[ExI] electric vehicles again

[spike at rainier66.com]

-----Original Message-----
From: extropy-chat <extropy-chat-bounces at lists.extropy.org> On Behalf Of BillK via ... _______________________________________________


>...I don't think you'll get away with this!  :) Remember, there are people from Nordic countries here.
Norway has many electric cars and in winter there are more rescue callouts for internal combustion cars.

<https://insideevs.com/news/705338/norway-winter-ev-charging-no-trouble/>
Quote:
How Norway does EV charging in the cold
Norway is one of the coldest countries in the world. It also has the highest EV adoption rate on the planet, but we can't remember seeing reports about endless lines at chargers during the winter. Here's what lessons can be learned from Norwegian EV drivers.
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BillK

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BillK, the difference is that the Nordic countries are relatively short distances between the biggest cities.  They have few long stretches of open empty freeway like one sees traversing the state of Texas.  Much of the resistance to EVs have to do with range anxiety, more than the risk from the occasional brutal cold snap, stuff that happens less often than Jingle Bells in the states.  

Consider this angle: the rental car companies offer a deal to their most profitable customers: a weekly rental with unlimited mileage.  Depending on what car one drives, it costs less to rent one of their cars for a cross country trip than to drive one's own, if one understands the depreciation per unit distance.  

Car rental companies are well aware of the yahoos who are their frequent fliers who rent their cars for cross country runs, and they know they lose money on those.  Hertz decided to go all-electric, which solves that problem: in the states, there aren't enough charging stations to make a cross country run practical.  So... Hertz can offer the unlimited-miles deal and not have crazy yahoos like me driving coast to coast in their conveyance.

But... plenty of people don't know what they are doing and don't understand that in sufficiently cold circumstances, electric car mileage decreases, sometimes in a most dangerous way: the prole doesn't make it to the charging station, or finds out the car will not charge if she makes it there.  Regarding the former, in the states, it can be damn dangerous in some places to be stranded with a dead car.  The locals might kill you for your jewelry or the cash on your person.  It isn't like that everywhere in the states of course.  But... I do advise not breaking down.  I didn't even mention the risk of hypothermia if one's EV conks a few miles short of the station.

I just returned last week from a four day Florida to California dash.  There is a loooootta lotta open empty country out across there.  On that entire trip of 5 megameters, I saw only one charging station, way the heck out in the middle of nowhere, in the middle of the day, with no customers charging there, zero point nada.  It won't be long before that establishment rips that back out of there and installs more fuel pumps.

But if one has an EV around here, it is practical: distances to the local sushi joint are short, plenty of homes have Tesla charging adapters and solar panels (which perhaps are now called a ChargeX and a PowerWallX) which makes them great for Bay Area local use.  But still not practical for a coast to coast dash.

I heard Hertz is ditching their EVs.  I was thinking of trying to score one, cheap, while the supply is high and the demand temporarily low (because so many potential Tesla customers are angry with Musk over TwitterX.)

spike