Biden’s plan to phase out gas-powered cars is all pain for consumers and no gain

Some people love electric vehicles (EVs). They drive them relatively short distances to work, charge them overnight in their garages and never stop for gas. Others, due to cost, convenience and climate, prefer gasoline-powered vehicles.

Thankfully, Americans today still have that choice. But if the Environmental Protection Agency’s (EPA) latest proposed rule on car emissions is finalized as written, they won’t for much longer.

The new rule would require 60 percent of vehicles sold in the U.S. to be battery-powered electric by 2030 and 67 percent by 2032, compared to just 6 percent today. This would effectively eliminate the choice of gasoline-powered cars for American drivers and make the economy more dependent on China, a source of the minerals needed to create their batteries.

Agreed. I can't stand that the warmageddonist cult and their control-freak politicians put it to this point. But it is what it is.

For what it's worth, there's a slowly growing population of conservatives with EV's that I meet at charging stations. Part of that is because I live in the southeast (any trip we make within driving range is liable to have a more conservative population, even at EV chargers). A few of them got an EV strictly to save on gas. Most of the conservative EV owners, however, bought the EV for mid-life crisis reasons. These things truly are fun to drive. LOL

Another reason I got the EV is to give my wife and me a diversification on energy needs. If the Dims make gas too hard to come buy and/or too expensive (IMHO it still is), we have the EV. Or if the Dims make power hard to come by and/or too expensive, we have the ICE pickup to handle long trips. If the Dims make both power and gas hard to come by, we have our solar for our local driving ("local" being 250 mile round trip). However, most of the people I meet at EV chargers are hard core liberals who thank me for doing my part in saving the world. I sometimes show them this:

As far as solar users go, there's a faster growing contingent in the south of conservatives getting solar for exactly the reason I did and not at all thinking we're saving the world. Think more prepper, less cow fart fear monger.

That’s a great chart, and it illustrates the totally fallacy of AGW. The idea that we’re going to somehow control the climate and “save da erf” with billions of giant batteries is just beyond me. I do know a few people who are very enamored of (and happy with) EV technology, but I’m not one of them. I used to be very tech-oriented, but I think I’m just saturated at this point. An EV of any type does not appeal to me at all.

While we can certainly afford to purchase a new vehicle, my wife and I have decided that we won’t pay the ridiculous prices that are being asked these days (EV or ICE). Our six cars and trucks range in age from 52 years to 15 years (our newest vehicle is a 2008 Jeep Wrangler), but we’re fortunate that I’m still able to maintain and repair all of them (and that my wife is very patient with the inevitable breakdowns). At some point, we may have to bite the bullet and purchase our “last” vehicle (I’m 61, she’s 65) but it will probably be a 3-5 year old diesel powered 3/4 ton pickup (we like to pull a travel trailer occasionally).

The solar idea is intriguing, but I’m definitely into the “no grid-connect” option. We live in Southern Oregon - the winters are fairly mild and we can heat with wood, but the summers are long and hot. With 4,700 square feet, three HVAC units and a pool, the electric bills are getting to be a bit stunning. When we first moved here from N California, our electric rates were a third of what we paid previously. Unfortunately, that’s starting to change.

We have 20 acres, with good sun exposure at the top of the hill behind our house. I would love to build a system large enough to power our pool, well pumps, and HVAC (although we’re also looking into geothermal).

When I worked in fleet management, energy diversification was my policy as well. I was involved in all sorts of alt-fuel projects, including propane, ethanol, biodiesel and compressed natural gas (my favorite). The EV push started about five years before I was ready to retire, so I missed out on that.

If we did somehow decide to purchase an EV, it would be on that point.

My solar inverters have the "no output" or sometimes called "zero report" feature. Basically, I don't put power onto the grid. But I pull from the grid if my solar and batteries aren't enough to handle the load.

However, I can choose to put power onto the grid. In fact, I'm currently in the approval process to do so. But that's only after I've had solar for 2 years (since May 2021) a now all-electric house (since Nov 2021), an EV (since June 2022), and upgraded my solar system to account for all of that (finished Aug 31, 2022). And my inverters have a good data export recording many things in 5-minute candles, which I import into a homemade SQL Server database and do analysis on (I'm a software engineer, specializing mainly on the back-end/data side). I then made a C# app to recreate the past 12 months of power bills according to different billing plans my power utility offers. One of which has to do with purchasing my excess power, but for 1/4th the price we pay (actually 1/5th after they add riders and state tax to the power we buy). The problem with the power purchase rate plan, it comes with a few new expenses, including either a demand charge or a flat monthly fee. The flat monthly fee would be horrendous (adding $135/month). The demand charge would vary, depending the highest amount of kW in power I pulled during the billing period. That's where analyzing the inverter data comes in. I was able to determine that in most months, the dollars given to me for purchasing power would be more than the dollars I give them for the demand. Thus, I'm signing up for the power purchase plan.

But if they ever change their polices, or if my wife and I change our power consumption habits so that the power purchase plan hurts me more than helps me, I'll shut it off. The same for if they change the policy that allows me to keep my solar power on when the grid goes down (other solar users have to turn their home power off to prevent their solar power from harming linemen working on downed power lines). My inverters are allowed to keep powering my home when the grid is down because my inverters have the feature to not try to put power onto the grid when the grid is down. Thus, the power purchase plan doesn't make me lose the feature of keeping power on when the rest of the neighborhood is down. At least for now.

That's my suggestion to you. If you go solar, always make sure you're the one in control (which you would be according to your "no grid connect" statement). And if you decide to sell excess power to the grid, fine, but again as long as you're in control and can disable it if you desire.

Perhaps even more important is to look for other ways to save energy, such as making sure you have as much insulation as is feasible, seal cracks, etc. When I replaced my two natural gas appliances with electric ones (probably not a good idea in Oregon), I made them highly efficient ones. I now have a variable speed heat pump and variable speed air handler to cool and heat the home with heat strips for the few times it's too cold for the heat pump.

I also now have a hybrid water heater, which heats the water tank with its built-in heat pump. Not only does that draw low power (300W vs 4kW in a normal electric water heater, though admittedly it takes 2-5 hours to reheat after my wife and I take back-to-back showers, vs 30 minutes to 45 minutes in a normal water heater). It also gives me a free cold air byproduct that I use during the warm 7-8 months to help cool my home. There's now an air receiver in the floor of the closet the water heater is in. During the winter months I duct the cold air byproduct into the attic. During the summer months I let the cold air byproduct fall to the floor to be picked up by the home air receiver, which is almost always drawing in air because the variable speed heat pump and air handler are almost always running, even if in low power mode. Thus, for the 2-3 hours in the summer the water heater runs, my home heat pump doesn't have to work as hard to cool the air in the home. Last but not least, the air intake of the water heater is drawing air from the attic (thanks to a duct). Thus, when the water heater's heat pump works to pull heat from the air, it doesn't have to work as hard because the air is usually warm from the attic (sometimes over 100F here in Alabama).

And if you get an EV and get solar, you might ought to consider having two charging ports to plus your EV in: one constantly powered and one intermittently powered. That means your inverter(s) have to have a feature like what mine calls Smart Load. Basically, whenever my home solar batteries are charged to a configurable amount (right now it's set to 70%), my inverters power a separate electrical panel. One of my 240V NEMA 14-50 outlets for charging the EV is tied to that panel. The other EV outlet is tied to the regular electrical panel (constantly powered). So if we come home in the EV with it already charged more than enough for the next day (my wife likes it to be at least 120 miles), we plug it into the intermittent outlet. That outlet doesn't guarantee us power, but it guarantees us that whatever power we get won't add to the power bill (because the home solar batteries are charged more than enough to power the home through the night). And if the EV is still plugged to it the next day after the sun comes out, charging will automatically begin when the home solar batteries are charged enough. (But if we come home needing the EV charged even if it might add to power bill, we plug the EV into the constantly powered outlet.) That one charging technique makes almost all of our local EV driving free. When our EV battery is charged 80%, it gets 230 miles. The 230 miles top off point minus the 120 miles my wife wants, gives us 110 miles of driving for a few days in a row (say 40-50 miles on an average day) that we're liable to get free solar power on to keep charging the EV with free power.

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