Toyota Warns (Again) About Electrifying All Autos. Is Anyone Listening?

pjmedia.com ^ | 3/19/2021 | bryon preston

[bitt]

Depending on how and when you count, Japan’s Toyota is the world’s largest automaker. According to Wheels, Toyota and Volkswagen vie for the title of the world’s largest, with each taking the crown from the other as the market moves. That’s including Volkswagen’s inherent advantage of sporting 12 brands versus Toyota’s four. Audi, Lamborghini, Porsche, Bugatti, and Bentley are included in the Volkswagen brand family.

GM, America’s largest automaker, is about half Toyota’s size thanks to its 2009 bankruptcy and restructuring. Toyota is actually a major car manufacturer in the United States; in 2016 it made about 81% of the cars it sold in the U.S. right here in its nearly half a dozen American plants. If you’re driving a Tundra, RAV4, Camry, or Corolla it was probably American-made in a red state. Toyota was among the first to introduce gas-electric hybrid cars into the market, with the Prius twenty years ago. It hasn’t been afraid to change the car game.

All of this is to point out that Toyota understands both the car market and the infrastructure that supports it perhaps better than any other manufacturer on the planet. It hasn’t grown its footprint through acquisitions, as Volkswagen has, and it hasn’t undergone bankruptcy and bailout as GM has. Toyota has grown by building reliable cars for decades.

When Toyota offers an opinion on the car market, it’s probably worth listening to. This week, Toyota reiterated an opinion it has offered before. That opinion is straightforward: The world is not yet ready to support a fully electric auto fleet.

Toyota’s head of energy and environmental research Robert Wimmer testified before the Senate this week, and said: “If we are to make dramatic progress in electrification, it will require overcoming tremendous challenges, including refueling infrastructure, battery availability, consumer acceptance, .

[from occupied ga]

I see often Teslas operate in two modes. Instant torque so they aggressively dart thru traffic. And running out of juice, doing 40 mph in the slow lane of the interstate

LOL I haven't seen many Teslas, but I've seen both modes you described

[Truthoverpower]

Nobody wants stupid electric cars. Except liberals

[Chickensoup]

Interesting that last month’s electric bill contained an offer to permit me to pat more money and buy carbon credits based on my usage.

[Olog-hai]

Red herring. And look up Baker cars.

There’s maintenance with all moving machinery.

[stylin19a]

hey...thanx for that.

warranty reads funny. For 2019 - Looks like the warranty is for 10 years\100,000 for the car and unlimted for the original car owner.

Near as I can figure, looks like hyundai made the warranty for 2020 and later 10 years\100,000 miles only.

I had a 2013 Prius C that had an 8 year limited warranty.

Where are u and what’s the range on the Leaf?

[PIF]

I don’t think the lithium fairy has enough lithium even if China is taken into account, not to mention the rare earth fairy for all of the super powerful magnets that those things use.

—

Right! But not to worry, asteroid miners will supply the needed ingredients, but there will be a hell of a tax put on it by the CCP miners ...

[rarestia]

Along with a need for ripping open huge mines for rare earths and copper to build these rolling eco-nightmares.

Bears repeating. The mines for battery materials are ecologically toxic. They make superfund sites look like beachfront property. To make matters worse, the amount of rare earth materials for battery making is much more finite than fossil fuel, and oil will still be necessary for the plastics that line in the interiors of these vehicles.

If the goal of these enviro whackos is the total cessation of oil drilling, they have no idea how much of their lives will be nonexistent if they succeed.

[momincombatboots]

It worked with covid.. and under conservative leadership. Freedom left with the first mask mandate. Meanwhile it has come and gone just like every flu season.. same as the other 3 decades of flu season i watched in the hospital.

[sphinx]

lectric vehicles make sense when they are operated in a fairly defined range and are stored overnight in a driveway or garage.

The natural home at this point is for commuter cars and urban fleet operations. I'd be interested in knowing how many people with EV's also have a second car for more ambitious outings -- e.g. they commute in the EV and use their "real car" when they venture outside their local beltway.

Nancy Pelosi probably has a small EV for the runs from her rec room to the ice cream freezer. It has ample mileage for that.

[Hootowl99]

Thanks, for the good first hand info and experiences. I don't own an EV and am in the learning mode.

As the technology is at this time, it does not fit the transportation requirements I set for myself. Fairly frequently, I set out on long distances and often this can include remote regions and crazy weather.

I require a truck for this, which inherently gives lower energy usage efficiency that's compensated for by greater onboard storage. Truck EVs seem to be close to to commercialization but this won't solve my “must have” requirements as far as I can tell. I'm not willing to change my lifestyle any at this time or the near future.

I live in GA but frequently travel out west to mountains and desert. Fuel availability can be 60-100 miles distant. Fuel consumption off road can be 2-3 greater than pavement usage. EVs just don't have the range. Perhaps fuel cell engines can be better?

I think it will take a different technology path for my kind of usage though unless EV battery capability were to take a radical leap forward. I think this will be very difficult because what I'm talking about is energy density, which is already extremely tight in existing technology. Improvements in recharge rate will not necessarily correlate with increased storage density.

So, towards the end of the month I'll take a road trip to OK to spend a month at the lake. Then I'll circle back to GA for a couple of months before heading back to the lake for a few weeks then return west to Northern New Mexico high country for a month or two of camping off grid.

Cheers...

[Chauncey Gardiner]

EV’s are The Big Lie. Coal fired, their batteries manufacturing process and disposal is unsustainable from an environmental point of view. Hardly a “green” thing.

[Zeneta]

The Green new deal would be an ecological Disaster.

You would think there would be some environmental activist out there protesting against this insane plan.

[ASOC]

The Tesla recycling plant is a model to follow.

50% of the material goes into new batteries, 10% is sold for value and the rest to landfill. Tesla is aiming for a closed loop system, I hope it works for them...

[stylin19a]

shhhh !

[DazedVet]

F150 is 14 years old and been through 2 sets of tires but nothing has gone wrong and I expect to get at least 10 more years. Every car I have ever owned I have had for more than 10 years so to me having to change batteries every 10 years sucks.

There is the problem of battery disposal which I have read is a problem.

[Covenantor]

Chart from US Energy Information Administration

https://www.eia.gov

Notice the three prime energy sources used to produce electricity.

Nuclear - no growth and continued efforts to close existing facilities.

Coal - ongoing efforts to close both raw material sources and generating plants.

Natural gas - Dems stopping pipelines, stopped licenses for fracking on Federal lands, etc.

And the additional 6.6% of hydro is also under attack.

61% electrical energy sources are slowly being impeded or target for closure.

It's worth noting that aside from public utilities, industries generating more than a mega-watt of electric power do so from there own generating plants. They will take a huge hit from current administration energy policies further cutting into foreign sales.

Progressive policies, an oxymoron of the highest order, will impede, if not cripple, our ability to produce the additional large scale generators, transformers, etc to handle increased electrical demands.

Heavy construction equipment and heavy agricultural machinery (a big export market) are not likely to be amenable to large scale electrification. Not likely to ever see a Terex truck run off batteries.

The coup de grace would be a foreign power attacking our vulnerable power grid after electric vehicles achieve a significant percentage of market share. The government embeds that cannot be fired virtually guarantee that will come to pass.

[Bob434]

Yep- you hit on it- a mileage tax- which will be i think even higher than taxes now for fuel- Especially for folks who have to drive a lot for their jobs-

[stylin19a]

hey...thanx for that. Funny guy..Will I live long enough\drive enough to cover the cost?

slight slide here...

I thought one of the best marketing tools back in the day was Mitsubishi’s 5yr\60k warranty, 10 yr\100,000 power train warranty.
Hyundai\Kia jumped on it also. How many really keep a car 10 years?

I am retired. before I retired, I tried to set-up everything for efficiency as best as I could.

Lights in the whole house inside\out = LED
Hot Water heater is tankless.
Furnace is 98% efficient.

In the scheme of things, I will, in my mind, always need gasoline, so the price of gas really doesn’t matter... So I decided on a hybrid.
Traded in a 2013 Prius C for a more fuel-efficient 2017 Hyundai IoniQ base hybrid-59 mpg.
All things being equal, I expect this is the last car I buy for myself. - bought an extended bumper-bumper warranty.

(My wife has a 2010 Chevy Equinox with about 57k miles on it - out kicking tires for something newer)

Sometimes, in the summer, I can get 62 mpg - for awhile.
both cars paid off. I drive about 7k miles a year - mostly for golf. COVID stay at home probably keeps the milage down.

If we get to a point where an EV would be more efficient, I probably wouldn’t consider it because the trade-off wouldn’t be worth it based on my age and initial cost vs use.

[catnipman]

looks like in a couple of decades toyota and honda will totally dominate manufacturing and supplying transportation vehicles of all types worldwide ...

[catnipman]

"there’s no question that advances in battery storage and charging time have been made in leaps and bounds in recent years."

like this, right?