Posted on 07/18/2021 11:51:22 PM PDT by Cronos
Many observers are forecasting that the world’s transition to electric cars will take place much sooner than expected. Now, BBC is also joining the fray. “What makes the end of the internal combustion engine inevitable is a technological revolution. And technological revolutions tend to happen very quickly … [and] this revolution will be electric,” reports BBC‘s Justin Rowlett.
Rowlett points to the late ’90s internet revolution as an example. “For those who hadn’t yet logged on [to the internet] it all seemed exciting and interesting but irrelevant — how useful could communicating by computer be? After all, we’ve got phones! But the internet, like all successful new technologies, did not follow a linear path to world domination. … Its growth was explosive and disruptive,” notes Rowlett.
So how fast will electric cars go mainstream? “The answer is very fast. Like the internet in the ’90s, the electric car market is already growing exponentially. Global sales of electric cars raced forward in 2020, rising by 43% to a total of 3.2m, despite overall car sales slumping by a fifth during the coronavirus pandemic,” reports the BBC.
According to Rowlett, “We are in the middle of the biggest revolution in motoring since Henry Ford’s first production line started turning back in 1913.”
Want more proof? “The world’s big car makers think [so]… General Motors says it will make only electric vehicles by 2035, Ford says all vehicles sold in Europe will be electric by 2030 and VW says 70% of its sales will be electric by 2030.”
And the world’s luxury automakers are also getting in on the action: “Jaguar plans to sell only electric cars from 2025, Volvo from 2030 and [recently] the British sportscar company Lotus said it would follow suit, selling only electric models from 2028.”
Rowlett spoke with Top Gear’s former host Quentin Wilson to get his take on the electric revolution. Once critical of electric cars, Wilson adores his new Tesla Model 3, noting, “It is supremely comfortable, it’s airy, it’s bright. It’s just a complete joy. And I would unequivocally say to you now that I would never ever go back.”
“No they won’t.”
I love my battery powered chainsaw. If you would have told me 10 years ago a battery powered chainsaw would run circles around a similar size gas powered saw I would have laughed.
I get an hour of cutting time with it. I could buy extra batteries but an hour is about I can do anymore physically. It blows away the cutting ability of the gas saws with torque. I gave away the old tempermental Stihl that sometimes would start sometimes would not.
Again you are losing faith in technology and the aftermarket.
The 2021 Farm and Science Review is going to be big with all new electric stuff this year with new offering by Stihl etc in electric.
I even saw companies with gps solar powered zero turn mowers and lawn mowers are going to be there.
Electric will be the thing in 10 years. You can keep your buggies and horse whips (gas)...and this is coming from an antique car guy.
The had electric cars in the early 1900’s - what’s so revolutionary?
I have faith in technology and capitalism.
++++++++++++++++++++
You may want to put your faith elsewhere...
and lawn mowers are going to be there.
**********
Electric mowers are available now but I wouldn’t have one. I
know people that have them and they like them mainly because
you don’t have to keep gasoline for the power.. A couple of
rechargeable batteries and you are ready to go.
On the shelf is my much and always cussed two cycle chain saw. I bought electric lawn mower, weed eater and leaf blower. All use a 56 volt battery and are actually better than the gas driven verities they replaced.
I have two jobs that need a chainsaw but just can’t summon the wherewithal to drag out the two cycle chainsaw and cuss it for an hour or so to get it started. At my age, by the time I get it running I’m too tired to work.
Although they don’t know it, kids growing up with all electric and cordless tools and lawn equipment may live longer simply because they are not faced with the stress developed from screwing with two cycle gas engines.
Electric cars didn’t go over in the early 1900’s. 😆
Biden will set up huge parking lots every 300 miles on the interstates where you can park your car when the batteries die,
There you can plug in your car to coal powered charging stations and continue your journey five hours later.
I don’t doubt small applications, like chainsaws or bicycles or daily commutungs of 50km or less reliability.
However, we are talking about physics and how many electrons can be stuffed together and how close without resulting in an explosion.
Our batteries are designed by super computers and all that. What we have is near the theoretical limit of performance with the materials that we know about.
Unless there is some new material or a new way to work with the material we have, we have pretty much topped out with what we can do.
We either have to find thinner battery casings or make the batteries bigger, but there will still be a limit in what we can do because there is no material to replace electrons.
I changed my tune on elctric a few years ago when my farm tractor tire needed repaired and the tire repair shop came out with a battery powered impact gun and took of rusty 1 3/4 lug nuts with ease.
They love them. No air hoses to drag around.
I have faith in technology and capitalism when it is left alone by government to seek the best possible options in a given situation.
However, when the government is telling the markets about what the outcome needs to be, the markets and technology cannot come out with the best possible options, because that road is blocked by bureaucrats.
The self driving is a far greater revolution. Huge implications.
In specific applications, electrical use can be better. But electricity does not have the work potential of hydrocarbons.
most of the charging stations around me are apparently free. What happens when they start charging for the actual energy used?
And taxing their use?
Or at home, for your electricity.
It’ll be OK
Jaguar won’t manufacture all the electrical components....
Lucas will.
Well, aren’t you Mister Killjoy?
Why, people will just have to learn to share. The grid will need to be upgraded to be more responsive to the 21st century. Why, why I dunoooooooooo!
Why are you so mean? :)
except electricity goes out all of the time and for days on end if a bad storm hits, which it does in many states in this country.
There have been electric cars since the late 1800s and 130+ years later they still suffer the same chief design flaw as they did 1880. They take longer to charge than to discharge (off ‘conventional’ home power).
Not to mention a small problem with infrastructure. All of our dead dinosaur-powered cars have their fuel delivered to the retail distribution point in a (similarly) dead dino-powered vehicle. To shift that load (which amounts to about 40% of America’s entire energy consumption) to the electric grid first means increasing electricity production. In order to switch one-half of all of America’s automobiles to electricity, we’d need to build ~100 new nuclear power plants. Plus we’d need to update the entire power grid to accommodate the delivery of the added capacity.
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