I’d really like a new 911 turbo… it’s very quick and looks great. But should I get “help” from the government?
There is, I realize, the “zero emissions” stuff. But – again – are electric cars really “emissions free”? Or do they produce their emissions elsewhere? And what about their specific “environmental” effects, such as the several hundred pounds per car of toxic materials in the battery pack? The impact of extraction/manufacture of these toxic materials? What happens down the road, when the car reaches the end of its life.. and some old boy parks it (and the several hundred pounds of toxic materials) in his yard? What happens when the battery pack, as the result of age/deterioration, breaks open and the toxic materials spill out?
Etc.
And as far as “no one will take away my toys”…. I dunno about that, either.
Consider the times we live in. Is it really paranoid or over-the-to be concerned that they might very well do exactly that?
Eric – good points all. Your emphasis on “what’s happening now” is valid and astute. I think we (humanity) are at a major inflection point right now, and any clinging to old ways of doing things will be a big hindrance. My main point is that it is all changing, and changing fast. There are a huge number of efforts underway at countless labs and research departments dealing with all aspects of energy and related fields. Peruse the “Energy” sections of these sites to get a sense of the energy-related innovations occurring daily:
phys.org
technologyreview.com
eurekalert.org
nextbigfuture.com
Casually follow those links for a few weeks and you’ll probably be amazed, as I was, at all the ongoing advances.
Everything is being affected, and will continue to change, faster and faster. I see no point in holding a death grip on any current technology, esp tech of 50+ years ago. Fossil fuels will continually lose their current huge market share as science, applications engineering and markets for new technologies crank along. I welcome all the advances.
Like you, I am hugely libertarian, more precisely a strong Voluntaryist/Anarcho-Capitalist. Had fun with a number of muscle cars when I got my first DL back in the early 70s.
As far as I am concerned, government should immediately get out of the way of pretty much everything, and totally everything soon after that.
And BTW – excellent site you’ve got and excellent writing and commentary to go with it. I came here via LRC.
I personally am not interested in adopting any of the so-called “advances” and will stick with the old tried and true fossil fuel technologies as long as possible.
BDev
Yeah, amazing stuff. The trouble with all this brave new stuff is affording it. In the USA you have 15% of the population on food stamps, 28% of able bodied workers are unable to find a job and be hired. A retired couple with $250,000 savings (admittedly members of a tiny minority since the vast majority of US citizens above the age of 55 yrs of age have less than $20,000 savings) can only get $600 per year in interest earnings before tax (unless, that is, they want to take the risky plunge into trading equities or derivatives), a ~$1.5 trillion government deficit, a Department of War which reports that over the last few years it mislaid something in the order of $6-trillion or so of taxpayer funds and does not know exactly how much there was of it or where it all went, $222-trillion of unfunded liabilities, consumers topped out in debt (peak debt has arrived), ZIRP, soon NIRP, $5-billion wasted in executing a coup d’etat in Ukraine, untold more in setting up ISIS in Syria (gee didn’t that work out well for everyone), a war in Afghanistan that just keeps going on and on (and has already been lost), etc etc etc etc.
Now where exactly is the enormous quanta of new capital necessary to fund the commercial development and deployment of all the “new stuff” going to come from? It won’t be retirees or people saving for their retirement. It won’t be the potential customers. It won’t even be the usual investors/savers either (why would anyone invest in this sort of thing when either they have little discretionary capital left or they realise that in the very near future circumstances are going to conspire such that very few people are going to be in the position to buy or use these new “hi-tech” thingawhatzits anyway?).
Siotu
” a war in Afghanistan that just keeps going on and on”
Well, ‘they’ say we can’t pull out yet, because there would be civil war. But that will always be the case, and was guaranteed from the moment ‘we’ went in. So the options are either let the civil war take place, or remain forever.
Hi Phillip,
The war serves the agenda of the government-corporate nexus. It justifies “defense” spending and it provides a sideshow to distract the masses as well as a sluice to dispose of the surplus peonage. Either literally, by putting them six feet under or simply by employing them as “troops” and thereby avoiding the problems associated with lots of disaffected young men with few, if any, economic prospects who might otherwise become dangerous to the government-corporate nexus.
“There are a huge number of efforts underway at countless labs and research departments dealing with all aspects of energy and related fields.”
And how much of that research is funded by the gunvermin?
“There are a huge number of efforts underway at countless labs and research departments dealing with all aspects of energy and related fields.”
Well, sure. The Apollo Program was one such.
But money is limited, even when government takes (and spends) it.
Solar, electric, fuel cell and so on… very appealing, in terms of This or That. But it ultimately comes down to what it costs.
If it costs too much – like electric cars – then it’s not economically viable.
Doesn’t matter how “cool” it is.
What people can afford does matter.
I mean most people.
Most if not all the hate mail I get from electric car FanBoys comes from self-unaware rich FanBoys. These people – who typically have six-figure (plus) incomes – simply don’t get the financial constraints most people have to deal with. They never seem to consider what it would be like to have a gross annual income of say $60,000 – and a mortgage.
For most people, the only appeal of an electric car is its economy. By which I mean the total cost of ownership, not whether it “saves” gas. For a person concerned about gas mileage/costs, a car that costs $40,000-plus is preposterous. Like advising a person to buy a $400,000 house because it has “efficient” appliances, vs. a house that costs $200k.
So this guy tells me “this truck will practically pay for itself”. How dat frien? Well, he shows me this rebate and another and another, zero percent down, zero percent financing(I lik dat….all zeros). Then he shows me how much I take off my taxes at end of year. Now me be excited, I take off more dan I make, got to be de bes ting I ever see.
So, can we put you in it today? Man, you don’t have to put me in nothin, I gets in my ownself. Then he puts a bunch of papers in front of me. I don’t have my specs so I just ask what it say. He told me in a few words. Are you ready to sign he say? No, just let the truck make its mark. First check truck sends me to pay for itself, i be back for anoder, maybe many more.
Dammit, Eight!
You are a master…. 🙂
Ever think about writing a book? Seriously.
You’ve got the mojo.
Thanks eric, it means a lot, esp. to a guy who couldn’t read or write before epa. It’s the mojo working here and the word master that operates the site that inspires.
I wrote a little book once, leetle, real small, 2 pages. They(whoever “they” are)say it’s not the length but the information you can get from it. My book, it was only two pages. A man with all that pohlesse protection and great big shotgun with a badge that say Texas State Police picked up my book. He looked at it and threw it back on my dresser top. Sweat rolls down my head and I feel a chill. In another while another protected up denizen with BATFE painted on his protection walks by, he looks at it and walks away.
I get out of jail, house looks like a tornado came through, no doors, most stuff broken, dogs nearly dead, but the book sits there. Computer, fax, scanner, copier….all gone…..containing nothing but legit financial stock trading info. Little book still there. I get a call from bailbondsmen, they be coming back, got a new tack to try. So I hide my book in best spot ever, on top of my dresser.
They want all my fancy gun parts and pieces. I watched several of them make all sorts of moves to avoid that big, nasty GoJo can. They be so allergic to anything like work. I find my GoJo can still full of slimy old GoJo, not been moved. I smiled, hide your stuff in plain sight came through again.
I dump out everything and let it drain. I grabbed my acetylene torch and in a couple minutes had a big pile of…….slag.
I sprayed the dogs down again with cool well water and then gave them baths and put them in their own rooms, jammed the outside doors back up over the frames and turned down the a/c as I knocked back some cold beer. Then I noticed a big trash can with a lid shoved down into it. My hash maker, full and untouched. I shook it a couple minutes and smoked the results, laid down in the detritus that had been a bed and foun I had a bit of a smile. I realized I was thinking along the lines of what the oracle of the NE would someday reveal to me……Fuck ’em and feed ’em fish heads.
Many thanks to all here in kindred spirit.
Fossil fuels? I have fossils but how you get fuel from them is a head scratcher. I work in the oil biz, out there where those gases tell you there’s a hole down to petroleum. I speak with petroleum engineers but nobody speaks of fossil fuel.
Ask a petroleum engineer where the black stuff originates. He’ll say he wished he knew, he’d be very rich if he knew.
Liquid methane ,5% of Titans atmosphere is methane(atmosphere at around 1.5 times earth pressure or density )
So I guess the oil companies dont need to drill any new wells ,beings they have the bonanza of the old depleted wells that were powered by natural gas refilling(is the Earth squeezing its zits or are the volcanoes boils ?)
Hi Kevin,
I don’t pretend to have the answers; I only have questions. How is it, for instance, that oil deposits are being found at such extreme depths? If hydrocarbons are the result of organic processes, why do they exist (in vast quantities) in apparently abiotic environments (Titan, for example)? Why, if oil is not abiotic and so not-renewable, are some “dry” wells apparently re-filling?
I think we can safely conjecture, at least, that the economically available reserves of petroleum are vast. That we are nowhere near “peak” oil.
Right?
As an aside, I’ve never grokked the apparent dislike for petroleum fuels that many people seem to have. The relative abundance of these fuels, their versatility and ease of use have improved the average person’s material existence to an extent that would have been considered impossible as recently as 150 years ago.
Yes, there are negatives associated with petroleum fuels. But most of these are manageable and the benefits are incalculable.
We can argue about non-issues from now on, the very thing TPTB wants to happen. They give these environmentalist dicks good enough salaries to sling bullshit. Some of them even believe what they’re saying but I’d bet plenty are just knocking back a check, one they couldn’t get any other way.
We’ve been building petroleum infra-structure for over a century. When you could literally skim oil from the surface of the ground everybody was doing it and it wasn’t expensive them. More oil meant more things to use it and more demand meant more money to find it. Hell, we had martial law in Texas at one point to keep people from bringing in new wells and selling the oil because there was so much and it was soooo cheap. This was in the 30’s. After the entire industrialized world changed from coal to petroleum in WWll, we didn’t have a problem getting enough and after the war it just continued to increase even though the demand for it compared to the 30’s was a huge increase. I first went to the west Tx. oil field in ’69 and there was plenty. Dry holes were uncommon and once ground radar was developed dry holes were nearly non-existent. Huge amounts of completed wells were capped simply because there were so many others that flowed all the oil you could want. I recall “gushers” when I was a kid. They’d blow out due to so much gas pressure, sometimes catastrophically. Deep wells back then were 7000 feet or less. Our normal wells in most of the patch now are the same depth and they’re easy peasy. 6 wells get drilled from the same location and right now, even some of those big rigs are still running. Most everybody now is simply using their single hole rigs and getting plenty oil, most of them flowing 300 BPD but choked back to 65-80. It’s hard to collect 300 BPD from a half dozen wells in a small area and plans are in the offing to build more pipelines to these areas to reduce costs.
China, this very second, has tankers lined up for miles at every US refinery port or offloading port. They’re not delivering petroleum. They’re delivering processed fuel and it’s cheap.
To replace the liquid fuel vehicles with electrics is sheer folly. We’ve worked hard he last decade+ to build transmission lines and routing facilities and we’re basically keeping up with home and business and manufacturing(sic)demands and in a lot of the US, not keeping up. To think that if tomorrow there were all of a sudden a completed battery or portable storage like capacitors we’d be able to convert to electric cars in a decade or even two decades is a fools mission.
Everybody can howl and scream for their fuel of choice but in a practical sense, there isn’t a fuel of choice besides petroleum products whether it be liquid or gas.
Hell,we can all arm up, get together in groups and shoot it out to determine who wins and it still wouldn’t matter.
Obama, like all other politicians at the federal level, was bought and paid for before his name was ever repeated to hold any office and certainly before becoming president. Republicans and Democrats can howl and gnash their highly costly teeth and “libertarians” can run against them as Republocrat lite but it won’t alter the fact that we are a petroleum society and we will likely never be an electrical society as far as vehicles are concerned. Well, none of us will ever see it if it should come about. What we’ll see is those getting paid to increase the cost of everything and watch the most prosperous people on earth be reduced to the same level of the masses of India. Carbon credits my ass. Where did those come from? Obviously companies aren’t held up by a free market. This bullshit has to be the work of the DC crowd.
Recently the state police demanded to know where my “bunker” was. I laughed at them and said “If I had a fuckin bunker I wouldn’t be having this conversation”. Without petroleum we’ll all need a bunker to not freeze in the winter and stay cool in the summer. In fact, there are two dugouts on my place, one only 100′ from our house where people lived during the first oil boom during the ’20’s. This field played out and no wells were drilled for decades. Now we have new wells and it continues to produce flowing wells. When we have “flowing well” batteries and ‘flowing well” electricity, we’ll be driving electric cars. Then we’ll be looking for more aluminum and copper mines. TANSTAAFL
I’d like to make one more point about global warming and now climate change. It virtually quit raining in west Tx. in 1993 and by 2007 we had the worst cotton crop ever, the next year we had the best one ever. Mother nature can sure change fast with that “climate change”. The old saw in this part of the country is “If you don’t like the weather right now, hang around a little while and it’ll change”. Climate Change caused by man and he’s so damned good at it he can make it not rain one year and rain like a big dog the next. If you can stomach that I have some beachfront property right here in the patch i’ll sell for bargain prices. Hell, it is sand after all.
It’s even worse. California CANNOT even today get enough electricity during the hot summer months when A/C is running so there’s brown-outs now. How will they get even more when a large part of their car fleet is electric? Aside from shredding birds, you can’t make enough using wind, and solar – Hey, another Musk crony boondoggle! – to generate enough power.
The supply side of the energy equation is even more badly broken unless neighboring states build a lot more coal plants.
But here the Auto-Uncle cronyism echoes Marx “A capitalist will sell us the rope we will use to hang him”.
California is a big economy, but because of greed the car companies all want to sell into the market.
I commented on Tom Woods’s recent “libertarian argument for free trade” that you can either have the NAP or “free trade”.
California would be Venezuela if we stopped subsidizing it.
But the worst thing is they just put onerous restrictions on Guns that violate the 2nd amendment. Maybe Gov. Moonbeam knows whats coming.
It will be interesting when Facebook, Twitter, Apple, and Google have brownouts or blackouts at their headquarters. Or the power goes out in their home neighborhoods and Black Lives Matters decides to use the opportunity to steal and burn their s***.
Smart meters, by one means or another will mean the corporations will get power and the peasants won’t.
Apples new corporate campus (the big round building) comes with its own on site natural gas power plant. They seem to know what is coming.
Many large businesses–some not so large–have gone to CHP generators. Right now the smallest are around 7kw. In the next 2 or 3 years there will be 3kw units coming into the market. Those make sense for a home. Most homes don’t use 2kw, so the extra power can be put back out onto the grid and the power company will have to pay you for it if you do net metering–up to a certain amount of kw.
Anyone with a CHP generator will be insulated from uncles brown outs and power outages. So yes, Apple probably sees what they have currently in California, and what’s coming.
Texas has been a source of NG powered everything for a long time. Almost all our power used to come from NatGas and lakes everywhere they used for cooling. It made great winter fishing and cheap electricity but 20 years ago a company with two arms, but controls both electrical production and retail NatGas bought all those companies who supplied cheap electrical power and tied everything into the Okla-Union coal-powered plant(don’t move upwind of this thing in Ok). Since Tx. has its own power grid it was easy to work the specifics for wind power, esp. since the western part of the state is…..windy. I mean west Texans are not put off by 45 mph wind when it comes to golfing or fishing or much or anything else. If you can’t do those things in the wind you need to move. I’ve seen people from out of state that didn’t realize not pissing into the wind wasn’t good enough. You have to turn sorta sideways or the low pressure created by your body will make things spin around…..and that’s not what you want. Our electrical capacity keeps growing by leaps and bounds….and it needs to with the huge influx of Ca. yankees moving in. The great thing is, there’s only two places of limited capacity that even connect to the US power grid.
Oil production and irrigation have been run off on-site natgas wells for as long as I can remember and before I was born. Now we’re seeing more CNG fueling stations, even for big rigs. Many of the oil related companies have been running GM CNG trucks for years now. It looks like a win-win situation. I live in an old oil field with not much oil left but plenty of gas.
Eight,
I’m waiting for the smaller CHP units to come out for sale. I’m tired of giving money to Rocky Mountain power, subsidiary of pacificorp, subsidiary of Berkshire Hathaway, owned by the oracle of Omaha, Warren Buffet.
That son of a bitch knows just how to get filthy rich. Regulated utilities. There’s no business like government protected monopoly business.
ancap, There’s a well near me drilled about 10 years ago. It was set to be a good producer for oil and it free-flowed 30 BPD. Owners got greedy, tried a cheap sand frac method that didn’t work. Every time they put a new pump in it, it sands up and destroys the pump. Now what they have is a gas well. If those units were affordable there are a few people close enough to buy that well or some other one like it that had the same thing happen and use that gas for electrical production and vehicle power.
Perhaps the answer in sunny California is a “powerwall” and a dedicated array that powers the AC when the sun is shining at its brightest (I think the math would work-if I were wealthy thats what I would do) People ignore things that the sun could easily do ( a solar batch heater wouldnt be that difficult to construct,yes you could basically have “free” hot water “you can heat a fair amount of water to the almost scalding point with a couple of loops of garden house “yech !”People lack the will to help themselves ,this society is geared toward dependency on convenience.
As Eric said electric cars would be more Viable if Uncle would get out of the way,the “sheeple”cannot be trusted to manage their own lives ,Uncle must keep us safe from ourselves(what are we going to turn into-those plump helpless people on the movie “Wall-e”?
The fruitsbats prosper and put faces on the trees (minus the genitalia) ” to -whit ,to -whit,while Greasy Joan ,doth stir the pot “
Publicly funded (read “taxpayer”) science has always been subject to the whims of those government agencies providing the funding. In all cases, FOLLOW THE MONEY. . . Here are a number of examples:
First was the marijuana “study” that was funded during the Nixon administration. The “results” of the study showed marijuana to be relatively innocuous and safe. Since the “results” of the study did not “square” with what those who funded it wanted, it was quietly closed. The government agency wanted the results to show marijuana as a “dangerous drug”.
Global warming (aka “climate change”) has been shown to be a fraud (climate is always changing) and has attracted the snake charmers (al gore) and hustlers out of the woodwork. The so-called “hockey stick” model has been shown to be fraudulent. The attempts to foist “carbon credits” and other scams on the public was unsuccessful. Once again FOLLOW THE MONEY.
Fraud in science is not only limited to those who are providing the funding. There was a case in the Pacific northwest where so-called scientists “planted” lynx fur in certain forests to make them “off-limits” to logging. Fortunately, these government Fish and Wildlife Service scientists were caught. Of course, they received NO punishment for their behavior. The so-called “endangered species act” is actually more detrimental to humanity . . . species are always changing . . .
The first pot study was done at the behest of Randolph Hearst through Hoover using their new point man, Harry J. Anslinger. Anslinger did as instructed and the study was a wash, no big deal, a non-issue. Hearst wanted the study to reveal that the brown horde from “down south” brought pot and were the source of a huge crime wave as a way to ban hemp, the real object Hearst feared. Hoover gave Anslinger the word on what the next study would reveal and Du Pont was front and center in wanting the ban on hemp since he had this new “miracle” fiber made from petroleum. Ban hemp and only wood would work for newsprint, only nylon and king cotton would work for the textile industry and demonizing Mexicans would work for the cops. It was a three-for and Anslinger came back with a study of which the results had been determined in back room deals.
If you can watch Reefer Madness and not bust a gut I dare you to watch it stoned and remain straight-faced. There’s a great deal of back room knowledge but these three things fairly sum up the need to ban pot. FBI benefits like a big dog, as do timber barons and the new nylon industry that was assured during WW ll of having it’s source, petroleum, supported in the middle east by any means necessary.
The movie, Killer Elite, is based on a true story of the lengths countries will go to in stealing middle east oil for the cheapest price possible for the PTB. It’s actually a decent movie.
And don’t forget that Henry Ford was already working with plastics made from hemp oil. Rockefeller was on board with the ban.
Environmentalists have been some of the most dishonest people in their misguided attempts to “save the planet”. Our earth is much more resilient than they would have you believe. Environmentalists see humans as a “pestilence”. They would like to see the human population reduced (by any means necessary) by around 90%. The survivors would be walled-off in soviet-style high-rise apartments, riding bicycles, taking trains and buses while the wilderness areas would be available only to the “anointed” environmentalists.
I, for one, have no use for these limp-wristed, birkenstock-wearing, prius-driving, tofu-eating poor excuses for human beings. I would suggest that environmentalists take their own advice and eliminate themselves first.
Environmentalists are like watermelons–green on the outside and red (communist) on the inside. It’s always been about control.
I CHEER when I hear a of a “greenpeace” ship getting blown out of the water. . .
No. You are talking out of your *ss.
Environmentalism is essentially the study, understanding and finding ever better ways to cooperate with Nature’s timeless systems of life-creation and life-preservation. To study it in depth is to be awed by it all – Life: One huge freaking miracle happening all around us every moment. Anyone with a lick of sense can and should be an ‘environmentalist;’ assuming you like to breath good air, drink clean water, eat nutritious food, enjoy temps that are hospitable to life, etc.
Then comes the politics… evil, psychopathic, manipulated, cronyed, corrupted and populated by the pathetic dregs of society. The politics of environmentalism are as bad if not worse than the politics of any other area of human social life. If you want to complain about the politics of environmentalism, fine. Don’t conflate the good people who truly care about living intelligently, wisely and well with those statist assh*les who want to run your life while making off with your wallet.
The controllers of the world co-opt freedom oriented labels.
Environmentalism used to be people who understood how to live with a certain harmony that promoted individual freedom. Look at what is now done to the mountain men, the desert dwellers, and all others who live lives in harmony with their environment? There is now prison for those who dare take care of things on their land.
Once upon a time environmentalism like liberalism were good things. Both have been co-opted by controllers and the policies under those labels are created to control us.
Amen BrentP.
So I say wrestle the words and labels back from the twisted jerks who warped them. The word “progressive” particularly bristles my neck hairs. I always understood progressive to mean “better and freer in every way.” Wow was I surprised when I first found out that it now means collectivist and statist to the Nth degree.
So I say wrestle the words and labels back from the twisted jerks who warped them.
I think it might be too late. I’m re-reading The Road to Serfdom right now. In the introduction, Hayek is distressed by the coopting of the term ‘liberal’ by the proggies. And that was many, many years ago.
They have had their way with this country for a long time. They take credit for things that would have happened, anyway. Like the improvement in the environment. As a society gets more affluent, of course they are going to pay more attention to their environment, to the water and the air. It’s only natural. They either come up with new ways to manufacture or they shift the dirtiest production to countries still on the way up.
Want a cleaner environment? Keep pushing the standard of living ever higher.
A.Yeti – Good point… the question is, “Can standards of living increase fast enough across the planet, and the environment survive along the way?” Very tough question; doesn’t seem likely. Mass extinctions >100X the normal background extinction rate, happening right now due to human activity. Most humans on the planet still breeding like rabbits. Tough to reconcile.
Hi BDev,
Arguably, much of the earth-rape (and “environmental impact”) currently happening is happening because of government. How much earth rape occurs as a result of the literally insane (if the standard is necessary defense) military apparat? The fleets of aircraft and carriers and tanks and mechanized equipment? How much fuel does the government burn and how much of it is effectively “uncontrolled” in terms of emissions?
Definitely true. The whole presence and business of govt is bizarre, as if people have unconsciously decided to take the worst aspects of humanity and coagulate all of them into one institution. And then to worship it as vital to our existence… more bizarre. Not only is govt the worst polluter of all time, it is also the worst killer of all time. You probably know about Rummel’s work on Democide (https://www.hawaii.edu/powerkills/welcome.html). 262,000,000 deaths have been cause directly by Government in the 20th century alone. And at least 625,000,000 more before that. We’re getting pretty close to 1 billion government-caused deaths on our planet.
So yeah, eliminating govt would be the biggest step, by far, of reestablishing sanity on this planet.
It’s what they are progressing towards. Seems few ever bother to find out.
BDev…your unwarranted criticism exposes your “agenda”.
What say you about the crony science that the “global warming” scientists are putting out, and DEMANDING that oil companies be prosecuted for having a differing take on this “globull warming” agenda?
What say you about the government “biologists” who planted lynx fur in a forest in order to stop logging interests?
What say you about the refusal of government to reclassify a plant (marijuana) as a useful medical (and social) substance?
Science id FULL of corruption, especially the environmental movement.
anarchyst – Having worked in and with science and engineering for my whole career, I see three distinct sets of scientists:
1) Those who are totally into science because they absolutely love it, live it and breathe it. They love the thrill of scientific discovery, improving things, making a difference, enjoying and following their innate curiosity. The True Blues.
2) Those who love science, and also hold politically oriented agendas. Their particular brand of science inflames their emotional side that wants to “make a difference,” but as we both can see, this often pollutes their objectivity and undermines their credibility. Nevertheless, in most cases, their intent is good.
3) Those who will do whatever science is ‘necessary’ in order to reach the desired conclusion of their paymasters, and quickly move on.
With that in mind, when I see someone spouting off about Crazy Evil Environmentalists, I see someone who disregards the huge number of good-intentioned people who are seriously concerned about how humanity is f**king up the planet and all Life on it (search: Sixth Great Extinction). Sure there are some politically-motivated scientists (closet statists) who get most of the attention, and they need to be muzzled. But you also have got to recognize all of the good guys out there who know what they are talking about, and are seriously concerned.
The “scientists” producing studies claiming that we are screwing up the entire planet are akin to the “scientists” employed by the tobacco companies whose studies concluded that cigarettes were perfectly safe. You have see where the funding is coming from, follow the money.
I don’t buy it and “saving the planet” does not enter into any of my decisions. As far as I am concerned environmentalists should be treated like rabid animals.
CO2 is not destroying the planet, but all I hear about is how I must obey and sacrifice because CO2 is destroying the planet. Then I see real environmental problems. Military open pit burning of waste, DU, China’s spewing of toxins, the amazon rain forest being cut down, and countless other tragedy of the commons issues. What’s being done to deal with these very real environmental problems? Approximately zero. It’s because science’s masters don’t care about any of the real problems, they care about control. They profit from the real problems.
^^Exactly. It may be hard for Americans or Europeans to comprehend, but if you were to travel outside to poorer countries and see the vast expanses of pollution in the cities and countryside (actual pollution like CO, NOx, etc), they’d have a heart attack. VW is getting crucified over minor dodges while Chinese vehicle dealers openly sell millions of new vehicles with carburetors and no catalyst.
When I was in SE Asia I had a fuel injected motorcycle, and no one wanted to fix it because it was “too high tech”. Never mind DI MPFI vs. MPI or TBI, most people don’t even have vehicles with electronic chokes or accelerator pumps! Hell, a vast majority of Indians don’t even bother with 4 strokes…
Point is, the left is so grossly uninformed yet so certain of themselves that they feel the need to push their virtue on other people without realizing how catastrophic the consequences are and how contrary they run against their agenda. The perfect irony if you will.
There is
Passive Ignorance: Don’t know, don’t care, gimme a beer, what’s on TV tonight?
Willful Ignorance: Don’t want to know cuz I’m ‘too sensitive’ to handle it;
Brazen Ignorance: I don’t buy it, their all a bunch of leftist commies or rightist fundamentalists, f**k ’em all, I’m right, they’re wrong and that’s that.
Passive ignorance is fine – mostly harmless people of modest IQ who just want to skate through life, enjoying/pleasuring themselves.
Willful ignorance is mostly not harmful, though sheltered, severely lopsided and pathetic. Pollyannas who close every email with “Love, Light and Laughter!”
Brazenly ignorant is at minimum irritating, at maximum self and other-destructive. No problem being self-destructive; go for it. It’s when arrogant, brazen ignorance is coupled with self-righteousness that it can be seriously destructive to loads of other people and property.
At least the self-righteous identify themselves to you as your enemy. That’s a plus since shot placement is so important. It’s the others who will be cornered and go along and support the self-righteous that are the worst threat. The asshole who is intolerant of most others is easily identified as such by thinking people. A person who can turn off even a clover. The ones who will secretly be bullied and support the bully is as much an enemy of freedom as the bully. Caesar is all-powerful, he see’s everything we do and is the final arbiter. Those who support him and not admit it are as dangerous as any disease that exists. Weimar Germany comes to mind. Everyone tried to outspy each other.
Eightsouthman – Yes indeed. When a human brain goes off-kilter, whether by drugs, horrible diet, psychopathy/mental illness or simple egocentric belligerence, it can spin out in all sorts of bizarre directions. And like U said, couple that with the hoards of a**kissers and bootlickers milling around, and you’ve suddenly got a real problem on your hands. And yeah, the neighbor spy thing in Germany was a case study in fear gone amok.
I imagine most electric utility companies in the US are like the one that services my area. They are far from being able to provide enough electric for more then the handful of electric cars that exist.
Between barely keeping up with basic maintenance on the distribution system and the loss of generation due to the feds war on coal powered plants. There is no way many people can even make the switch in my area before it would cause brown outs.
The are closing nearly a THIRD of their generation due to no longer being able to pollute as much as before. They hope to be able to buy on the open market instead of making their own, which I imagine won’t work out so hot when all electric companies do that. At some point they would likely restrict when electric cars can recharge, they already try to encourage night charging, someday it won’t be asking.
Brown outs and black outs are common in the third world. They seem intent on importing that here too, only decreasing the range of these cars even more.
These people are insane.
Mother Theresa was one of these rabid altruist-collectivist types, not a saint.
https://scienceblog.com/60730/mother-teresa-anything-but-a-saint/
Yep. But of course it was inevitable that (anti)Pope Frankie Marx would push for her canonization. Joseph Stalin is probably next on the list (hey, ol’ Uncle Joe was once a student at a Jesuit seminary as a teenager!).
Edits: manifests manufacture flim-flam-thank
It’s a sick world out there.
Hi Eric,
I recommend a new name for electric cars: “REV’s” (remote emission vehicles).
Jeremy
I like it, Jeremy – hat tip, sir!
Hey Eric,
Thanks! I own eight genuine ZEV’s, of which I use three regularly. One of them has full fenders, lights and a small cargo rack. I use this for 95% of my around town errands. Another one is a fully custom skinny tired rocket ship that I use for pleasure and longer errands. The third is a fully custom fat tired ATV that I use for pleasure as well as longer errands. All told, about 3/4 of my errands of 20 miles (round trip) or less are made on one of these ZEV’s. My one “BEV” (bad emission vehicle) needs go juice about every 6-8 weeks (unless I’m traveling).
So, where the hell are my carbon credits?
Cheers,
Jeremy
funny how those “credits” alway end up in the hands of the connected, not the actual users of said vehicles.
Hi Rich,
Of course, I’m being sarcastic about wanting “carbon credits”, though your point remains. Also, in case it wasn’t clear to all, my “genuine ZEV’s” are bicycles.
Cheers,
Jeremy
my point is sarcastic too ha ha!
Jeremy,
“So, where the hell are my carbon credits?”
You’ll have to do better than that comrade. You have to use more energy to save energy.
Like the Great Rocket Surgeon’s amigos plugless hands-free charging system for the Tesla. Saving energy by using less efficient ways to transfer it. That contraption will also work with Summon, so the fucking car can just drive around and “save” energy when no one is inside.
You come up with some shit like that Jeremy, and you can print your own carbon credits. I’ll buy them.
To think that these folk, (Musk, et. al.), are heralded as saviors of the planet, in fact, the ones who will get us off this planet and boldly go where no man has gone before, to think that, well it just sucks.
This is all just one huge clusterfuck. Perhaps it will turn out to be the biggest one in the history of mankind. That scenario is logical.
If the free market automobile changed the face of the earth (literally and figuratively) then why wouldn’t the government automobile have the same effect in terms of magnitude. Of course in terms of freedom, the government automobile will have the opposite effect.
All this stuff is ISO standardized. Anyone think it would be a big deal to use ISO Region Restrictions like with DVD players?
Remember this? https://youtu.be/Xn7N2UiOYCk
Won’t be long until the weight sensors in the car’s seats are hooked up to the drive-thru menu.
Hi Tuanorea,
So, if I drove to a “Park n’ Ride” miles from my house and then used my bike to run errands and then drove back to my house, I’d be saving energy.
I get it,
Jeremy
Almost Jeremy,
You forgot the part about parking in the Must Idle spot.
Think of all the energy saved by not having to start your engine when you get back a few hours later.
It should be evident that air that’s going to be moving past the car generate some charge, maybe dragging a fine wire will create even more. A tiny motor/generator for power and stopping. I mean hell, they’re doing that anyway right? Technology already here. If you’re going to call it a Tesla then driving beside power lines should be free energy. Put your hamster in for added charge via his little exercise wheel/generator. Fart ports in the seats/methane powered generator. If you need to sneeze, turn your head backward and sneeze into the sneezolator current maker. Reckon how many of the soon to be owners are health nuts? It’s obvious every seat should have handy pedals in reach, optional rear facing child seat. Teach those tykes early aerobics and proper environmentalism. Every trip is an adventure. Take the dog, weenie on a stick over a treadmill, what’s to lose?
Mang, I’ve seen all this stuff and more since I was a kid in places like Mechanix Illustrated, Popular Science, etc. In 1960 we were quite literally only a decade away from electric cars. We all dreamed of that Jetson car without the funny sound. If we’d just jumped in and tried hard enough we’d have left OPEC sitting high and dry. If you were going to walk to town, why be so stingy and not pull the wagon and take the neighbors too.
It’s all the fault of oil companies who couldn’t stand the thought of losing the sale on a gallon of gas or we’d be flying with our free energy glider suits. We could have been to Jupiter and back on the energy the energy movement has wasted and that includes all the hot air. I think I’m getting the hang of this blame game.
Eight,
“We all dreamed of that Jetson car without the funny sound.”
The hell you say? Without the funny sound, who would even want one.
Anyone watch “The American Side?”
I don’t want to give away any spoilers, but it does have Tesla, Niagara Falls, Serbian spies, and a cool old car that makes a Jetsons like sound.
I find it very telling that 160 years after the birth of a great man like Tesla, we have this fellow, Mr. Musk, named after a testicle, sucking on that great tit in the sky and blowing up or burning things on a somewhat regular basis.
When Tesla opened up the power plant on the American side of the falls in 1897, he said “It is a monument worthy of our scientific age, a true monument of enlightenment and of peace. It signifies the subjugation of natural forces to the service of man, the discontinuance of barbarous methods, the relieving of millions from want and suffering”
I think we need a monument worthy of Mr. Musk. Perhaps a statue of him standing “erect” with Dr. Borkenstein blowing his “breathalyzer.” Would look nice in Johnny Appleseed Park alongside North Harry Baals Drive.
“There is only one treatment for a rabid raccoon.”
Safe space and hug rooms?
Gather them all up and let them loose inside the California State Assembly chamber while legislature is in session.
Seriously, either KKKalifornia needs to be kicked out of the union (along with most of the Northeastern states), or the rest of us need to secede so as to not be impacted by Left Coast nutiness.
Lib,
There are TWO “left” coasts.
I have come to believe it is a terminal human condition. Cannot stop the “civilization” (domestication) of humans by those who think they’re smarter than we are.
Can’t even get it to burn itself out, it’s not like an infection. It’s just wrong thinking because people cannot comprehend a life they haven’t lived.
E.G.: Man cannot understand woman, nor can woman understand man.
Man (the animal) cannot understand an elephant’s life.
“Civilized” humans are incapable of understanding how hard-scrabble life is some places. They SEE it on TV: Ethiopia, Somalia, South Africa (now and then), but they don’t UNDERSTAND it. Don’t need to, any more than they really want or “need” to understand the Revolutionary War, War of 1812, Shores of Tripoli, WW1, WW2, Korea, East Germany, the U.N. (especially compared to league of nations), or what it means to be FREE.
Hell, we’ve got people who want to live as pets…
And I can’t really blame them some ways; the world – freedom, and the horrors of man’s inhumanity to man – are frightening. Relinquishing control of your life doesn’t help, though – you’re just making excuses for not living an actual life.
Better a wolf than a dog. The problems are real, but so are the solutions. The dog doesn’t question; the wolf earns the right to question. Makes it obvious why we are consistently domesticated by TPTB, regardless of era.
Nuke both coasts. No loss. Solves a lot of problems. Then hit Pittsburgh, Detroit, and probably Kansas City (both of them). Chicago, too.
Probably many more I can’t recall offhand…. Almost any population center above 10,000 people. 😛
Retreat to tribes and remind people to live off grid. Let them learn why… Most won’t ever understand, but one can hope that the Children of Seth might become something more than naked apes…