Electric Cars

[tombogan03884]

"Free" charging stations all over the place was one of the things the proponents were talking about, but the few free stations that were installed around here—in a movie theater parking lot—have been removed. Not sure why, but I suspect that (1) nobody was using them with the cinema slump, or (2) people started using them a lot, and the owners figured out how much they were spending!

Dirty Bob

Every one was using them, but no one was going to the movies to pay for it.   

There is a lesson there.   

[TAB]

The local library has 2 of those free charging stations.  Right next door is a dentist office.  Guess who uses the charging stations?

When I brought  it up to the head of the library ( not the branch as they knew about it)  I got a text from her a couple weeks later of the tesla being impounded.   

Yeah, I could have minded my own business, but they were stealing my tax dollars.  Come to find out there were several people that had complained about not being able to use the spaces...  I just happened to be the only one with the home number of the library director.


Its not what you know, its who.

[Rastus]

"Free" charging stations all over the place was one of the things the proponents were talking about, but the few free stations that were installed around here—in a movie theater parking lot—have been removed. Not sure why, but I suspect that (1) nobody was using them with the cinema slump, or (2) people started using them a lot, and the owners figured out how much they were spending!

Dirty Bob

I suspect "free" only lasts so long. 

[Dirty Bob]

I suspect "free" only lasts so long.

Abso-frickin-lutely right!

The whole electric car push is fraudulent. They're trying to get everyone to accept something that would be totally awesome for a small percentage of the population, who do short distance driving and almost never need to make a long trip. I think of the golf carts I see in use in some neighborhoods as equivalent.

For the rest of us, electric cars are not the best choice.

• Long trip? It'll take days instead of hours, due to charging times and the locations of chargers.
• Low cost? Sure, at first, while the gummint subsidizes electric cars and public chargers. Later, the high relative cost of electricity will bite frequent drivers on the posterior, and vehicle costs will soar when competition has been reduced.
• Safe? Nah! Electrics carry around heavy batteries full of fun, toxic chemicals. Flip an electric car for the bonus round, with heavy objects flying and toxic chemicals potentially leaking and maybe even catching fire! Woohoo!
• Green? Only in the sense that we move the carbon footprint to wherever the power is generated, but there's still pollution.
• By the way, with the war on energy, there won't be enough available electricity to charge all those electric vehicles, unless rolling blackouts and brownouts are OK.

I suspect that the current war on energy—especially petroleum—is meant in part to help make electrics look cheap to operate as gas prices climb. Once enough people are wedded to electric transport, the prices can soar, and people can stop most travelling—especially long trips—altogether.

</rant>

Dirty Bob

[Timothy]

All great points, DB!

Without nuclear power, electric vehicles will fail!  Somewhere on the inter webs is an actual photograph of a EV charging station being powered by a diesel generator!  The irony…

[Sponsor]

[billt]

The problem with high amperage, rapid charging is it is very hard on batteries. Even Tesla mentions not to give their batteries a steady diet of these type of charges. IT cuts into battery life. This was as true with lead acid batteries 50 years ago, as it is today with the modern Lithium / Ion batteries. Slow and steady is always better. The problem is it eats up a lot of time when you have to get somewhere.

[Rastus]

I might need to get into the battery replacement business too......

If our clueless, self-interest driven leaders are hell bent on pushing the mindless masses towards the farce of "green" electricity to consolidate their own wealth and power then why shouldn't I make a buck on the mindless masses? 

[tombogan03884]

Did any one else stop to think that the only way this drive for all electric, one world govt crap makes sense is in dealing with other worlds.
Just like the colonies uniting in the face of outside nations.
Otherwise who are groups like the UN showing a unified face to ?   

[MikeBjerum]

I suspect "free" only lasts so long.

There is no such thing as free.  You pay for it somewhere/somehow.  If it is like validated parking, every customer is paying like they will be using it, and only the few will actually use what they paid for.  Biden's program is about putting free stations in, but while we are all paying for it in taxes, they will slowly remove the free part.  Those using them will pay, and we will continue to be taxed for it.

[billt]

There is no such thing as free.  You pay for it somewhere/somehow.  If it is like validated parking, every customer is paying like they will be using it, and only the few will actually use what they paid for.  Biden's program is about putting free stations in, but while we are all paying for it in taxes, they will slowly remove the free part.  Those using them will pay, and we will continue to be taxed for it.

It's a similar situation with the Illinois Toll Road System. They were only supposed to be a "toll road", until the bonds were paid off. They were first opened in 1958. That was 63 years ago. But they're still paying, and ALWAYS will be paying. They keep increasing the toll most every couple of years. Today they receive over $800,000 A DAY from over 1.2 MILLION motorists.

There is no way they will ever take their hands out of pockets that deep. Especially in a socialist state like Illinois, that is falling apart economically as it is.