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Comment by theluketowers | Hacker News Reader

I've been fascinated watching the progress of Edison Motors (https://www.edisonmotors.ca/), who are making a diesel electric hybrid semi. Their logic and arguments make a lot of sense: the diesel engine gets to run at its peak RPM 100% of the time to charge the batteries - and it gets to take advantage of the perks of electric like regenerative breaking, quieter operation, and immediate torque. Not to mention the easier transition time when it comes to working within existing infrastructure. There's also all sorts of side benefits with what they're doing like the semi itself being a generator on wheels for heavy duty equipment. Lots of fascinating stuff coming from them, and they already have a driving prototype :)

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The problem with hybrid vehicles in general is that they still rely on fossil fuels to some extent, so they're not a truly sustainable solution. And they have all the maintenance and reliability baggage of their fully ICE counterparts, something BEVs do away with.

The time and money being spent on developing hybrid technology could be better spent on making fully electric vehicles more affordable and accessible.

EDIT: and keep in mind, trucks are purchased with a long service life in mind (decades)

While not perfect, they do meet real world needs in ways that are better than current ICE options. A fully electric truck isn't really a viable option in the market they're building for right now (heavy duty working trucks for logging, etc). Additionally, getting a working hybrid option out into the wild still benefits the eventual transition to fully EV trucks as it allows for testing and validating of the electrical systems required to make a functional workhorse that can deliver value to its owners / operators as well as pushes forward the viability & benefit of electric vehicles in the eyes of the public / industry.

They are a transition, to be sure, but especially for consumers who do 80% short trip and need the ability to do long trip, it would seem to ideal choice for the 2020s.

Given the critical urgency of climate change, there is no situation where burning oil is the ideal choice.

BP, for one, has been making noises about their fuel being carbon neutral. It's not impossible, e.g. you sell fuel that makes so many tons of CO2, you bury in a hole so many tons of vegetable matter that captured that much CO2.

Doesn't fly in practice, perhaps because of public perception. Net-zero on synthetic fuels is more obvious, although not necessarily less expensive.

That's why transition is in the phrase.

Maybe in 5 years it will be different. Maybe the Chevy equinox will stay in stock and stay around 30k. But I'd bet a lot of money we will have gas stations for another 40 years no matter what we do, barring global collapse.

> The problem with hybrid vehicles in general is that they still rely on fossil fuels to some extent, so they're not a truly sustainable solution

Why not ?

https://www.epa.gov/greenvehicles/fast-facts-transportation-...

Trucks apparently are only about 25% of US emissions. Using hybrid would remove emissions from city centers (where your lungs are the recycling filters)

Freight is one of the only use case that requires long range, private cars are used something like 40km per day on average.

Having an electric drive train increases reliability, and having a diesel engine running at peak efficiency 24/7 will be much more reliable than a regular engine, especially given the abuse they take from trucks. (+ not as much stress on the batteries vs quick charge)

> The time and money being spent on developing hybrid technology could be better spent on making fully electric vehicles more affordable and accessible.

You still have to solve the resource issues, 1.4B vehicles on earth today, total lithium production per year is about 100 000 tonnes, even if we only needed 10kg per car that's going to take a bit of time, and that's not even talking about other uses

> Why not ?

As in, we run out of fossil fuels (or it gets prohibitively expensive) and your truck becomes brick because its internal battery and electric drivetrain is pretty much useless without the ICE part.

Solar, wind and thermal are practically unlimited for duration of the planet's existence.

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