A good outcome of this crisis. These god damn fossil fuels. Never even mind climate change. Being depend on them has turned out to be a huge national security risk. Picking a seller is picking your poison: Russia, the Golf states, and now the US.
I'm reminded of the cartoon that circulated some years back where a climate denier asks the speaker "what if we built a better world for nothing?", or something along those lines.
The way these past few years have shown the absolute precarity of fossil fuel systems just proves that, preserving a comfortably liveable climate aside, renewables just make more sense across pretty much every axis.
You still get people fear mongering about Chinese solar, as if we shouldn't make the most of the oversupply subsidised by a supposed geopolitical foe. Like, no, they're not going to turn it off, once you have the panel, the light hits it and the electrons jump the gap. Oil/gas can be turned off yet the speaker is somehow glossing over that.
> The way these past few years have shown the absolute precarity of fossil fuel systems
I agree with you but wasn't the primary takeaway of these past years that there is so much corruption anywhere even remotely related to burnable fuel that one needs not one but two actual wars (key to the fossil rich world) to provide a somewhat level playing field?
Can we move on from climate change and focus on the fact that EVs are better in every possible way.
Somehow I feel buying EV for the sake of climate change is cringe (I know, I am not a good person, but also feel most people who say they care about climate change are disingenuous). Maybe it's change of political climate, maybe it's me who changed, maybe it's the odd hate you get for driving EV, IDK.
I'm not going to worry about climate 100years ago because just about everyone I know doesn't either. None of them deny it either.
Yes, but the circuit is way more complex than that. You're dependant on the OEM for spare parts, support, software and whatever else, not to mention the problems inherent in putting this junk on the internet (which it will be). I am not fond of the idea of giving the CCP access to our infrastructure.
For battery storage systems sure, but for panels, not really. The panel breaks you just throw it away and buy another. And sure China can cut us off from buying another, but we have 15 years with most panels to use them while we build out local manufacture if needed. (even beyond that point you likely get usable output)
A panel is just a dumb slate of crystals that shoots out electrons, the wires and inverters and rest-of-system are up to us to design if we're indulging our China-panic. But we're basically being paid to take as many dumb panels as we can warehouse. Whether you believe that oversupply is a weapon, a mistake, or just normal industrial strategy is basically irrelevant.
It could happen I suppose, but most likely it would be an American company adding unnecessary spyware/rentware to a commodity product that didn't really need software in the first place and then lobbying to make the bare product illegal somehow.
> It’s sad to see that in the US the ev incentives are gone.
After the incentives were cancelled, many of the EV manufacturers simply cut the prices of their cars by a large amount, some as high as the incentive, in the following months and model years. EV sales still fell but are recovering now. It's hard to know how many people shifted their purchase early to 2025 instead of waiting for 2026, where they may have gotten the same price.
To be honest, in my experience, you don't need the incentives. Like what more do you actually need? Cheaper, faster, smoother, quieter, wake up every day to a full "tank", less things to go wrong. They're just better now - no one can deny that apart from absolute die-hard "petrol heads".
It's not like driving an EV has any actual downsides Vs a gasoline car any more? Yes yes I am sure people will reply saying how they need to drive 900 miles every day without stopping once while towing a trailer at 100mph etc. Most people don't need to do that, but hey enjoy spending your life doing that if that's your thing.
> It's not like driving an EV has any actual downsides Vs a gasoline car any more?
Driving, no. Buying, yes. I bought a used car for €2600 8 years ago and it’s still going strong. That won’t buy me an EV. I drive maybe 1000 kilometers a year, the difference in fuel costs doesn’t make a dent in the difference in the initial purchase.
>I bought a used car for €2600 8 years ago and it’s still going strong.
Same for me. Also, I live in rental apartment, I don't live in a house with residential charging, which would make me dependent on public chagrin spots which suck and have massive energy prices compared to residential ones, so I'm in no way better off/cheaper with an EV than my gasoline car.
EVs where I live massively benefit the wealthy who own their homes and have charging at home, making EV ownership a slam dunk. Even cheaper for them if they have solar panels. But not for the poor, where TC ICE ownership is so much cheaper overall.
The government can fix this by putting cheap subsidized charging spots across all existing street parking to lead the way, but they aren't, so then we're at the mercy of the "free market" who will just gouge us, and so nothing will change.
No need to worry about cam belts or oil changes or spark plugs or mice eating your air filter or petrol going stale in the tank or replacing fuel filters or 12v batteries going flat if you don't drive them for at least 20 mins once every 10 days etc.
> Cheaper, faster, smoother, quieter, wake up every day to a full "tank", less things to go wrong
I agree to everything except waking up every day to a full "tank". That's only if you have your own house. If not, you'll depend on public chargers, so you'll buy "fuel" at premium prices, possibly higher than petrol, and you'll have to move your car at the end of the recharge in the middle of the night to avoid the parking fee.
You need the money to buy one. Europeans do not have much money, and less and less of the working population have the employment arrangements which the banks demand to allow them to get a nice car loan, even if they wanted to borrow money for a new car. Gas vehicles can be purchased used from the past three decades.
Wait, why are you being downvoted? Not every European has Norwegian money to buy an EV. Wealth disparity across the EU is massive.
I just came from my short Euro vacation and majority of EVs I saw at the tourist spots had license plates from countries with above average wealthy people: CH, NL, DK, etc. Germans, Italians, eastern Europeans, etc mostly had ICEs.
You can't mandated all switch to EVs unless you can somehow mandate they all have the same wealth too, which isn't the case.
>Taking out a loan for something that depreciates as fast as a car seems like the dumbest thing a person could do.
...what? For most the world by area (so at least 20-30% of the population, even in Europe) arbitrary point to point mechanical transportation is a requirement for work/life at least a significant chunk of the year. Most will also either flat out need, or find quite valuable: 1) Having that capability on demand. 2) Being able to permanently customize it to suit their needs (be it accessibility, having tools and organizational systems onboard, or most basically having what can be transported along with them match their common/rare needs).
The most economical way to manage that in general is owning your own vehicle. But it's a large capital expenditure upfront. Getting a loan to spread that out over time is one of the most basic purposes of debt. The ROI is in the actual utility, not in some sort of asset appreciation. Which is how most economics is right? I didn't replace all my incandescent bulbs with LED bulbs because I expected to be able to resell them later for more money, I bought them because they deliver far more useful visible wavelength photons per watt, and with more precise tuning and far less toxicity and other concerns then fluorescent. If I needed to replace 10k bulbs and wanted to get a loan for it the economics would be pretty straightforward to pencil out even with the expectation the entire value of the bulbs would go to zero wouldn't it? Taking out a loan for an EV car isn't any different.
Or more charitably to the consumers: "Having all EVs priced as luxury vehicles is stupid." Fortunately, non-American manufacturers are doing something about this, while Americans continue to dream about an electric Ford Maverick.
A new Chevy Bolt starts at $27,600. The least expensive new ICE car in the US is still over $20,000 and will cost you most or all of the difference in fuel depending on how much you drive.
The real "problem" is that price-conscious buyers will be buying used, and then you need EVs to be a larger percentage of new cars for a few years before they're a larger percentage of used cars.
Brake dust is at least mostly solved by EVs, because regenerative braking does the vast majority of the braking work, thus no dust. Tire dust is real, but is going to be there no matter what kind of powertrain a vehicle has. EVs have more wear, but it is marginal. A Tesla Model 3 weighs less than any new pickup truck for sale today.
> A Tesla Model 3 weighs less than any new pickup truck for sale today.
I'm an EV fan but this is apples to oranges comparison. EV vehicles are substantially heavier than their ICE counterparts. Their instant torque also wears tread quicker. That's just facts and there's nothing wrong with that. The world is not black and white.
> EV vehicles are substantially heavier than their ICE counterparts.
Tesla model 3 curb weight: "3,552 lbs to 4,072 lbs"
BMW 3 series curb weight: "3,536 lbs to 4,180 lbs"
> Their instant torque also wears tread quicker.
This works the opposite of how you imagine it does. Because electric motors have a flat torque curve, electric cars typically use a single-speed transmission, e.g. Model 3 has a fixed gear ratio of ~9:1.
Modern ICE cars typically have around 6 gears and the lowest one will have a higher total gear ratio than that, more like 15:1, causing wheel torque to be around two thirds higher in that gear proportional to engine torque than it would be at 9:1, and the engine's torque peak is commonly ~2400 RPM, which translates to as little as 10-15 MPH in first gear.
Electric cars like the Model 3 Performance accelerate quickly because they have >500 horsepower. So do ICE cars with equivalent power. Meanwhile something like a Nissan Leaf has similar power and correspondingly a similar 0-60 time to a Honda Civic.
To put it another way, there are very few modern cars where you can't hit the traction limit of the tires by putting your foot down in low gear, so the limit was never the powertrain to begin with.
Electric cars typically have a faster 60-100 time than similar ICE cars, because then the ICE car has to use a higher gear, but now we're back to the thing where this is hardly relevant unless you're accelerating the vehicle flat out to 100 MPH.
Brake dust is significantly less. Modern EV specific tyres paired with moderated torque curves significantly mitigates the tyre dust.
Fossil fueled vehicles are still significantly worse for the environment and health (before you even start considering the wars and bloodshed for the fossil fuels that we're currently witnessing in Ukraine and Iran). Don't accept the propaganda.
My 13 Chevy Volt has 225k miles and is still on its original brake pads and rotors. The rotors are basically good as new, and the pads are at about 40-50%.
I have nearly 125k on a M3P, on the original pads. Right foot tends to be heavy on both pedals. Regen takes a lot of the load, makes a huge difference in pad usage / life.
"brake dust"? On an EV? Do you have any idea how long brake pads last on a hybrid (hint: a long time)? Now, for the same reasons, imagine how long the pads last on a pure EV. I expect the pads on our Hyundai Ioniq 5 to outlast me. (Granted, I'm retirement age.)
I'm not even going to address tire dust. That's just people looking for an EV-related pearl to clutch.
Move to Shenzhen or Shanghai, that's already the reality there. It was so weird to experience this while stopped in traffic in the centers of so many Chinese cities. You're sitting in your car, and it's so quiet that all you can hear are footsteps on the sidewalk, the wind, and birds chirping.
It's not even about the incentives at this point. Americans in general are kind of dumb. The ones who aren't dumb have been driving EVs for a decade+. The rest are still "oh 300 miles isn't enough for me" "oh the cold kills the range by 10% oh no I'm going to get stuck" "oh, I have severe range anxiety". And these are all smart Harvard, Johns Hopkins educated people with multiple degrees. Not yokels.
People are out here spending $40k on a Camry and $50k on a Plugin Rav4 :facepalm:
99% of EV drivers (there is full data to support this so its not just an anecdotal claim) want another EV for their next car.
Once you've driven any EV, you will never want to go back to a gas car. Even if it's not for environmental reasons, the tech, smoothness, quiet are just magnitudes better than any gas car.
Is this really the case though? The average car payment an American pays was $750/month last I checked, and I believe that was in 2025. Americans are willingly want to pay this price for... mediocre cars. Like leather and massage upholstered trucks and fully loaded Lexus ES's. If people really wanted, they can get a 1 year old EV with 10k miles for 40% off MSRP. Or wait 2 years, 25k miles and get it for more than 50% off. But people won't because they think the battery is depleted.
That is correct. I think the alleged "dumbess" comes most from voting for the people that won't do the things you mentioned in your second paragraph.
But as I always say, it is not a property exclusive to US citizens. currently it looks like there is a drinking contest on which country will do the most ridiculous election result. The US started it but Germany said "halt meine Leberwurscht" and whent straigt to the top.
Why is everyone not understanding that good cheap EVs are banned in the US? If people actually got an experience a Chinese EV I dont think it would be nearly this bad.
Well, to be fair we Europeans kinda topped that by doing everything right and then in months killing all regulations that drove those things. #TechnologyOpenness
In Czechia businesses can get ~17000€ per EV, free vignettes for EV, cheaper price for charging if you get photovoltaic panels, also donated ~8000€. No wonder that sales goes up when our taxes sponsor EV manufacturing outside EU. And simultaneously automotive in EU dies. Germany is in real trouble.
It’s a shame that the US and Canada are lagging behind. I get that politicians want to protect the fossil fuel industry and slow-to-adapt domestic automakers, but consumers and the environment suffer instead.
It's interesting to see the way politics influences public opinion which in turn influences manufacturers, which in turn influence politics.
In Europe EV's have a positive political support, which means lots of sales, which means "all" European manufacturers have solid (and improving) offerings.
By contrast the biggest EV manufacturer is politically toxic to the very people likely to buy it. And oil companies lobby hard to keep anti-EV talking points alive. Which drives sales down, and manufacturers drop EVs from the range. Banning competition doesn't seem to help with making progress.
And yes, I get the "Europe short distances" argument, but how many Americans are really driving 300+ miles every day?
So, 20 years from now, will US manufacturers exist? Or will products from Asia and Europe be too far ahead?
>And yes, I get the "Europe short distances" argument, but how many Americans are really driving 300+ miles every day?
Everyday? probably not many, but 300+ in a single day several times a year, well I bet it is quite a few. Visiting relatives at Thanksgiving and other holidays, summer vacations, sure some people take airplanes, but most aren't that well off. And if you have children visiting aunts/uncles/cousins/grandparents, the only place I'd want to do a 40 minute charge for the next leg is maybe Buc-ees, which is in a pretty small part of the country.
Will this take me and my family where we need to go is a more important consideration than the daily commute for me, but perhaps that is not as common a sentiment.
> but 300+ in a single day several times a year, well I bet it is quite a few.
And this hasn't been a problem in an EV for years. That's a single charge for almost all EVs now. And with fast chargers being almost everywhere, especially along highways, I doubt the actual time taken is very different.
If you don't take a single ~20 minute break in a 5 hour drive, you can beat it. I'm not sure that's healthy or safe though. If you have children this isn't even an option IMHO.
> Will this take me and my family where we need to go is a more important consideration than the daily commute
Totally your decision obviously. It's also why you see so many trucks and all terrain vehicles drive around for the 1 time a year that might be useful. The rest of the year you just pay for that in gas/maintenance/parking ease etc. Again, your decision and I'm not saying you should change, just playing Devils advocate
Charging, for me at least, is usually a 10-15 minute affair which is faster than my family can use a washroom and stretch our legs. Several road trips per year in an EV is painless.
Towing things long distances is one of the few EV weak points I can think of, but REV trucks should mostly fix that too.
I do this frequently. A 15 minute stop for a biobreak and a takeaway coffee usually adds 100 miles or so on a modern EV and fast charger.
It's really not much (if any) inconvenience. If in a gas car you assume you are going to stop to take a piss and grab a drink or a snack or something anyway during the course of a long 300+ mile drive (very likely I'd say, unless you and your passengers are urinating into bottles), you'd still need to stop for gas at some point too when with an EV you are actually spending less time since it's "filling up" while you are in the line waiting for your skinny latte. You don't have to do all that then also stop to grab gas too, because your car filled up without you.
You don't need a 40 minute change. My Ioniq 5 will go from 30% to 85% in 20 minutes. On road trips I'm usually in and out in about 15 minutes which is aligned with my stop time with my ICE car. Why would you limit yourself to stopping at a single vendor like Buc-ee's? My EV is the best roadtripping car I've ever owned. It's a superior car, and it "refuels" quickly.
So stop at a supercharger once or twice a week on your way wherever. Im sure there's time in your week where you are mindlessly scrolling. Do that while charging instead of at home.
Do a few 500km trips in Sweden per year. We have lots of fast chargers so mostly not an issue, quick coffee/bathroom break, like 20 min is enough. Only time it was a bit of an issue was when it was minus 30c, had to wait 20 minutes for a charger where they didn't have many.
There are plenty of non-Tesla options available. The market in the US was already on the decline and then the federal incentive got pulled and demand has really stalled.
Speaking as a EV driver myself, the charging network in the US is really lacking. Charging times are fine but the ease of finding an unnocupied and working charger that you can drive up to and start charging quickly still too difficult.
Maybe reasons like this make people not desire EVs:
But with winter right around the corner, owners are worried that the cold weather. The ID.4 Pro S AWD is rated for 263 miles of EPA range in ideal conditions. The 20% hit to the battery likely brings real-world range below 200 miles, and actual winter condition tests show that the ID.4 loses up 37% of its range in the cold—ouch.
https://insideevs.com/news/812129/vw-id4-charge-limit-80/
Yes, me and all the others are worried that our daily 200km commute in -40 Degrees will not be feasible.
I mean, seriously, it's a small inconvenience once you realize you don't need a huge range in your daily life. I do wish my EV had a longer range, but I get over 300km on a charge and it's more than enough for everyday use.
200+ miles is quite optimistic. On a bad day it's more like 130 miles, and a significant minority of americans drive 130 miles a day. I love my EV but my wife might refuse to buy another one for exactly this reason. A 250 mile range is more like 200 miles in cold weather(and that's what I see in florida so that's probably a best case). And at 85mph(what people are actually driving on the highway) it's more like 150 miles(mi/kwh really falls off a cliff over 60ish mph). And you don't want risk running out of battery just before you destination, so make that 130miles even with a dangerously small margin for error. That's 1.5 hours at highway speed in the winter. And chargers are 20-40 minutes apart and may not work(again florida so "good" charger availability...I've seen 1hr+ apart in new hampshire). So if you hit a bad charger you're potentially stranded.
Our EV is great for normal use, but my wife had to do a 200 mile round trip once a week for a couple months(not anticipated when we bought it). She quickly went from loving her fancy new car to wanting to sell that annoying POS. A faster charger plus extended range battery would have helped some(Chevy Bolt is weak on both) but it is honestly a pain point for the kind of trip many americans do somewhat regularly.
I believe you're misunderstanding OPs point. I read it as saying North Americans drive 200+ miles at once more often than Europeans, and so it makes sense that EV adoption would lag in North America given that.
Most people don't worry so much about thermal efficiency and care more about cost per mile..
If I could buy a type of vehicle that was only 10% thermally efficient but the fuel was practically free, that would be pretty cost effective even if not thermally efficient.
If it's 100% coal, then yes, otherwise EVs are better. And since the grids are moving to renewables all over the world, it will continue to get better.
I mean, EVs are supposed to be cheaper than ICE vehicles. They probably would be if EU didn't let its automakers manufacture a high margin market again by blocking more affordable competitors
The median monthly gross income in Poland as of 2026 is 7.6k PLN ($1.9k USD) and like 80-90% of it will go towards your living costs, EVs will probably be a thing here in a decade or so when there's second hand market for cheap used ones coming imported from richer countries.
Local legislation can make a huge difference. In my country, you can install solar panels without storage, pump the electricity directly to the company, consume theirs, and pay the difference. Our house produces more than we consume, so charging an EV would still be mostly free for us.
If the energy company didn't buy our electricity, we would be forced to use batteries to store the surplus to charge the EV batteries.
The only disadvantage is that during a blackout, we still produce energy but can't use it. Fortunately blackouts are very rare in my region.
Same here, but the initial cost is gigantic. And after a lot of Poles made the leap of faith and went all in on renewables, the gov changed the rules of buying/selling so now if you don't have a storage, there's a very small chance this investment will ever pay off. And if you want to have a storage, then you basically need a small bunker, a separate structure, to stay compliant, which requires from you to be even more wealthy.
They weren’t until recently rich enough to fund the required charger infrastructure. Most people don’t want an EV until it flips from “not too big of a deal if you plan ahead” to “of course I can always find a charger”.
EVs are still pretty expensive, besides I'm sure that PIS decided that EVs are somehow a communist plot and will let Tusk turn your kids atheist. EVs are only just around the tipping point where they are cheaper without political incentives. And you need some political good will for charging infrastructure etc.
It's distribution rather than generation which is the problem. Offshore wind farms generate copious electricity and then because of lack of interconnects they end up being paid to switch off on the windiest days. This will all be solved as more infrastructure is built.
oh no! your over estimating the hundreds of millions of USD saved from a health population that doesn't have to deal with air and noise pollution... also have you ever thought about the infrastructure of public transports? i don't cycle, much less mix myself in a metro/tram with all kind of people /s
Low EV adoption will lead to much more death and suffering due to climate change. So, sure, it's not the ideal way to achieve this result, but it's better than the alternative.
I wouldn't be so optimistic. At the current trend, we might be just walking corpses. Like newborn Japanese children from Nagasaki on the 2nd August 1945 (4 days before its sudden democratisation or vaporisation by the American democrazy). We are just seeing the apocalypse in slow motion.
According to some of the most optimistic doomsayers of the Interwebs, the warming levels we are enjoying as of today are due to the CO2 levels of 30 years ago.
1. This is for "Battery EVs" (so probably not hybrid I guess)
2. I am somewhat suspicious of this statistic. A 70% jump in one month? I doubt it. Perhaps there was some change in regulation? Coordinated removal of models from the market? Or maybe a collapse in availability of some models or of car sales overall?
I believe the car market is very depressed in the summer months, especially August, so a good chunk of it is probably simply people buy more cars in September than in August.
Proportion would be more interesting.
Why are people still arguing and trying to dilute 2035 fossil fuel car production ban? Isn't it obvious that by 2035 these cars will be off market, ban or not, because no one will want to buy them?
No, it is not obvious, especially to anyone who lives in a rural area. There is a type of smooth-brained reactionary person who will buy the biggest gas-guzzling truck he can find just because you told him not to.
There is so much plastic we could eliminate from our lives before we even worry about that.
First of all, ban synthetics in clothes and footwear except for specific uses: windproof, waterproof, athletic gear meant for actual competitions (not athleisure). Or force full disclosure for clothes, not just main fabric, but lining, filling, decoration, trim, sewing threads, pockets, etc. Ban all false advertising (100% cotton needs to be 100% cotton, not just exterior and then 100% polyester filling, lining, trim, sewing threads, pockets...).
Ban all single use plastics such as bags or mineral water and soda plastic bottles. We are perfectly fine with natural textile bags, aluminum cans (yeah, I know), glass bottles, etc.
Ah, ban plastic plush toys and all massive microplastic generators like fleece. Keep only very limited plastic toy categories (Legos, balloons, etc).
e-bikes in particular have reduced fossil fuel use by huge amounts compared to EVs. When you consider that most of a car’s energy is used simply to move the car itself, the aggregate inefficiencies are staggering.
Most people, and especially women, don't want to ride motrocyrcles as they are dangerous. Yes, that's also because cars and dangerous, but motorcycles, by design, mingle with cars.
A good outcome of this crisis. These god damn fossil fuels. Never even mind climate change. Being depend on them has turned out to be a huge national security risk. Picking a seller is picking your poison: Russia, the Golf states, and now the US.
> the Golf states
Scotland?
Certainly not the US, we only get the Golf R and GTI here and they're not particularly popular
For EVs, the e-Golf has been dead for years but they may bring the name back to electric as an id.Golf next time
whoops :P
Florida
I think they're referring to the Persian Gulf.
Woosh
Golf in the Gulf. Must happen sometimes.
Cricket?
Also not a first. The oil crisis (1973, 1979, ...) caused many countries to seek alternative energies (like nuclear), electrification, etc...
I'm reminded of the cartoon that circulated some years back where a climate denier asks the speaker "what if we built a better world for nothing?", or something along those lines.
The way these past few years have shown the absolute precarity of fossil fuel systems just proves that, preserving a comfortably liveable climate aside, renewables just make more sense across pretty much every axis.
You still get people fear mongering about Chinese solar, as if we shouldn't make the most of the oversupply subsidised by a supposed geopolitical foe. Like, no, they're not going to turn it off, once you have the panel, the light hits it and the electrons jump the gap. Oil/gas can be turned off yet the speaker is somehow glossing over that.
> The way these past few years have shown the absolute precarity of fossil fuel systems
I agree with you but wasn't the primary takeaway of these past years that there is so much corruption anywhere even remotely related to burnable fuel that one needs not one but two actual wars (key to the fossil rich world) to provide a somewhat level playing field?
> climate denier
Can we move on from climate change and focus on the fact that EVs are better in every possible way.
Somehow I feel buying EV for the sake of climate change is cringe (I know, I am not a good person, but also feel most people who say they care about climate change are disingenuous). Maybe it's change of political climate, maybe it's me who changed, maybe it's the odd hate you get for driving EV, IDK.
I'm not going to worry about climate 100years ago because just about everyone I know doesn't either. None of them deny it either.
And China didn't need to bomb any country to sell solar for us.
Economic coercion and dumping is well known.
>the light hits it and the electrons jump the gap
Yes, but the circuit is way more complex than that. You're dependant on the OEM for spare parts, support, software and whatever else, not to mention the problems inherent in putting this junk on the internet (which it will be). I am not fond of the idea of giving the CCP access to our infrastructure.
For battery storage systems sure, but for panels, not really. The panel breaks you just throw it away and buy another. And sure China can cut us off from buying another, but we have 15 years with most panels to use them while we build out local manufacture if needed. (even beyond that point you likely get usable output)
A panel is just a dumb slate of crystals that shoots out electrons, the wires and inverters and rest-of-system are up to us to design if we're indulging our China-panic. But we're basically being paid to take as many dumb panels as we can warehouse. Whether you believe that oversupply is a weapon, a mistake, or just normal industrial strategy is basically irrelevant.
Software? For a solar panel? Likewise spare parts? What?
I am pretty sure a solar panel is just a solar panel, a frame and some wires?
The inverters and all that sure whatever just buy local. Those have not been the bottleneck - the panels have been what has been enabling the boom.
Sadly, this is not the first time someone on HN ignorantly assumed solar panels come bundled with scary Chinese firmware in their comment.
It's a failure-mode only those not familiar with the basics of solar can come up with, but are readoning it out from "first principles".
It could happen I suppose, but most likely it would be an American company adding unnecessary spyware/rentware to a commodity product that didn't really need software in the first place and then lobbying to make the bare product illegal somehow.
> You're dependant on the OEM for spare parts, support, software and whatever else
China also manufactures and exports ICE vehicle parts and fossil fuel extraction equipment. No one thinks that's a dangerous dependency.
You can have completely autonomous systems.
Also, really? You think that Internet-facing software in inverters is a big deal?
I would love a world, where I while waiting at the traffic stop can breathe clean air. It’s sad to see that in the US the ev incentives are gone.
> It’s sad to see that in the US the ev incentives are gone.
After the incentives were cancelled, many of the EV manufacturers simply cut the prices of their cars by a large amount, some as high as the incentive, in the following months and model years. EV sales still fell but are recovering now. It's hard to know how many people shifted their purchase early to 2025 instead of waiting for 2026, where they may have gotten the same price.
To be honest, in my experience, you don't need the incentives. Like what more do you actually need? Cheaper, faster, smoother, quieter, wake up every day to a full "tank", less things to go wrong. They're just better now - no one can deny that apart from absolute die-hard "petrol heads".
It's not like driving an EV has any actual downsides Vs a gasoline car any more? Yes yes I am sure people will reply saying how they need to drive 900 miles every day without stopping once while towing a trailer at 100mph etc. Most people don't need to do that, but hey enjoy spending your life doing that if that's your thing.
> It's not like driving an EV has any actual downsides Vs a gasoline car any more?
Driving, no. Buying, yes. I bought a used car for €2600 8 years ago and it’s still going strong. That won’t buy me an EV. I drive maybe 1000 kilometers a year, the difference in fuel costs doesn’t make a dent in the difference in the initial purchase.
>I bought a used car for €2600 8 years ago and it’s still going strong.
Same for me. Also, I live in rental apartment, I don't live in a house with residential charging, which would make me dependent on public chagrin spots which suck and have massive energy prices compared to residential ones, so I'm in no way better off/cheaper with an EV than my gasoline car.
EVs where I live massively benefit the wealthy who own their homes and have charging at home, making EV ownership a slam dunk. Even cheaper for them if they have solar panels. But not for the poor, where TC ICE ownership is so much cheaper overall.
The government can fix this by putting cheap subsidized charging spots across all existing street parking to lead the way, but they aren't, so then we're at the mercy of the "free market" who will just gouge us, and so nothing will change.
You totally can get an EV for those sort of prices on the used market, e.g. https://www.autotrader.co.uk/car-search?body-type=&channel=c...
No need to worry about cam belts or oil changes or spark plugs or mice eating your air filter or petrol going stale in the tank or replacing fuel filters or 12v batteries going flat if you don't drive them for at least 20 mins once every 10 days etc.
Used car market in the Eurozone is a lot worse(expensive) than in UK.
Most good electric bicycles I saw cost more than 2,8K. You're not getting a suable EV for that where I live.
> That won’t buy me an EV.
for now, but maybe in a few years it will
Well yes, we're talking about NOW.
Suire, EVs might get cheaper in the future, but I also might lose my auto sector job (again), so that's hardly a silver lining.
> Cheaper, faster, smoother, quieter, wake up every day to a full "tank", less things to go wrong
I agree to everything except waking up every day to a full "tank". That's only if you have your own house. If not, you'll depend on public chargers, so you'll buy "fuel" at premium prices, possibly higher than petrol, and you'll have to move your car at the end of the recharge in the middle of the night to avoid the parking fee.
You need the money to buy one. Europeans do not have much money, and less and less of the working population have the employment arrangements which the banks demand to allow them to get a nice car loan, even if they wanted to borrow money for a new car. Gas vehicles can be purchased used from the past three decades.
Wait, why are you being downvoted? Not every European has Norwegian money to buy an EV. Wealth disparity across the EU is massive.
I just came from my short Euro vacation and majority of EVs I saw at the tourist spots had license plates from countries with above average wealthy people: CH, NL, DK, etc. Germans, Italians, eastern Europeans, etc mostly had ICEs.
You can't mandated all switch to EVs unless you can somehow mandate they all have the same wealth too, which isn't the case.
Taking out a loan for something that depreciates as fast as a car seems like the dumbest thing a person could do.
>Taking out a loan for something that depreciates as fast as a car seems like the dumbest thing a person could do.
...what? For most the world by area (so at least 20-30% of the population, even in Europe) arbitrary point to point mechanical transportation is a requirement for work/life at least a significant chunk of the year. Most will also either flat out need, or find quite valuable: 1) Having that capability on demand. 2) Being able to permanently customize it to suit their needs (be it accessibility, having tools and organizational systems onboard, or most basically having what can be transported along with them match their common/rare needs).
The most economical way to manage that in general is owning your own vehicle. But it's a large capital expenditure upfront. Getting a loan to spread that out over time is one of the most basic purposes of debt. The ROI is in the actual utility, not in some sort of asset appreciation. Which is how most economics is right? I didn't replace all my incandescent bulbs with LED bulbs because I expected to be able to resell them later for more money, I bought them because they deliver far more useful visible wavelength photons per watt, and with more precise tuning and far less toxicity and other concerns then fluorescent. If I needed to replace 10k bulbs and wanted to get a loan for it the economics would be pretty straightforward to pencil out even with the expectation the entire value of the bulbs would go to zero wouldn't it? Taking out a loan for an EV car isn't any different.
Well then the enlightened hacker argument simply turns into: "People who can't afford an electric car are stupid".
Or more charitably to the consumers: "Having all EVs priced as luxury vehicles is stupid." Fortunately, non-American manufacturers are doing something about this, while Americans continue to dream about an electric Ford Maverick.
A new Chevy Bolt starts at $27,600. The least expensive new ICE car in the US is still over $20,000 and will cost you most or all of the difference in fuel depending on how much you drive.
The real "problem" is that price-conscious buyers will be buying used, and then you need EVs to be a larger percentage of new cars for a few years before they're a larger percentage of used cars.
Tailpipe emissions are only half of it. The brake and tyre dust is the second half, and not solved by EVs.
Brake dust is at least mostly solved by EVs, because regenerative braking does the vast majority of the braking work, thus no dust. Tire dust is real, but is going to be there no matter what kind of powertrain a vehicle has. EVs have more wear, but it is marginal. A Tesla Model 3 weighs less than any new pickup truck for sale today.
> A Tesla Model 3 weighs less than any new pickup truck for sale today.
I'm an EV fan but this is apples to oranges comparison. EV vehicles are substantially heavier than their ICE counterparts. Their instant torque also wears tread quicker. That's just facts and there's nothing wrong with that. The world is not black and white.
> EV vehicles are substantially heavier than their ICE counterparts.
Tesla model 3 curb weight: "3,552 lbs to 4,072 lbs"
BMW 3 series curb weight: "3,536 lbs to 4,180 lbs"
> Their instant torque also wears tread quicker.
This works the opposite of how you imagine it does. Because electric motors have a flat torque curve, electric cars typically use a single-speed transmission, e.g. Model 3 has a fixed gear ratio of ~9:1.
Modern ICE cars typically have around 6 gears and the lowest one will have a higher total gear ratio than that, more like 15:1, causing wheel torque to be around two thirds higher in that gear proportional to engine torque than it would be at 9:1, and the engine's torque peak is commonly ~2400 RPM, which translates to as little as 10-15 MPH in first gear.
Electric cars like the Model 3 Performance accelerate quickly because they have >500 horsepower. So do ICE cars with equivalent power. Meanwhile something like a Nissan Leaf has similar power and correspondingly a similar 0-60 time to a Honda Civic.
To put it another way, there are very few modern cars where you can't hit the traction limit of the tires by putting your foot down in low gear, so the limit was never the powertrain to begin with.
Electric cars typically have a faster 60-100 time than similar ICE cars, because then the ICE car has to use a higher gear, but now we're back to the thing where this is hardly relevant unless you're accelerating the vehicle flat out to 100 MPH.
Brake dust is significantly less. Modern EV specific tyres paired with moderated torque curves significantly mitigates the tyre dust.
Fossil fueled vehicles are still significantly worse for the environment and health (before you even start considering the wars and bloodshed for the fossil fuels that we're currently witnessing in Ukraine and Iran). Don't accept the propaganda.
My 13 Chevy Volt has 225k miles and is still on its original brake pads and rotors. The rotors are basically good as new, and the pads are at about 40-50%.
But you agree that if we can eliminate half of the problem, then we should do it, right?
More like 99% of it. But either way, perfect is the enemy of good.
If driven smoothly, EVs solve most of the brake dust problem.
I have nearly 125k on a M3P, on the original pads. Right foot tends to be heavy on both pedals. Regen takes a lot of the load, makes a huge difference in pad usage / life.
Exactly. And EVs are marginally heavier if tire dust is an actual concern. Massive SUVs and pickup trucks should be criticized first.
They sadly also increase the tire problem significantly
"brake dust"? On an EV? Do you have any idea how long brake pads last on a hybrid (hint: a long time)? Now, for the same reasons, imagine how long the pads last on a pure EV. I expect the pads on our Hyundai Ioniq 5 to outlast me. (Granted, I'm retirement age.)
I'm not even going to address tire dust. That's just people looking for an EV-related pearl to clutch.
Move to Shenzhen or Shanghai, that's already the reality there. It was so weird to experience this while stopped in traffic in the centers of so many Chinese cities. You're sitting in your car, and it's so quiet that all you can hear are footsteps on the sidewalk, the wind, and birds chirping.
>Move to Shenzhen or Shanghai, that's already the reality there.
EVs are a lot cheaper there than in Europe(same modes), plus way more charging infra, plus much cheaper energy than in Europe.
what an embarrassment for the West. We are truly a 20th century civilization
As always, the Europeans are told by their out of touch ruling elates, they should eat cake if they can't afford bread.
Compare the London subway with the Shanghai subway.
The first was built one hundred years ago with the modern tech of those times.
To quote the philosopher Bob Dylan "those who are first will later be last".
It's not even about the incentives at this point. Americans in general are kind of dumb. The ones who aren't dumb have been driving EVs for a decade+. The rest are still "oh 300 miles isn't enough for me" "oh the cold kills the range by 10% oh no I'm going to get stuck" "oh, I have severe range anxiety". And these are all smart Harvard, Johns Hopkins educated people with multiple degrees. Not yokels.
People are out here spending $40k on a Camry and $50k on a Plugin Rav4 :facepalm:
99% of EV drivers (there is full data to support this so its not just an anecdotal claim) want another EV for their next car.
Once you've driven any EV, you will never want to go back to a gas car. Even if it's not for environmental reasons, the tech, smoothness, quiet are just magnitudes better than any gas car.
they aren't dumb at all, they count their dollars. they see cheap gas guzzlers, they buy them because they're cheap and gas is cheap. this is smart!
tax the gas guzzlers, tax gas, subsidize EVs and watch Americans rush to the dealerships to get EVs.
Is this really the case though? The average car payment an American pays was $750/month last I checked, and I believe that was in 2025. Americans are willingly want to pay this price for... mediocre cars. Like leather and massage upholstered trucks and fully loaded Lexus ES's. If people really wanted, they can get a 1 year old EV with 10k miles for 40% off MSRP. Or wait 2 years, 25k miles and get it for more than 50% off. But people won't because they think the battery is depleted.
That is correct. I think the alleged "dumbess" comes most from voting for the people that won't do the things you mentioned in your second paragraph.
But as I always say, it is not a property exclusive to US citizens. currently it looks like there is a drinking contest on which country will do the most ridiculous election result. The US started it but Germany said "halt meine Leberwurscht" and whent straigt to the top.
Why is everyone not understanding that good cheap EVs are banned in the US? If people actually got an experience a Chinese EV I dont think it would be nearly this bad.
Well, to be fair we Europeans kinda topped that by doing everything right and then in months killing all regulations that drove those things. #TechnologyOpenness
The EV incentives are not gone, they just changed from being a non refundable federal income tax credit to higher fossil fuel prices.
In Czechia businesses can get ~17000€ per EV, free vignettes for EV, cheaper price for charging if you get photovoltaic panels, also donated ~8000€. No wonder that sales goes up when our taxes sponsor EV manufacturing outside EU. And simultaneously automotive in EU dies. Germany is in real trouble.
It’s a shame that the US and Canada are lagging behind. I get that politicians want to protect the fossil fuel industry and slow-to-adapt domestic automakers, but consumers and the environment suffer instead.
It's interesting to see the way politics influences public opinion which in turn influences manufacturers, which in turn influence politics.
In Europe EV's have a positive political support, which means lots of sales, which means "all" European manufacturers have solid (and improving) offerings.
By contrast the biggest EV manufacturer is politically toxic to the very people likely to buy it. And oil companies lobby hard to keep anti-EV talking points alive. Which drives sales down, and manufacturers drop EVs from the range. Banning competition doesn't seem to help with making progress.
And yes, I get the "Europe short distances" argument, but how many Americans are really driving 300+ miles every day?
So, 20 years from now, will US manufacturers exist? Or will products from Asia and Europe be too far ahead?
>And yes, I get the "Europe short distances" argument, but how many Americans are really driving 300+ miles every day?
Everyday? probably not many, but 300+ in a single day several times a year, well I bet it is quite a few. Visiting relatives at Thanksgiving and other holidays, summer vacations, sure some people take airplanes, but most aren't that well off. And if you have children visiting aunts/uncles/cousins/grandparents, the only place I'd want to do a 40 minute charge for the next leg is maybe Buc-ees, which is in a pretty small part of the country.
Will this take me and my family where we need to go is a more important consideration than the daily commute for me, but perhaps that is not as common a sentiment.
> but 300+ in a single day several times a year, well I bet it is quite a few.
And this hasn't been a problem in an EV for years. That's a single charge for almost all EVs now. And with fast chargers being almost everywhere, especially along highways, I doubt the actual time taken is very different.
If you don't take a single ~20 minute break in a 5 hour drive, you can beat it. I'm not sure that's healthy or safe though. If you have children this isn't even an option IMHO.
> Will this take me and my family where we need to go is a more important consideration than the daily commute
Totally your decision obviously. It's also why you see so many trucks and all terrain vehicles drive around for the 1 time a year that might be useful. The rest of the year you just pay for that in gas/maintenance/parking ease etc. Again, your decision and I'm not saying you should change, just playing Devils advocate
Charging, for me at least, is usually a 10-15 minute affair which is faster than my family can use a washroom and stretch our legs. Several road trips per year in an EV is painless.
Towing things long distances is one of the few EV weak points I can think of, but REV trucks should mostly fix that too.
I do this frequently. A 15 minute stop for a biobreak and a takeaway coffee usually adds 100 miles or so on a modern EV and fast charger.
It's really not much (if any) inconvenience. If in a gas car you assume you are going to stop to take a piss and grab a drink or a snack or something anyway during the course of a long 300+ mile drive (very likely I'd say, unless you and your passengers are urinating into bottles), you'd still need to stop for gas at some point too when with an EV you are actually spending less time since it's "filling up" while you are in the line waiting for your skinny latte. You don't have to do all that then also stop to grab gas too, because your car filled up without you.
You don't need a 40 minute change. My Ioniq 5 will go from 30% to 85% in 20 minutes. On road trips I'm usually in and out in about 15 minutes which is aligned with my stop time with my ICE car. Why would you limit yourself to stopping at a single vendor like Buc-ee's? My EV is the best roadtripping car I've ever owned. It's a superior car, and it "refuels" quickly.
I only drive 300 miles a week. The problem is, I live in a apartment and there are no chargers at my workplace.
So stop at a supercharger once or twice a week on your way wherever. Im sure there's time in your week where you are mindlessly scrolling. Do that while charging instead of at home.
> ...sure some people take airplanes, but most aren't that well off.
Which highlights the other American failure: dismal rail transportation
We've been waiting for you to solve it. We know you, and only you, have the solution.
Do a few 500km trips in Sweden per year. We have lots of fast chargers so mostly not an issue, quick coffee/bathroom break, like 20 min is enough. Only time it was a bit of an issue was when it was minus 30c, had to wait 20 minutes for a charger where they didn't have many.
There are plenty of non-Tesla options available. The market in the US was already on the decline and then the federal incentive got pulled and demand has really stalled.
Speaking as a EV driver myself, the charging network in the US is really lacking. Charging times are fine but the ease of finding an unnocupied and working charger that you can drive up to and start charging quickly still too difficult.
Maybe reasons like this make people not desire EVs:
But with winter right around the corner, owners are worried that the cold weather. The ID.4 Pro S AWD is rated for 263 miles of EPA range in ideal conditions. The 20% hit to the battery likely brings real-world range below 200 miles, and actual winter condition tests show that the ID.4 loses up 37% of its range in the cold—ouch. https://insideevs.com/news/812129/vw-id4-charge-limit-80/
You should warn Norway, which is approaching 100% EVs for new vehicle sales.
200 miles is still further than I ever need or want to drive in a single journey.
Yes, me and all the others are worried that our daily 200km commute in -40 Degrees will not be feasible.
I mean, seriously, it's a small inconvenience once you realize you don't need a huge range in your daily life. I do wish my EV had a longer range, but I get over 300km on a charge and it's more than enough for everyday use.
The number of people driving 200 miles in one go in Europe is tiny.
Plus charging points are everywhere, so it's trivial to just top up for 30 mins or so.
I feel like the range question is becoming more FUD than reality.
200+ miles is quite optimistic. On a bad day it's more like 130 miles, and a significant minority of americans drive 130 miles a day. I love my EV but my wife might refuse to buy another one for exactly this reason. A 250 mile range is more like 200 miles in cold weather(and that's what I see in florida so that's probably a best case). And at 85mph(what people are actually driving on the highway) it's more like 150 miles(mi/kwh really falls off a cliff over 60ish mph). And you don't want risk running out of battery just before you destination, so make that 130miles even with a dangerously small margin for error. That's 1.5 hours at highway speed in the winter. And chargers are 20-40 minutes apart and may not work(again florida so "good" charger availability...I've seen 1hr+ apart in new hampshire). So if you hit a bad charger you're potentially stranded.
Our EV is great for normal use, but my wife had to do a 200 mile round trip once a week for a couple months(not anticipated when we bought it). She quickly went from loving her fancy new car to wanting to sell that annoying POS. A faster charger plus extended range battery would have helped some(Chevy Bolt is weak on both) but it is honestly a pain point for the kind of trip many americans do somewhat regularly.
I believe you're misunderstanding OPs point. I read it as saying North Americans drive 200+ miles at once more often than Europeans, and so it makes sense that EV adoption would lag in North America given that.
Oil has produced the political system, as well as the complexity it sits atop. [0] [1]
[0]https://www.apocalypse-confidential.com/the-autonomous-chemi...
[1]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KCSsKV5F4xc
What's going on in Poland? Why is the EV market share there lower than in the US?
Probably lower buying power, poor on-the-go charging network and people not “trusting” the Evs as much yet
Also electric power generation is dirtier in Poland (still lots of coal), so the relative emissions benefit is lower.
If the power is generated by burning coal and after transmission efficiency losses etc, gasoline cars could actually be better for the environment.
I think I've seen studies that they still aren't. ICE are really (thermally) inefficient.
Most people don't worry so much about thermal efficiency and care more about cost per mile..
If I could buy a type of vehicle that was only 10% thermally efficient but the fuel was practically free, that would be pretty cost effective even if not thermally efficient.
If it's 100% coal, then yes, otherwise EVs are better. And since the grids are moving to renewables all over the world, it will continue to get better.
I mean, EVs are supposed to be cheaper than ICE vehicles. They probably would be if EU didn't let its automakers manufacture a high margin market again by blocking more affordable competitors
The median monthly gross income in Poland as of 2026 is 7.6k PLN ($1.9k USD) and like 80-90% of it will go towards your living costs, EVs will probably be a thing here in a decade or so when there's second hand market for cheap used ones coming imported from richer countries.
We don't have a lot of superchargers etc. so you mostly rely on what you collect yourself.
EVs here make the most sense if you have solar panels on the roof, something to store the energy in and obviously a house.
Most of the Poles don't have a house.
Edit: superchargers map https://www.tesla.com/pl_pl/findus?bounds=60.47900349927211%...
I know it's not about Tesla only, but it says something.
Local legislation can make a huge difference. In my country, you can install solar panels without storage, pump the electricity directly to the company, consume theirs, and pay the difference. Our house produces more than we consume, so charging an EV would still be mostly free for us.
If the energy company didn't buy our electricity, we would be forced to use batteries to store the surplus to charge the EV batteries.
The only disadvantage is that during a blackout, we still produce energy but can't use it. Fortunately blackouts are very rare in my region.
Same here, but the initial cost is gigantic. And after a lot of Poles made the leap of faith and went all in on renewables, the gov changed the rules of buying/selling so now if you don't have a storage, there's a very small chance this investment will ever pay off. And if you want to have a storage, then you basically need a small bunker, a separate structure, to stay compliant, which requires from you to be even more wealthy.
They weren’t until recently rich enough to fund the required charger infrastructure. Most people don’t want an EV until it flips from “not too big of a deal if you plan ahead” to “of course I can always find a charger”.
EVs are still pretty expensive, besides I'm sure that PIS decided that EVs are somehow a communist plot and will let Tusk turn your kids atheist. EVs are only just around the tipping point where they are cheaper without political incentives. And you need some political good will for charging infrastructure etc.
Europe is going to have to build more electricity generation...
It's distribution rather than generation which is the problem. Offshore wind farms generate copious electricity and then because of lack of interconnects they end up being paid to switch off on the windiest days. This will all be solved as more infrastructure is built.
Or charge the EVS when the sun shines and the wind blows. Today you don't really need to charge your EV that often.
Or when the radioactive rocks shine
That is much more complicated and expensive.
I wish cities would just outright ban private cars unless you get a permit for specific reasons.
Absolutely.
Replaced with trams, which i used extensively when visiting amsterdam. It was such a joy to just hop on/off.
oh no! your over estimating the hundreds of millions of USD saved from a health population that doesn't have to deal with air and noise pollution... also have you ever thought about the infrastructure of public transports? i don't cycle, much less mix myself in a metro/tram with all kind of people /s
Is there anyone in the world who did more to make this happen than Donald Trump? Maybe Vladimir Putin?
One more reason to demand the Nobel peace prize next year
Please god give donald trump a nobel peace prize for killing oil. Please, please happen.
Yes, give him a Nobel prize but have him share it with Masoud Pezeshkian of Iran.
The ceremony :)
The bombings will continue until the Nobel peace prize is awarded.
Its effective but death and suffering on a mass scale aren't the best ways to drive EV adoption overall.
Low EV adoption will lead to much more death and suffering due to climate change. So, sure, it's not the ideal way to achieve this result, but it's better than the alternative.
I wouldn't be so optimistic. At the current trend, we might be just walking corpses. Like newborn Japanese children from Nagasaki on the 2nd August 1945 (4 days before its sudden democratisation or vaporisation by the American democrazy). We are just seeing the apocalypse in slow motion.
According to some of the most optimistic doomsayers of the Interwebs, the warming levels we are enjoying as of today are due to the CO2 levels of 30 years ago.
Username checks out. Why age when you can sacrifice your life for climate preservation.
1. This is for "Battery EVs" (so probably not hybrid I guess)
2. I am somewhat suspicious of this statistic. A 70% jump in one month? I doubt it. Perhaps there was some change in regulation? Coordinated removal of models from the market? Or maybe a collapse in availability of some models or of car sales overall?
I believe the car market is very depressed in the summer months, especially August, so a good chunk of it is probably simply people buy more cars in September than in August. Proportion would be more interesting.
See the 5y graph here: https://tradingeconomics.com/european-union/car-registration...
There's always a massive drop in August for some reasons.
3. A massive sustained oil crisis that can no longer be ignored
Why are people still arguing and trying to dilute 2035 fossil fuel car production ban? Isn't it obvious that by 2035 these cars will be off market, ban or not, because no one will want to buy them?
No one would care about ban or no ban if this were true. The European auto industry cares because they are less competitive in the EV sector.
No, it is not obvious, especially to anyone who lives in a rural area. There is a type of smooth-brained reactionary person who will buy the biggest gas-guzzling truck he can find just because you told him not to.
EV, epedelecs (+bike infra), heat pumps, anti plastic regulation, and Europe becomes fossil fuel resilient.
There will always be conflicting interest between reducing plastic packaging and guaranteeing hygiene for food products.
In my opinion hygiene takes priority.
That's a huge leap of logic - and a bad one.
There is so much plastic we could eliminate from our lives before we even worry about that.
First of all, ban synthetics in clothes and footwear except for specific uses: windproof, waterproof, athletic gear meant for actual competitions (not athleisure). Or force full disclosure for clothes, not just main fabric, but lining, filling, decoration, trim, sewing threads, pockets, etc. Ban all false advertising (100% cotton needs to be 100% cotton, not just exterior and then 100% polyester filling, lining, trim, sewing threads, pockets...).
Ban all single use plastics such as bags or mineral water and soda plastic bottles. We are perfectly fine with natural textile bags, aluminum cans (yeah, I know), glass bottles, etc.
Ah, ban plastic plush toys and all massive microplastic generators like fleece. Keep only very limited plastic toy categories (Legos, balloons, etc).
e-bikes in particular have reduced fossil fuel use by huge amounts compared to EVs. When you consider that most of a car’s energy is used simply to move the car itself, the aggregate inefficiencies are staggering.
A motorcycle uses about half the amount of fuel as a gas car, and costs a fraction of what a gas or EV car costs.
But motorbikes are always ignored, even though they would be the fastest and cheapest way for Europeans to reduce their gas usage.
What mid-sized motorcycles and EV cars have in common is superior performance.
Most people, and especially women, don't want to ride motrocyrcles as they are dangerous. Yes, that's also because cars and dangerous, but motorcycles, by design, mingle with cars.