Automotive News reports that “EV sales start to fall in California, an industry bellwhether.” Then comes the good part – assuming you’re as weary of the force-feeding of EVs as you probably were of the force-feeding of drugs to people who didn’t want to take them, either:
“Following a long, seemingly inexorable climb, registrations of battery-electric vehicles in California fell in the fourth quarter of last year. EV sales have now fallen for two consecutive quarters in the state, even as California regulators set a 2035 deadline for all new auto registrations to consist of zero-emission vehicles.”
This is happening in California – the state where the most EVs have been sold. Italics to emphasize the past tense. It is the state most favorable to EVs, politically as well as practically and financially. The climate is generally temperate – neither particularly hot nor cold. Optimal conditions for an EV in that such conditions don’t have the same effect on an EV that extremes of heat and cold do. And much of the driving in California is stop-and-go, also ideal for an EV as they go farther when they don’t have to go very fast for very long.
California is also politically very Left and so very favorable to expressions of Leftism, such as the wearing of “masks” – and the driving of EVs. Leftists are often affluent in these latter days (as opposed to former days) because government employment has become so remunerative and so pervasive. Those suckling on the teat of taxpayers often take in – as opposed to earning – tens of thousands dollars more each year than a person who earns his living in the private sector, which is getting smaller almost daily as the government gets commensurately bigger.
In summary, you have a lot of affluent Leftists in California who wanted to be seen driving an EV at least as much as they wanted to be seen wearing a “mask.”
Italics to emphasize the passing tense.
Just the same as we see far fewer people “masking up” – even out there – so also we’re beginning to see waning interest in battery powered devices. Even out there. The place where EV Fever has been the most widespread.
Two things probably account for this flaccidity.
The first thing has nothing to do with EVs, per se but everything to do with the fact that there are only so many affluent people, irrespective of their politics. There’s a reason why there are brands like Chevrolet, Honda and Toyota as opposed to only brands like Mercedes-Benz and Lexus. It is that most people cannot afford to buy a Mercedes-Benz or a Lexus – regardless of their politics.
Whether it’s electric is incidental.
What’s not is that a Mercedes or a Lexus is a luxury-brand (and priced) vehicle. If everyone could afford to drive one, there would be no market for Chevys or Hondas or Toyotas. But there is a much larger market for Chevys and Hondas and Toyotas than there is for luxury-brand (and priced) vehicles such as those sold by Mercedes-Benz and Lexus, et al. In fact, the latter’s share of the market is less than 20 percent vs. the rest. This has nothing to do with the putative desirability of a Mercedes or a Lexus. Many of us would love to own such a car.
But most of us can’t afford one.
Which brings us back to electric cars, which are as or even more expensive than luxury cars. Whatever their putative desirability, there are only so many people who can afford one – and most of those appear to have already bought one. The term here is market saturation. Those who want and can afford an EV probably already have one. There is a much smaller market remaining of people who haven’t bought one and want one and have the means to buy one.
And there are also probably fewer potential buyers, regardless – for the same reason there are fewer people buying into the latest “booster” offerings. The truth about both has begun to get traction in the minds of more and more people who were led to believe in untruths about both. The “uptake” – as it’s styled – of “booster” shots is something in the range of 20 percent of the general public. The “uptake” of battery-powered devices isn’t even that high – and is unlikely ever to come close. Akio Toyoda – the grandson of the founder of the company that bears his name – said as much a few days ago.
And – just wait!
At just the moment when EV Fever is cooling, more EVs are coming. Chiefly because of the mandates and regulations effectively outlawing alternatives to them. What was until just recently almost exclusively Tesla’s market – as almost no one else was manufacturing battery powered devices as recently as just three or four years ago – is now a market on the cusp of being flooded with battery powered devices manufactured by others. And all of them are luxury-priced vehicles – including those offered by non-luxury brands such as Honda, which is now trying to sell a rebadged GM-made EV as the “Honda” Prologue.
It has a sticker price just shy of $50,000 to start.
It may be badged a “Honda” but it might as well be a Mercedes or a Lexus in that not many Honda buyers can afford a “Honda” that’s as expensive as a Mercedes.
Or a Tesla.
This will end one of two ways. Either with the end of the EV pushing. Or with the pushing of three out of four us out of the driver’s seat. Just as three out of four of us won’t ever sit in the driver’s seat of a Benz or a Lexus.
. . .
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EVs are going down! GM just SHUT DOWN EVs and dropped a SHOCKING plan to bring back gas cars, making all EV makers angry and confused! CEO Mary Barra finally heard the public, and just REVERSED GM’s EV strategy, going back to the good old gas cars!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VvpP8v7DCSY
Toyota CEO thinks EVs are a SCAM! The biggest automaker in the world is going AGAINST electric vehicles. He just dropped a brutal warning making all political leaders confused and afraid! Toyota is totally against EVs, and the public is going to get their gas cars back due to their recent decision!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=amxZJvuNnEE
Trump just KILLED Joe Biden’s EV dream! He’s promised to stop the forced EV push on the common man, and thinks EVs are a big scam! Biden just launched a new emissions policy that will destroy all gas car makers.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m0zDsZm77m8
V12 Audi Q7 v Audi e-tron: DRAG RACE *Diesel vs Electric*
The diesel does alright off the line….but it walks away from the EV over 120 mph….
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qFbnvGY-WX8
What Went Wrong? Uber Driver’s 120,000 mile Tesla Experiment!
Uber driver buys a used 2019 Tesla in 2022 with 20,000 miles?…for $53,000…in one year he puts 100.000 miles on it…at 120,000 miles the battery won’t charge properly, and has a huge drop in range…..
He charges it at home plus twice a day at superchargers to go a total of 300 miles per day….lol….
NOTE: a diesel could give him 900 miles range…refuel in 5 minutes every 3 days…….
tesla tells him he needs to replace the battery…$9,000… plus installation labor?….it is replaced with a used battery…NOTE….even under warranty tesla gives you a used/reconditioned battery…not a new one…..
Now the replacement battery….after a few miles…. won’t charge properly…Tesla says it has a one year warranty only…..so used batteries have to be replaced yearly?….lol
The car doesn’t work properly and he still owes $40,000 on it…..$900/month payments…debt is a trap….
It only has 120,000 miles on it….some old diesels went 1 million miles on one engine….
He has a go fund me account to get other people to pay for his battery….lol….that is what you have to do if you own an EV……
The moron in the video says a backyard mechanic could rebuild the battery cheaper…lol….sure…it would propably catch fire and kill him…..Tesla is connected to the car 24/7….if a backyard mechanic rebuilt it…I bet it would never run again…become a brick…..lol
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4dartx7EoaQ
Scotty says…..
Proof Electric Cars are a Scam and the Media is Lying to You
EV’s get a real world 25 mpg….but for carbon credits they are said to get 600 mpg…a huge lie giving Tesla 100’s of millions of dollars…
Solar panel buyers were getting paid for excess electricity…but the government changed the formula on the payment…now they get almost nothing….the solar panel installers are going bankrupt…nobody wants them now….
A Tesla Cyber Truck buyer took it on a 1340 mile trip…he had to recharge 12 times….lol
In sentry mode…anti theft…a Tesla can use 15% of the charge in 24 hr….
EV’s start off the little 12 volt battery…if it is dead they won’t start….you have to dig through a bunch of stuff…take stuff apart…. to get at it to charge it/jump it……….
In very cold weather the charging stations don’t work…. period…your car is a brick…and you freeze….see Chicago…lol
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GCMIqXx5p9k
A Tesla Cyber Truck buyer took it on a 1340 mile trip…he had to recharge 12 times….
Some diesels would only refuel once…for 5 min….. in 1340 miles….it would arrive hours sooner then the EV Cybertruck…lol
[…] EV Fever Cooling . . . in California […]
Another nail in the EV coffin….
Sitting in McDonalds drinking coffee…people at a table near by start talking about cars…EV’s….one says….someone was quoted $40,000 to replace the battery….now people are starting to laugh at EV’s…..when it becomes common knowledge how bad and expensive EV’s are, it gets difficult for the liars pushing these abortions to get people to buy them…..
I saw this while at work today and almost busted out laughing loud.
Denali EV (Not a GM product)
Here’s what made me laugh because it is so freaking stupid:
“Imagine a future where Alaska leads the way in embracing electric vehicles. Denali EV LLC is at the forefront, empowering Alaska’s electric vehicle future. By choosing us, you not only support sustainability but also invest in a seamless charging experience.”
Imagine a future, leads the way, embracing EVs, empowering, support sustainability, invest, seamless, bwahahahaha “Alaska’s electric vehicle future”. Stop it! You’re killing me! It was -31 degrees this morning. Bwahahahaha
I think all the rich liberals who are wealthy enough to buy an EV just to be “seen” in it also have a $70k, 14 MPG Toyota Sequoia Platinum hiding in the garage for those ski trips to Tahoe…
For sure!
In Norway the government gave enormous subsidies to buy an EV….people bought them to virtue signal, drive once a week…it was a 4th or 5th car….lol
That might have been the case initially, but now Norwegians who want new cars have to buy EVs because officially starting next year, and in reality already this year, EVs are the only game in town, and dealers don’t sell or stock anything else.
It doesn’t exactly hurt the pro-EV cause that Norwegians are perhaps the world’s most obedient people who do what their government wants them to do. Expect the rest of Europe to follow suit soon.
Coming everywhere soon …..ban everything except EV’s…then they ban them and the slaves walk…easier to control if immobile….
Norway…another communist government….
….but…. for retiring slaves there, they are better off then anywhere else in the G7…when you turn 60 you get a $60,000 U.S. pension per year…no matter how much money or other pensions you have…..no homeless old people like in the G7….
The slave owners steal from the slaves there but give them a bit back….
The government pushes EV’s but the money they have came from selling oil…lol
Or an 80k Tahoe for trips to Sequoia.
This guy, who has been all in and a very vocal advocate of EV’s and uses engineering to try and make EV’s sound even more awesome, despite that they are worse in every measurable way for vehicles… finally did a engineers and science [down to the atomic chemical level] about this.
In the video, Jason explains three very common mistakes that not only make EV ownership undeniably worse, but cause the vehicle’s serviceable life to go way down. This is a big deal, because having to prematurely replace an EV’s battery can negate the cost advantages of owning an EV in the first place. in usual Engineering Explained practice, he doesn’t just do what I do and tell you what things to do and what things not to do.
https://youtu.be/w4lvDGtfI9U?si=vnVjTf7CsTbSXKzn
Oh, Fenske is a friend. He’s done so many videos over the years about cool car engines. He’s just an engineering nerd and doesn’t advocate for EV (nor against them).
Anyhow, his video links to a much deeper video on battery health:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i31x5JW361k
And it turns out, that there are now batteries which don’t degrade due to charge/discharge cycles. They’re not widespread yet, but it’s looking that the problem of worrying about how much to charge your battery is going to disappear.
Hi OL,
In re: “… the problem of worrying about how much to charge your battery is going to disappear.” Then there will still be the problem of charging it quickly and conveniently, as we are able to do when we need to pump gas into a tank. There will still be absurd waits and having to plan one’s life around them.
EVs are the Face Diapers of transportation. An evil foisted upon the stupid in the name of a false crisis and a new religion.
Oh, I 100% agree, but it removes one annoyance and the battery replacement cost problem for many people, making EV’s less crappy, and closer to an actual product. I like to see competition. EV’s being forced is a separate issue and we should fight against that.
“that there are now batteries which don’t degrade”….
at jaloponik they said too….and in the MSM….and on all the pro EV sites….they think if they keep repeating it…it will become reality….
better batteries coming soon…..
they said that 100 years ago too…lol…
These esoteric battery designs are great in the lab, but so far continue to evade mass production. I recently saw an ad for a campsite battery bank that uses solid state battery design, the first retail product as far as I know (and I watch this sector pretty carefully, even owning a few shares of SLDP for a time).
https://yoshinopower.com
Good luck to them. At those prices the only advantage I see over a Battle Born kits is saving space. If you’re trying to solar charge the thing it won’t get enough incoming power to reach fast charge unless you deploy your own solar farm. And I’m sure the AC input is current limited to 15 A just because people will be blowing fuses and breakers if it pulls whatever it’s actually capable of.
> Now California is an economic sewer,
Not really.
From Wikipedia:
>The economy of the State of California is the largest in the United States, with a $3.8 trillion gross state product (GSP) as of 2023.[1] It is the largest sub-national economy in the world. If California were a sovereign nation (2022), it would rank in terms of nominal GDP as the world’s fifth largest economy, behind Japan and ahead of India.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_GDP_(nominal)
Also larger than the economies of
UK, France, Italy, Brazil, Canada, and Russia, among many others.
Russia and Canada are the two largest countries by land area, have abundant natural resources, and are industrially and technologically developed modern economies.
Russia does not count debt as part of their GDP. In the US every dollar spent by the government, $1600 hammers, government employees paid to watch porn all day, and all that crap gets counted as GDP as of that is some manner of productive activity when it would cheaper to just have federal employees shovel $100 bills into a furnace all day
> cheaper to just have federal employees shovel $100 bills into a furnace all day
Impossible to unwatch that image.
Why do I think this is really happening somewhere?
Is there an economist in the house?
Well think about it, the work required to do it, harvest the heat for a small steam boiler and you at least have something productive, and probably cost a lots less. It takes a while to feed $100 bills into the fire enough to make a billion dollars. That would slow the agencies spending down substantially.
A Soft Landing Is A Fairytale
The last time the phrase “soft landing” was this popular on the internet was on the eve of the largest financial crisis the world has ever seen.
Today, with the collective hive mind of the internet invoking a soft landing, we’re again trying to will into existence something that cannot and will not happen….A soft landing is a fairy tale told by liars and believed by fools.
it’ll be a recession, but they’ll call it a downturn.
then a depression but they’ll call it a recession.
then a collapse but they’ll call it a depression.
then the (news) will go dark. and (they)’ll laugh at us and celebrate. “we did it!”
The Fed hasn’t been doing any tightening. They’re poring close to $2 trillion liquidity from the backdoor. Otherwise, stock market would have tanked last year.
it will be to institute socialism. It is all about a world totalitarian government ….with local governors….. Neo feudalism is what it amounts too, but technically, it will be socialist totalitarianism exactly like china. If they can bring the whole world under that system, then they can eliminate debt, and name the value of currency without anyone to challenge it…
https://www.zerohedge.com/economics/soft-landing-fairytale
California also has more conservatives than any other state, so what? How is California trending not just economically but in social indicators like crime, homelessness, drug use, mental health, and so on compared to other states? Californians and businesses have been fleeing the state, especially since 2020.
Wikipedia, now there’s an unbiased accurate source.
With respect to California in general, I wonder if the recent cooling of EV fever you allude to is a symptom/effect of what appears to be a downturn or deflation of a bubble, not only in EVs, but of tech in general.
I hear almost every day of layoffs at one tech company or another, both the out loud kind and of the “quiet firing” kind, as in, “either return to the office or be fired.”
That means that quite a few people can no longer afford any new car, let alone an EV. And those who can are seeing that EVs don’t provide real value.
Firing….
Instead of firing people or laying them off, they are reassigning them to a different bs position…so the people quit….same result
If they just fire them they might get sued
The stupid, it burns brightly. Even brighter in some of the brainwashed comments:
https://komonews.com/news/local/washington-democrats-propose-ban-on-gas-powered-landscaping-equipment-not-going-to-work-seattle-olympia-green-new-deal-energy-power-workers-epa-leaf-blowers-dems-inslee-capitol-northwest-pacific#
Our city banned gasoline equipment (I don’t care, I ignore the ban), however, anyone with a business has no choice but to comply. The landscapers around here are largely mexicans, and mostly illegal. They can’t afford electric stuff, it’s useless, so we’re back to using big manual clippers, push mowers, and rakes. It costs 5x as much now to get anything done. The city landscapers who look after the parks use electric equipment plugged into a gasoling generator. LOL. They did not ban generators yet.
Now there’s a thought! Gen set in the landscape truck, lots of cords. Nice powerful diesel engine generator setup. When a cord won’t reach a miniature locomotive setup, diesel/electric powered lawnmower.
Sad to hear that Honda quit making gasoline powered lawn mowers. IMO, electric lawn mowers suck. Too heavy, because battery, and short active time between charges. Electric “pressure washer?” Bad joke, too weak to do the job. And nearly every construction carpenter or roofer needs a gasoline powered air compressor to drive his air tools, without which he cannot make a living. Electric power typically will not cut it, because a) temp power on many construction sites has too much voltage drop from power pole to plug, and b) temp power plugs are not necessarily convenient to where the air tools need to be used.
I’ve been on sites where nominal 220 volt plugs only provided 180 volts, by actual measure. Nominal 110 volt plugs were too weak to power standard construction power tools, including electric air compressors. I brought my own step down transformer and conversion plugs, ran my tools by stepping down the 180 volts. Brush motors run just fine on 140-150 volts. Just be careful with your worm drive saws – they can kill you if used improperly.
They have no choice but to comply? I don’t agree with that, but it was the sheep mentality during lockdowns, travel restrictions, and mask and vaccine mandates. Had businesses said No, none of the damage over the past four years would have had happened.
No, absolutely they have no choice. The police cite them and the city pulls their business license. The dudes working totally under the table get chased off.
A ban on gasoline powered leaf blowers would be welcome, but you ain’t gonna climb a tree with an electric chainsaw.
Why? Electrics are not much quieter.
“A ban on gasoline powered leaf blowers would be welcome”
When a ban goes into effect and I still use my gas powered leaf blower, what do you wish to see happen to me?
Stay far enough from my yard that I do not have to hear, or smell, your two stroke gasoline powered backpack. One of the joys of moving from an apartment to a SFR was not being awakened from sleep by the noise and noxious odors of these infernal devices used by the landscape maintenance company for the apartment complex.
I cherish the right to quiet enjoyment of my own property.
Adi. Get a bigger yard.
Ugg-
Practice the non-aggression principle. I’ll leave you alone if you leave me alone.
Bans are enforced through violence
Where I live we have anti-noise ordinance. The police will enforce it if called. Allowed noise levels are stipulated as being measured at the property line, and depend on the time of day.
Call that violence if you like, or the threat of violence, because it is enforced by armed government agents (AGWs, if you prefer). Bottom line: your neighbor does not have the right to deprive you of the right to the quiet enjoyment of your property, including SLEEP, by assaulting your senses with excessive noise. Sleep deprivation is a common torture technique, from what I have read. In this case, there definitely IS a victim.
Personally, I am happy to live in a society where enforcement of local law is carried out peacefully, in an orderly manner, by individuals acting in an official capacity.
Perhaps you prefer a society where the only way I would be able to get my neighbor to shut down the EXTREMELY LOUD band he hired, so I could get a good night’s sleep, would be to blow their heads off with my 12 gauge, and then claim “self defense,” or “property rights.”
Jedem das seine.
Careful Adi, what goes around comes around. Your neighbor, or the lawn service, may discover something you do that damages their calm.
>Your neighbor, or the lawn service, may discover something you do that damages their calm.
Will the law back them up?
Or does that matter, these days? Do we live in a society subject to the rule of law, or are we to be ruled by the whims of those with the most raw power?
Inquiring minds want to know…it makes a big difference.
‘Will the law back them up?”
It may very well. That’s the problem with law. It can change at the drop of a hat.
Whoa Adi. Sticks and stones. Now that’s aggression.
Yep, I’m an aggressive kind of guy.
Must be a manifestation of my German-American heritage. F* with me at your own peril.
(See how easy it is to be a keyboard commando?)
Hi Adi,
I’m a very leave-me-alone kind of dude, kind of like the Dude (Big Lebowski reference). I don’t look for confrontation and try my best to avoid them, when possible. But I’m also the kind of guy who cannot stand bullying of any kind ; it’s a “trigger” for me (to use Leftist lingo). That sets me off every time. No tolerance for it, at all.
Maybe there could possibly be an alternative to state coercion when a neighbor annoys you. Maybe you could, I don’t know, talk to the neighbor about the noise and work it out amongst yourselves?
Neighbor may rightly tell you to take a hike. Then your only morally acceptable option would be to get a bigger yard with fewer neighbors. Or maybe some kind of screening between the properties.
State violence against your neighbor is not only unacceptable, but also cowardly.
>talk to the neighbor
That would be the first option. But what if the neighbor is hot head, and refuses to listen, or acquiesce to your very reasonable request?
BTDT. What then?
> rightly tell you to take a hike
How so “rightly?”
>get a bigger yard
Lebensraum, eh?
One way to “get a bigger yard” would be to level my neighbor’s house, drive him away, and take over the property. We see this happening in real time right now in the Middle East. But, I think you have to be Jewish to get away with it, which I am not.
My neighbor problem was a barking Dobermann dog. Took neighbor to small claims court (Ohio), she tried to use tears (claimed I’d shoot her “lapdog”), I won the judgement.
> I won the judgement.
Good for you.
Peaceful resolution to problem,
backed by government monopoly on use of force except in exigent circumstances.
Presumably your intent was specific relief from the nuisance rather than money damages. Did you get the dog quieted down (I hope)?
Dog got quieted down, I applied additional training with a water hose – perfect!
Well done. 🙂
Hi Philo,
Yup; I had a problem like this once and found a way to solve it. I think it’s worth a short article!
Well Comrade, The Soviet of Washington has you covered, gulag for you of course!
From an article on this proposed Washington State abomination:
“ Operating a prohibited lawn care tool would be deemed a gross misdemeanor punishable by jail time. Offenders ‘shall be punished by a fine of not more than ten thousand dollars, or by imprisonment in the county jail for up to three hundred sixty-four days, or by both for each separate violation,’ according to state law. “
I’m going to need a bigger trailer for the gear I’ll be buying in Idaho hauling back here: nat gas furnace, nat gas hot water heater, lawn tractor, weed whacker, cans of R134a, TSP, semi auto lead slingers, booze.
A new inmate shows up in the King County jail, and is eyed suspiciously by the old timers.
‘What are you in for, pal?’
‘Uhhh … leaf blowing.’
Hi Jim,
Sadly, that could happen, and it would likely be from the same people who wanted to jail those who refused to wear a face diaper everywhere or take that “Safe and Effective COVID jab”.
… and they all moved away rom him on he Group W bench. 🙂
A year (minus a day) in jail for mowing your lawn with “prohibited equipment?” Jesus. YGBSM.
Guaranteed you will have to mow stuff, one way or the other, in that area of the world. Bro and wife live on Olympic Peninsula. Vegetation everywhere you look.
Another electric douchebag bites the dust:
‘Volvo said it won’t provide further funding to Polestar, the electric-car maker it created with Volvo’s Chinese owner Geely—the latest EV retrenchment by the global auto industry. Earlier this week, French automaker Renault said it has decided to cancel the initial public offering of its electric-car unit Ampere.
‘Analysts have highlighted how Volvo’s 48% stake in Polestar has been a drag on its resources, with the company struggling with losses amid the slow consumer uptake of electric vehicles and Polestar tapping Volvo for around $1 billion in financing while the company works through a turnaround plan.
‘In a sign of investor unease about automakers’ march toward an EV future [sic], Volvo shares surged more than 20% Thursday on its decision to cut off funding to Polestar.’
http://tinyurl.com/2wefnc54
Shoulda named it Polecat, not Polestar. It stunk up the joint.
Shed your EeeVee concrete shoes … and run like the wind again! 🙂
The Tesla Model 3 is probably one of the most common cars where I live in Silicon Valley. There’s always some car the rich techies drive, and we call that the “Silicon Valley Civic”. For years, this was the BMW 3-series, now it’s the Tesla Model 3.
My neighbors were all early Tesla adopters. Some have two or three Tesla’s in the driveway. A bunch of those have given way to Rivians, and a couple of Cybertrucks in the EV fanboy driveways, but the other more casual EV owners are now going back to various gas powered cars. My two Tesla neighbors next door now have one tesla and one Subaru.
Some people don’t believe the naysayers like us, and have to learn on their own, that the cars can’t fill their needs. In the case of my neighbors, the 300 mile range Tesla can’t make it 200 miles to Lake Tahoe for skiing.
‘the 300 mile range Tesla can’t make it 200 miles to Lake Tahoe for skiing’ — OppositeLock
Yep. And the long slog up to Donner Pass (elev 7,056 ft) on I-80, if they are headed to north Lake Tahoe, kills the range.
At least on the way back, they can just coast downhill, Trevor Milton style.
>Donner Pass (elev 7,056 ft) on I-80
Let alone Tioga Pass (elev. 9945 ft.) :
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tioga_Pass
Mean daily minimum °F
Jan 10.0
Feb 9.7
Mar 13.0
Apr 17.9
Average snowfall (in.) 224
>Tioga Pass is the most direct route from Bishop or Mammoth Lakes, California to Fresno, Merced, and Stockton.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mammoth_Mountain_Ski_Area
Head south on 395 out of Bishop, hang a left just south of Lone Pine, and you will end up in Death Valley National Park.
Not exactly “EV friendly,” at either extreme.
“Mild California climate” chiefly means Southern California coastal areas, west of the Santa Ana Mountains, which, being desirable places to live are very high cost of housing, and therefore out of reach to people of average means. If you can afford Malibu or Newport Beach (New Porsche Beach), or even Costa Mesa, then a Tesla is no doubt well within your means, and well suited to the mild coastal climate.
If you live inland, whether at high or low elevation, perhaps not so much. There are a noticeable number of Teslas where I live, in western Riverside County, but electrics have not “taken over,” and IMO are unlikely to do so, even if the prices were lower. Hybrids (Prius, etc.) are popular, as are macho pendejo “Big Dog” diesel pickups and gasoline powered Jeeps. Off-roading is popular, and no sane person would go off road in an electric anything.
My in-laws who live in San Francisco have a Tesla Model X. Their presence at the holidays at family events in WA State is always dependent on whether they think they can make the drive through Grant’s Pass on the OR/CA border without running out of battery power given the temperatures and road conditions.
A new excuse for not visiting the in-laws. Sorry, not enough battery! Maybe next year!
Almost tempting.
295 san jose to ashland. 229 LA to LV at 90+. Over 200 Los Altos to South lake up a hill. No trips for snob trrrrrrrrinkets.
Gas kicks ASS!
I think this winter has been the tipping point for EV’s, only the willfully ignorant cannot see how useless they are in cold weather. A compact sized EV as a second car for puttering around locally would be ok as long as you owned an ICE vehicle to get out of Dodge when necessary. As Eric noted in a prior post, govco won’t allow that so it’s clear their intention is to hobble the mobility of us serfs.
Although things have warmed up in my neck of the woods, there was a pretty long cold stretch this past January.
That story about folks stuck in their EVs in Chicago probably gave a lot of people second thoughts about EVs.
Yes, and its the warmest winter in years in norcal and southern Oregon.
“ 36.5 billion barrels per year of crude oil used for all sorts of applications.”
And there it is.
The automotive world can go 100% EV, yet oil isn’t going away until the world gives up plastics, paved roads (asphalt), lubricating oils, organic solvents, travel by plane, all food that isn’t locally grown, and of course their beloved pharmaceuticals.
This desire to eliminate “fossil fuels” is nothing more than a desire to plunge humanity back into poverty and the dark ages.
First of all, let’s get rid of the term “fossil fuels”.
Naturally-occurring hydrocarbons are “abiotic”.
Hydrocarbon products are constantly being created deep within the earth by yet-unknown processes well below the layers that contain fossils. Keep in mind that hydrocarbons migrate upward and pass through “fossil layers” picking up remnants of “fossil” material; hence, the present-day scientists’ stupid mistaken assumption that hydrocarbons are derived from “fossils”.
Oil interests are drilling wells at 5,000 feet, 10,000 feet, and 15,000 feet and deeper, and coming up with oil deposits well below the layers and levels where “fossils” were known to exist.
As Russia gained much expertise in deep-well drilling and coming up with oil deposits far deeper than that of the level of “fossils”, abiotic oil at extreme depths was actually a Russian “state secret” for a long time.
“Peak oil” and “fossil fuels” are discredited dishonest concepts that environmentalists and others are latching on to, in order to display their hatred of oil being a renewable resource as well as to push prices up.
Follow the money.
Naturally-occurring hydrocarbons have done more to advance civilization than any other influence. It is the discovery, creation and utilization of ENERGY that propels civilizations upward and onward.
We have more oil underneath our feet than the rest of the world. In fact, we became energy independent under Trump. That trend was reversed with the Biden regime.
For a good treatise on abiotic oil, please google L. Fletcher Prouty. He is a scientist who gives a good explanation of “abiotic oil”.
Our production is actually at record levels. What the traitors did, however, was eliminate the ban on the export of oil in 2015 This was done by a GOP congress, signed by Obama. What Biden did was cancel a lot of oil leases and restrict new drilling, which affected future prices (which reflect back to now prices fast) during periods of tight supply and temporarily low production (2020-22). What Biden did is nothing short of treason anyway.
It should be noted our gas prices are higher at any point in the last 9 years, since (save for 2022-early 23).
I agree on abiotic oil.
The only thing is that if we pull oil out of the earth faster than it creates it, what happens? I think that merits more ivestigation. At least the oil companies bought us about 50 years more breathing room before they went completely woke.
I agree about the a
Hydrocarbons exist on Saturn’s moon, Titan.
“Titan’s atmosphere is made mostly of nitrogen, like Earth’s, but with a surface pressure 50 percent higher than Earth’s. Titan has clouds, rain, rivers, lakes and seas of liquid hydrocarbons like methane and ethane. The largest seas are hundreds of feet deep and hundreds of miles wide.”
Plenty of water on Titan, the liquids and gases are formed in space somehow, not a whole lot of biomes on Titan.
Titan, moon of Saturn, has methane and ethane galore. The hydrocarbons obviously didn’t form on the earth and undoubtedly did form somewhere in outer space.
The Universe is a fluid situation at all times. Just never ends.
Hydrocarbons über alles!
You can synthesize methane into synthetic oil, synthetic gasoline and synthetic diesel. GTL, Gas to Liquids technology does exist. The Fischer–Tropsch Process works.
Humans can actually solve problems. Humans killing each other is a problem that can’t really be solved here on this god-forsaken earth. A couple of million humans are at each other’s throats from time to time, that’s life.
Good luck to all humans and God bless every single one of them.
>humanity back into poverty and the dark ages
You nailed it, Screw em’
Mud huts (wattle & daub, w/ thatched roofs & dirt floors).
Ban fire now!
You will eat zee live raw bugs, and you will like it.
Like hell we will.
If you drive 40 miles per day, you are going to travel 1200 miles in 30 days of driving.
1200 x 12 = 14,400 miles in a year.
30 mpg, high estimate, you’ll be burning 14400/30, 480 gallons of gasoline, times three dollars for a gallon of gas, your yearly cost is going to be 1440 dollars to pay for the gasoline to move your car 14,400 miles in one year.
Times 100,000,000 cars on the road, 48,000,000,000 billion gallons of gas needed in one year. You’ll have to mine out 2,000,000,000 barrels of oil to obtain 1.1 billion barrels of gasoline. There is a lot of oil and it sells, there is demand.
It’s an industry, easy to see that supply and demand makes for an economic base, raw materials, resources, trains, planes, automobiles.
Ships at sea, commerce happens naturally, trade worldwide.
100,000,000 barrels per day consumption by people doing what they do everyday.
36.5 billion barrels per year of crude oil used for all sorts of applications.
The Orinoco Basin, one trillion barrels, Saudi Arabia, 2 trillion barrels, Athabasca tar sands in Alberta, one trillion barrels. The Great Plains has more than one million wells from Texas to North Dakota to Alberta. Probably another trillion barrels down a few thousand feet to more than 10,000 feet in depth.
China and Russia, that oil amounts to more yet.
There are more than likely over five trillion barrels and more being generated all of the time.
There is a lot of oil, might as well use it. If you divide 36.5 billion into five trillion, 5000/36.5, that is approximately 137 years of potential supply of crude oil.
There is even more petroleum always being generated, so the potential recovery probably increases over the years increasing the number of years of consumption.
137 years and all of the oil will all be gone!
No wonder the WEF Chicken Littles fly all over the world worrying about everybody running around in their cars burning all of the oil. Air Force One has to have 54,000 gallons of number one jet fuel. Freaking hypocrites are being greedy pigs, they all should be slapped silly.
All they think about is making you do what they tell you what to do. They don’t quit and won’t.
But you, that means you!, have to quit driving. Yeah, right.
Go for a drive and don’t feel guilty about it.
Ground the high flyers and make zem eat zee bugs.
If you see Kay those people.
It’s a good song by April Wine, If You See Kay.
‘The “uptake” of battery-powered devices isn’t even that high – and is unlikely ever to come close.’ — eric
From Ford’s 4th quarter 2023 sales report:
‘Ford sold 25,937 EVs in Q4 … Ford 2023 sales totaled 1,995,912 vehicles [no 4th quarter breakout provided]’
http://tinyurl.com/yc5uztam
Ford’s press release is nigh-on useless. It provides only selective product breakouts in a narrative format — no tables (you know, with numbers and stuff, in rows and columns).
Still, if we guesstimate Ford’s 4th quarter total sales at 500,000 — about one fourth of the 2023 annual figure — then EeeVees were a chickenshit 5.2% of sales.
If I were a Ford shareholder, I’d be leading a mob bearing torches and pitchforks, agitating to burn the place down. LOSERS!
From other sources, I located the stubborn facts I wanted:
Ford F-series sales, 4Q 2023: 165,514
Ford Lightning sales, 4Q 2023: 11,905
My longstanding bet has been that Lightning sales will never exceed 10 percent of F-150 sales, which Ford doesn’t break out from all F-series sales. I estimate F-150 sales at two-thirds of all F-series sales, or 110,343 units. Dividing:
11,905 / 110,343 = 10.8% (Lightning vs all F-150s)
Well, this is humiliating. It’s occurring even as Ford announces Lightning production cuts, which Eric covered last week. All we can do, comrades, is join holds and hold the line. Pints of stout! EeeVees out! Hut! Hut! Hut!
Everyone should understand that the government doesn’t care whether EV’s sell or not. What they want is to force people away from all forms of private transportation, and yes, that includes bicycles. In some parts of the world, they require bicycle registration. Again, they aren’t trying to “force people into EV’s”, it s more like they are forcing people out of their cars.
These people never cease and they will scream about white supremacy or overconsumption when we are all South Africa and eating beans and rice.
I don’t know what is driving them, but they need to be stopped by all means necessary.
Yes, the bicycle industry is being systematically tanked by ebike infestation. Half or more of what rolls out the door of my local bike shop now has a motor. About $1k to replace proprietary baaaaaaaaaaahtery pack when it fails.
And bicycle people get all butthurt wierd when the lower priced Surron 68 mph edirtbike is mentioned.
Brainwashing, though dangerous, is fascinating to behold.
>Brainwashing, though dangerous, is fascinating to behold.
Part of that horseshit is defining electric bicycles as “active transportation,” same as actual bicycles which require human muscle power to move. All a part of the same enormous heap of Communist horse dung.
And what of the charging stations? The feds set aside billions of Build Back Better bucks for charging stations. “These things take time,” they’ll crow. “Rome wasn’t built back better in a day, you know.”
Seems if there was money to be made with charging stations, they’d be cropping up everywhere, subsidy or not. Just the new market for selling power should get the electric company excited to grow their business. Extending high voltage power to a location isn’t simple, but it is well established engineering. Just take the measurements and plug ’em into the spreadsheet. Sighting them at the edge of a parking lot isn’t a big deal either, except maybe needing a zoning variance to allow it to go into the setback… but that’s just government bureaucrats talking amongst themselves about projects they themselves initiated.
Unless… those bureaucrats are all chomping at the bit to add their line item to the project budget. So instead of a simple cut-and-patch road crossing, it becomes an expensive bore, or the locals start requiring a complete repaving of the block*. Well, that’s never gonna make payback, so the plan goes back on the shelf for when a more sensible zoning rule comes into effect -or the feds kick in more money.
*It happens. Many telcos’ plans for fiber networks were shelved by municipalities’ plans to get their roads repaved by the fiber telco. Many cities actually requires telecom and cable companies to pay for the entire street (from intersection to intersection) to be repaved if the road surface was breeched in any way.
Same with the architectural industry. When doing a simple commercial interior remodel, the city often requires landscaping and sidewalk upgrades at owner’s expense. It’s ridiculous because it’s a deterrent to economic activity. Sometimes the exterior requirements are more cost than the interior!
We have been pretty successful in fighting these requirements on a per project basis, but they are on the books, so those damn bureaucrats can change their mind on a whim.
This video about the inherent dangers of EV batteries is a must see before anybody buys or rides in one, or even allows one to be parked in a structure where they live.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AIXTP-TgPEw
Every condo association, apartment complex owner and property insurer should be provided a copy of this video. I suspect the EV wouldn’t exist much longer.
A severe hail storm in North Austin, where, ironically, a lot of Tesla management employees live, seems to have quelled the enthusiasm in the area. The reality of what the insurance mafia would cover and the time frames involved for repair was a wake up call for many people.
Plus, a lot of cash got spent on roofs in the last four months since Capo Gecko and his friends served up a helping of reality there too.
One way the Biden regime might (they think) increase sales of EVs is declare a “Climate Emergency” and MANDATE that people buy an EV. After all, the Biden Thing used the so-called “COVID Public Health Emergency” in 2021 to justify MANDATES for employers with 100+ employees to be “Fully vaxxed” until the Supreme Court struck it down. I’d hate to imagine what the Biden Thing might have been emboldened to do had SCOTUS ruled that the government COULD FORCE Americans to take experimental pharma products.
Years ago, when California was still booming, one could kinda sorta understand the auto makers favoring California regulations. Now California is an economic sewer, among its other sewage, its citizens leaving, and deserves no special consideration.
These are the same fools that banned gas leaf blowers, lawn mowers, hedge trimmers, etc. They are bat shit crazy. Like EP said, screw ’em.
And residential air compressors capable of running air tools….
If the automakers had any common sense they would have pulled out of California long ago when CARB started with their single state mandates.
Remember when we used to have California cars and 49 state cars?
Instead of letting California go without, it was decided to make the emissions systems of the other 49 state cars more expensive and complicated in order to satisfy one state of psychos.
Yes, it would have been painful for the automakers to not sell in CA. Instead of a couple years of short term pain while CA came to its senses, they all will find themselves on the brink of insolvency.
Amen, Screw ’em –
Never give people with malignant intentions an inch of ground (or grace). Their demands will never cease – and you will always lose.
Eric, as Ayn Rand wrote, if the choice is food or poison any compromise means death.
Socialism is poison.
Years ago, when California was still booming, one could kinda sorta understand the auto makers favoring California regulations. Now California is an economic sewer, among its other sewage, its citizens leaving, and deserves no special consideration.
Government is the poison. Without it socialism wouldn’t exist.
Touche’
The new libertarian president of Argentina summarized this best with his speech about leftists & socialists. Dude absolutely nailed it, link here;
https://twitter.com/i/status/1726610095339938077
You shouldn’t bargain with a thief; you always lose something.
That’s the whole premise of the progressives. Little by little. Any compromise with these parasites is a losing proposition.
Had they stopped complying with CA’s ridiculous regulations, the price of complying cars would have skyrocketed. That would have created so much economic pain it would have caused CA to ditch the regulations. Alternatively, they could have created specific CA compliant cars and passed on the full cost. This would have shown the actual cost of the regulations.
Eric is spot on: “Never give people with malignant intentions an inch of ground (or grace). Their demands will never cease – and you will always lose.”