Will Electric Vehicles Be Viable? When?

[Big Tea]

Can you (in practical terms) recharge by towing?

Yep.

[djos]

That's awesome, I love raptors and EV's and would love to own both!

[gruntguru]

The industry clearly chose electric power and are investing in a good infrastructure. Don’t count on anything else

You mean "The industry" minus Toyota.

[gruntguru]

Looks like the hydrogen refuelling experience is pretty poor. Very few filling stations, long waits to use the single pump and the nozzle freezing to the car. Oh and very expensive unless the car come with free fuel (Toyota need to provide $15k USD of free fuel, that’s just insane!).

Sounds very similar to what I was hearing when EVs started to appear.

The cost of hydrogen is not an issue. The Toyota Mirai carries 5kg. Green hydrogen currently costs about $4.00/kg but the goal is to get the cost down to $2.00/kg. Green hydrogen will eventually be produced using surplus renewable electricity. You know - the sun doesn't always shine and the wind doesn't always blow - so we need more generation capacity than we can use.

[djos]

The industry clearly chose electric power and are investing in a good infrastructure. Don’t count on anything else

You mean "The industry" minus Toyota.

Even they have begrudgingly started investing in BEV's after wasting years on HEV's.

https://electrek.co/2021/09/09/toyota-i ... yone-else/

[djos]

Looks like the hydrogen refuelling experience is pretty poor. Very few filling stations, long waits to use the single pump and the nozzle freezing to the car. Oh and very expensive unless the car come with free fuel (Toyota need to provide $15k USD of free fuel, that’s just insane!).

Sounds very similar to what I was hearing when EVs started to appear.

Not really, EV's have always had access to power sockets at home and the charging infra has really only been needed for long-distance travel. The nozzle's freezing to the car issue is unique to hydrogen.

The cost of hydrogen is not an issue. The Toyota Mirai carries 5kg. Green hydrogen currently costs about $4.00/kg but the goal is to get the cost down to $2.00/kg. Green hydrogen will eventually be produced using surplus renewable electricity. You know - the sun doesn't always shine and the wind doesn't always blow - so we need more generation capacity than we can use.

It absolutely is an issue, the entire HEV energy lifecycle is orders of magnitude less efficient than the BEV energy lifecycle which means cost will always be an issue. Hydrogen requires expensive storage and fueling systems that will take longer to earn an ROI also.

And then there the sheer convenience of charging from home for 90% of ppl - I don't know about you, but avoiding visiting petrol stations on a bi-weekly basis is a huge bonus for me. Even my little Rio GT is costing me $90 AUD for 45 litres of 98 RON atm - running a BEV would cost me cents per week so why would I want an HEV that will cost roughly the same as a petrol powered car?

[Big Tea]

The industry clearly chose electric power and are investing in a good infrastructure. Don’t count on anything else

You mean "The industry" minus Toyota.

Even they have begrudgingly started investing in BEV's after wasting years on HEV's.

https://electrek.co/2021/09/09/toyota-i ... yone-else/

Can I just remind you of the Prius

[djos]

Toyota went big on hybrids, and then dropped the ball, not only that, they’ve been caught lobbying governments to slow down BEV adoption so they can catch up.

[Jolle]

Toyota went big on hybrids, and then dropped the ball, not only that, they’ve been caught lobbying governments to slow down BEV adoption so they can catch up.

We’ve seen the same with VW. Car companies don’t change their engine program that often and it takes a lot of lead time. When Toyota was taking the world by storm with their hybrid solutions, Volkswagen was going all in on the downsizing with the turbo-compressor 1.4. It’s only now, in the new cycle that they go directly to EV.

[Airshifter]

You mean "The industry" minus Toyota.

Even they have begrudgingly started investing in BEV's after wasting years on HEV's.

https://electrek.co/2021/09/09/toyota-i ... yone-else/

Can I just remind you of the Prius

Unless things have changed a lot recently, Toyota had over 50% of the hybrid market in the US. They also have some BEV's, but to be honest I don't think they will ramp up as quick in some areas.

As for hydrogen, remember it was only about 20 years ago when people said the Prius was a pipe dream, and that people wouldn't buy such cars. Hydrogen has some hurdles in infrastructure, but it's not dead. In certain regions and markets it still has some potential.

At this point most of the US market is still slow to warm to BEVs, even with financial incentives. As with much of the rest of the world, getting people to change their mindsets isn't always easy.

[Andres125sx]

Problem still is, even with financial incentives, they´re still a lot more expensive. You´d need to do some serious mileage to be worth from an economic pov, and then the battery need to be replaced so...

I love electric whatever, but cars are still too expensive. And bikes btw, some are becoming quite tempting lately, but IMHO this is the right moment to purchase a muscle car for example, or a Lancer EVO I´ve always loved

[Billzilla]

The cost of hydrogen is not an issue. The Toyota Mirai carries 5kg. Green hydrogen currently costs about $4.00/kg but the goal is to get the cost down to $2.00/kg. Green hydrogen will eventually be produced using surplus renewable electricity. You know - the sun doesn't always shine and the wind doesn't always blow - so we need more generation capacity than we can use.

That certainly does work, but it's more effective & efficient just to use that electricity to charge a battery instead of all those extra steps.

[Big Tea]

The cost of hydrogen is not an issue. The Toyota Mirai carries 5kg. Green hydrogen currently costs about $4.00/kg but the goal is to get the cost down to $2.00/kg. Green hydrogen will eventually be produced using surplus renewable electricity. You know - the sun doesn't always shine and the wind doesn't always blow - so we need more generation capacity than we can use.

That certainly does work, but it's more effective & efficient just to use that electricity to charge a battery instead of all those extra steps.

And being able to send 'letric down a wire instead of by truck into a storage tank gives it a huge advantage.(once the wires are already there of course)

[djos]

I stumbled across this 6 year old video today on HEV’s vs BEV’s.

Frankly if it was this obvious 6 years ago that HEV’s weren’t ideal for passenger vehicles, it makes me wonder why Toyota and Hyundai have poured so much money into HEV’s.

[gruntguru]

The industry clearly chose electric power and are investing in a good infrastructure. Don’t count on anything else

You mean "The industry" minus Toyota.

Even they have begrudgingly started investing in BEV's after wasting years on HEV's.
https://electrek.co/2021/09/09/toyota-i ... yone-else/

They have to - HEV refuelling infrastructure, the avaiability of cheap H2, fine tuning of refuelling hardware, and storage (both bulk and onboard) are all immature and miles behind BEV. There is every possibility HEV will become competitive at some point - especially so in the heavy vehicle arena (ask Mercedes Benz)