Automakers make the case for electric pickup trucks

[mentalfloss]

Automakers make the case for electric pickup trucks

Bollinger has poured tens of millions of dollars of his own money into his eponymous start-up, convinced that Americans would swap their gas-guzzling pickup trucks for battery-powered ones. Without the technical know-how or automotive industry experience, he relocated his 5-year-old business from the Catskills to Detroit to hire engineers, pitching his dream that electric trucks could offer the same ruggedness, excitement and off-roading capabilities that have always appealed to Americans.

"Every bit of starting this company has been extremely challenging," he told ABC News by phone from Michigan. "The odds are crazy stacked against us. The No. 1 thing when I started this is that if we get across the finish line, we can't stop. Let's make something completely different than anyone else."

https://abcnews.go.com/Business/automakers-make-case-electric-pickup-trucks/story?id=71931673

 

[Tecumsehsbones]

Good luck to him. The market will decide.

 

[Hoid]

Ask yourself who is developing and making ICE vehicles.

Nobody.

The major automakers are trapped into producing them but even they are now developing only EVs.

 

[Jinentonix]

The Mustang EV. What's the f*ckng point?

 

[Tecumsehsbones]

Ask yourself who is developing and making ICE vehicles.
Nobody.
The major automakers are trapped into producing them but even they are now developing only EVs.

Hmmm. . . Honda, General Motors, Toyota, Ford, Nissan, Mercedes, Fiat-Chrysler, Kia, Hyundai.

To name a few.

 

[Hoid]

Another one sails over your head.

 

[gerryh]

For me, if it can't tow 10k-12k pounds for 600 km for under 100k, then I'm not interested.

 

[Tecumsehsbones]

Another one sails over your head.

If you think auto companies aren't doing R&D full time, you're stupid.

 

[gerryh]

If you think auto companies aren't doing R&D full time, you're stupid.

The fact that hoid is stupid, goes without saying.

 

[Tecumsehsbones]

The fact that hoid is stupid, goes without saying.

Always state the obvious. You'd be surprised how many people don't get it.

 

[Hoid]

If you think auto companies aren't doing R&D full time, you're stupid.

I think they're doing R&D full time on EVs

I think if they're doing R&D full time on ICE vehicles they are going out of business.

 

[Tecumsehsbones]

I think they're doing R&D full time on EVs
I think if they're doing R&D full time on ICE vehicles they are going out of business.

Honda's still the most popular passenger-car brand in the U.S. A couple of years ago, they improved the 1500-cc turbo engine, which is now working its way down through the fleet from a the luxury packages to standard, replacing the 1800-cc standard 4-cylinder. Just one example.

You do understand that it's possible to do research on ICEs and non-fossil engines at the same time, right? Honda also has electric cars and hydrogen-powered cars.

Non-fossil cars are probably the wave of the future. But they won't necessarily be Li-ion battery-powered cars (hydrogen and fuel cells are options being tried, and alcohol is a current option, and has been for decades). I figure we'll get to the point where individual-vehicle market is a mix, just like the current power market is a mix of coal, oil, LNG, hydro, nuclear, wind, solar, and a few cutting-edge tech options being researched.

 

[Hoid]

The big problem is selling all these ICE engines when you know and they know its a buggy whip.

 

[Jinentonix]

The big problem is selling all these ICE engines when you know and they know its a buggy whip.

No, the big problem is getting fools like you to understand the environmental costs of going full EV, particularly when paired with the disastrous net-zero by 2050 garbage.
As everyone except the anti-oil crowd knows apparently, mining is easily the most destructive endeavour in which we regularly partake. We've even removed the tops of mountains to get at the mineral wealth inside. Right now, estimates put us at 84% of our mining sustainability. The kind of increase in mining needed to fulfill the green nightmare would blow us well past 100%.


It's already happening in South America. It takes 500,000 GALLONS of water to produce one ton of lithium. Water that is effectively lost to us forever. And here we are being warned about fresh water shortages. Meanwhile, farmers downstream of the lithium mines are seeing their land turn to dust as the water flow slows to a trickle. Currently global output of lithium is around 215,000 tons a year. Multiply that by 500,000 and that's how much fresh water is being destroyed every year so you can have a nice, "clean, guilt-free" EV and your portable electronic crack devices.



Lake Baotou in China is a 120 km2 man made lake of bubbling toxicity. It is literally called "The worst place on earth". One journalist even stated that the desolation of Mordor, Tolkien's fictional wasteland in the Lord of the Rings, got nothing on the nightmare that is Baotou.

 

[Tecumsehsbones]

The big problem is selling all these ICE engines when you know and they know its a buggy whip.

The big problem is your fallacy-laden magical thinking.

You are the mirror image of the oilsuckers. Neither of y'all makes a damn bit of sense.

 

[Hoid]

That is the basic problem I suppose - that electric vehicles which are faster cheaper less polluting do not make sense.

 

[Tecumsehsbones]

That is the basic problem I suppose - that electric vehicles which are faster cheaper less polluting do not make sense.

No, your hallucination that next week every ICE in the world is going to magically disappear and be replaced by a fairy-powered vehicle.

 

[Hoid]

I know electricity is invisible but it isn't magical.

But as you say all these electric trucks don't make a lick of sense.

And you even threw in a "y'all" which is one of your passive aggressive tells.

Clearly you are upset.

 

[Tecumsehsbones]

But as you say all these electric trucks don't make a lick of sense.

I didn't say that. You're a liar.

 

[Jinentonix]

That is the basic problem I suppose - that electric vehicles which are faster cheaper less polluting do not make sense.

Wait a second. I thought there was supposed to be a growing fresh water shortage. How is destroying 500,000 gallons of water/ton of lithium not going to exacerbate the problem? Assuming it's actually a problem.
Let's do the math by weight shall we. Based on 10lbs per gallon of water, yes that's pretty much what a gallon of water weighs, that's 5 million lbs of water. Converted to tons, lithium production destroys 2500 tons of water for every 1 ton of lithium. Less polluting? I doubt it. And that's just one single element where mining and refining is going to have be ramped up substantially to meet the 2050 target date bullshit.


Here's what the "intelligentsia" of the left has decided. They are simply going to replace one form of environmental problems with an even bigger, different set of environmental problems. There seems to be a complete disconnect between seeing "clean energy" on the end-users end, and the massive environmental, ecological and habitat destruction on the production end that the "Green Devolution" ideology will require.


Then again, as the old saw goes, "The road to hell is paved with good intentions". Good, poorly thought out intentions.