Hacker News Reader

Comment by rglover | Hacker News Reader

> Toyota’s top executives, including billionaire CEO Akio Toyoda, have been on the record calling the trend toward electric vehicles “overhyped” in part because of emissions associated with power plants — which is a favorite talking point used by the oil and gas industry.

How is this just brushed off as NBD? Where do people think the energy is going to come from for these electric vehicles (especially if everyone drives one/fossil fueled vehicles are restricted)?

View on HN

Because it's pretty easy to use google and look up the fact that the carbon intensity of EVs is already significantly lower than ICE vehicles, and the gap is only going to widen as more renewables (and possibly nuclear) come online.

One of my favorite facts of recent note is the rapid decrease in the price of solar.

This article by Ramez Naam puts the whole thing into perspective: https://rameznaam.com/2020/05/14/solars-future-is-insanely-c...

You don't need to be snarky.

My point isn't the vehicles themselves, it's the energy required to power those vehicles.

The power plants are already there. They are already polluting however they are polluting. So are ICE vehicles. If you remove the ICE vehicles, that pollution goes away. Why is this hard?

Why do you need to be snarky? It's hard because every time I ask questions or challenge the narrative, I get the same passive aggressive bullshit response (especially so on HN).

Your comment is a veiled "you're an idiot," which immediately makes me disregard what you're saying.

It wasn't meant as snark. I honestly want to know why people disregard the effect that removing ICE pollution would have. We have seen direct evidence of this when the pandemic lockdown went into effect. People in LA could see the sky again. Similar stories from all over like this. Stop driving polluting cars, and the air gets cleaner. I was shocked at just how fast, but mother nature is impressive.

I think your snark meter could use some recalibrating. I read the parent comment you also claimed being snarky, yet I'm not reading any snark in it. Also, I've never met you, so I'd never call you an idiot or anyone I don't know.

If I said "why is this hard?" or "it's pretty easy to use google and look up the fact" to you in person, you'd think I was a dick. The calibration is fine, you just got called out.

More to your point, it's not a question of whether or not it could be an environmental benefit, it's about grid capacity. Is it realistic/feasible for the grid to handle the increased load for more EVs (assuming we expect no interruption in current standard of living while simultaneously meeting Paris Accord goals in 2030)? Texas, California, and New York are asking people to conserve energy due to grid instability before there's a mass of EVs on the road.

>If I said "why is this hard?" or "it's pretty easy to use google and look up the fact" to you in person, you'd think I was a dick.

Thanks for letting me know how I'd feel, but this is not what I would think. We'll just put it down to I just have thick skin. I'd just accept the challenge and continue on. <shrug>

Yes, Texas power grid is run by a bunch of people unconcerned about what they are charged with doing. ERCOT has proven itself unable to see the future. It's not that the grid as installed can't handle demands, it's their managment of power generation that is totally off base. "Let's plan downtime when it's getting hot where we know (at least should know) people will put a higher demand on the system" was the most recent. Can't speak to CA,NY,etc. CA was definitely hampered by things like being managed by Enron. So essentially, it seems to be coming down to incompetent/corrupt management.

> Thanks for letting me know how I'd feel

You're welcome. Thank you for suggesting I get a tune up.

> Yes, Texas power grid is run by a bunch of people unconcerned about what they are charged with doing

So that doesn't sound like a grid that's prepared—irrespective of the reason why—to handle the load increase you'd expect to see. And this is the point, before people shame companies for not jumping on the bandwagon, it should be considered if it makes sense to do it (e.g., if we sell these cars, will people be able to use them as the customer base expands, will this negatively impact customer support, etc).

>So that doesn't sound like a grid that's prepared—irrespective of the reason why

Maybe, but there's a big difference in infrastructure not being there vs turning generation down/off at the wrong times.

Honestly, your opener "Where do people think the energy is going to come from for these electric vehicles?" could be interpreted as being just as snarky. That statement also has an implied "these people are idiots".

Fair enough.

Sorry, I didn’t mean to be snarky. It’s just that it’s a weird argument for the head of a car company to make, as the alternative to EVs currently is no cars at all. That seems pretty bad from a profit perspective.

Because it is misinformation. An electric car on dirty power still produces less pollution than an ICE car. Power plants are very efficient.

And even if they weren't the case it would still be a good strategy to tackle both problems simultaneously instead of waiting until one problem is solved until you start solving the other one.

But Toyota is pushing hydrogen as a superior alternative, which isn't any cleaner. Most hydrogen is made from steam-methane reforming using equally vast amounts of natural gas.

Source: https://www.energy.gov/eere/fuelcells/hydrogen-production-na...

Isn't this the same argument Toyota is making? With electricity depending on where you live you could say "Most electricity is made from coal! So an electric car is way worse for the environment!"

Major power stations are far more efficient than a million individual engines. Even if the power stations literally ran off petrol we’d still be in a better position than before.

Not sure this is right. Coal plants are at best 40% efficient, combined-cycle natural gas 60%. Then you have transmission losses (2-13%), and then inefficiency in EV chargers. Atkinson-cycle engines (often used in hybrids like the Prius) can reach 40% efficiency. Seems like a wash to me in terms of efficiency. On the other hand, if using solar or wind, efficiency becomes a little less interesting because the fuel is "free".

There’s also a significant amount of emissions from the production and transportation of petrol/diesel for use in vehicles you have to factor in.

I meant in terms of emissions, rather than simple mechanical efficiency. Power stations at scale can have complex emissions management. Car engine's don't.

Who says it's a "NBD"?

Do you think we should stop selling electric cars because electricity is dirty? Someone has to start, and it's not exactly easy to convert every power grid, it's a lot easier to start using it more and more and new power sources are green and older dirty is phased out slowly.

In context of the article it was implied.

ICE cars will always burn fossil fuels. Electric cars can consume any kind of energy as long as it is converted to electricity to first charge its battery. Maybe right now most electricity is generated via fossil fuels but you have to be really unimaginative to see how in the future that might not be the case and we’re going to be very happy with our cars being electrified instead of still burning oil.

The conflict I see is the aversion to the greener tech that will actually make that possible (nuclear). It's a question of capacity. Assuming EV production becomes the rule rather than the exception over say, the next 10 years (the timeline for many of the climate initiatives), it's not crazy to think that, okay, that means we're going to need _more_ energy, not less, and the only thing capable of producing consistent electricity on that timeline is fossil fuels (or nuclear).

I'm not saying that it won't be possible eventually (that'd be naive), but do the timelines align? If not, is the hysteria/doomerism around climate change warranted? That's what I'm getting at.

You can always install solar on your home, power your EV and remove your electric bill and it'll pay for itself in about 8-10 years.

It's easier to build solar farms than solar cars.

(wind farms than wind powered cars, nuclear plants than nuclear powered cars...)

So, the issue is that, as a talking point, it's silly, because we're simultaneously pushing for greener power plants. And economies of scale presumably can make even dirty power plants more efficient than little power plants packed in cars and sold as cheap as humanly possible. From a human health standpoint, it's probably also better to concentrate our environmental impact in places we can directly combat it, rather than emit garbage all over the place right next to where humans live and work and inhale.

It's absolutely true that buying an electric car may not reduce your carbon footprint today. (It may actually increase it, if your old car was still working just fine, because the carbon cost of car production is very high.) But it's an important step on the path forward.

Producing clean electricity is NBD. Distribution is where the real problem has a potential to arise. But that is literally just a political problem. Infrastructure investment and subsidies for home solar panels will fix that issue.

The only thing government will really need to get creative on is road taxes. Today you pay via gas, at some point they’re going to need a non-intrusive way to do it via your odometer I suppose.

Renewables already surpassed coal power since 2019, at least in the U.S. This is a trend that will continue over the next few years. Also, a good number of EV drivers already have solar.

"U.S. renewable energy consumption surpasses coal for the first time in over 130 years"

https://www.eia.gov/todayinenergy/detail.php?id=43895

Switching to electric vehicles is a necessary but not sufficient condition to eliminate fossil fuel emissions.

Excellent article and visualization explaining how EVs have less lifetime impact than ICEs.

https://www.wsj.com/graphics/are-electric-cars-really-better...

Reply on news.ycombinator.com