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I don't think it would be hard to find credible reporting that when EVs are powered by coal-fired electricity, it's more climate-friendly, in terms of greenhouse gas emissions, than if the equivalent number of passenger miles and drayage were delivered by gasoline and diesel-powered road vehicles.

No one likes coal-generated electricity, except as a way to get by until every remaining coal-fired electrical power plant can be replaced with electrical power that comes with a much smaller "greenhouse" footprint than coal.

China and India and perhaps some other countries with big plans for more coal-fired electricity... I have some ideas about that.

I already said this much, before Patrick's very brief remark, but it pleases me to enlarge on what I already said about the stupidity of this "Coal-fired electric cars" meme.

What makes anyone think that the EVs in this photograph are recharging with electrical power that's being generated by a coal-fired electrical power plant?

During 2023, only 16% of the electricity produced in the U.S. was from coal. That's a slender slice of the electrical "pie" for coal that has long been declining from year to year and will continue to decline.

If the meme were changed to "Coal, oil and natural gas-fired electric cars,", or "Fossil fuel-fired electric cars," referencing the entire fossil fuels portfolio within the U.S. electricity pie chart, that would be a slice that's dominated by natural gas, and it would represent 60% of all the electricity generated in the U.S. during 2023. So that would be a more representational version of the meme.



But the meme is oblivious to the reality that "Leftists" are among a larger portfolio of people in this country that want the United States to aggressively pursue an agenda of reducing carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gas emissions, and believe that the replacement of Internal Combustion Engine road vehicles by EVs are an important step in that direction.

When this larger portfolio of people—including the "Leftists" among them—see EVs at recharging stations, they understand that the electricity could very likely be electricity that is being generated with fossil fuels, but they also see the possibility of replacing more of that electricity with electricity from wind, solar, hydro and nuclear, in the endeavor to reduce human greenhouse gas emissions and become friendlier to the earth's climate.

Reducing greenhouse gas emissions and becoming friendlier to the earth's climate... "Two Things at Once."


Celebrated NFL Kansas City Chiefs player Travis Kelce is featured in a "Two Things at Once" commercial from Pfizer, aimed at boosting uptake of their latest Covid-19 "booster" vaccine. (I consider myself a "curator" of commercial art.)

[This message has been edited by rinselberg (edited 01-24-2024).]

THAT LAST MEME IS STUPID.

The meme ignores the reality of how road service to recharge a stranded EV can and should be accomplished. This is why the meme is stupid.




"AAA says that its emergency electric vehicle charging trucks served “thousands” of EVs without power"

quote AAA has a little-known program for which it equipped trucks with Level 2 AC chargers, and even some with a CHAdeMO DC fast charger powered by onboard generators, in order to help electric vehicle drivers stranded without power. The service, which is only offered in a few of AAA’s markets, aimed at addressing the often talked about issues with “range anxiety”, but as most EV drivers know, range anxiety doesn’t really exist with vigilant power management. Nonetheless, the service has seen “thousands” of service calls according to AAA. Unsurprisingly, the number is dwarfed by the ~500,000 assistance requests AAA received last year from drivers who ran out of gas. Greg Brannon, AAA director of automotive engineering and industry relations, told Car and Driver: “It seems that folks who drive an electric vehicle are very aware of the range of that electric vehicle. Our feeling is that they keep a pretty close eye on it and manage their drive accordingly—much more so than a driver of a gasoline vehicle.” AAA has been ahead of the curve with its emergency electric vehicle charging service, which has been available since 2011. Seeing EVs as the future, the organization is sticking with the program despite the relatively low number of service calls. The non-profit member service organization is starting by making the service available in areas where electric vehicles are more popular. It’s currently available in Portland, Seattle, San Francisco, Los Angeles, Denver, Phoenix, and Orlando. Several trucks equipped with the onboard charger are made available in each market.

I like keeping up with a variety of news reports on a variety of media venues, because with every passing day, what I see in the news is a world that's one day closer to a world without memes like that last one—and without people that try to legitimize memes like that last one.

It will be a world in which that kind of stupidity is no longer extant, having finally gone extinct.

[This message has been edited by rinselberg (edited 01-25-2024).]

Other major auto manufacturers are also hitting the brakes before driving off the business suicide cliff in electric cars and trucks.

https://www.cnbc.com/2023/1...n-ev-investment.html

https://www.automotivedive....000-mid-2024/697670/

https://arstechnica.com/car...llaboration-with-gm/

As usual, Leftist's Utopian fantasies inevitably run up against hard economic / market reality.

[This message has been edited by randye (edited 01-25-2024).]

A gas powered truck carrying, (instead of towing), a diesel powered generator to charge an electric car.

No matter how you tote the Genny, the Leftist fantasy future is still stupid.

[This message has been edited by randye (edited 01-25-2024).]

quote Originally posted by randye: Other major auto manufacturers are also hitting the brakes before driving off the business suicide cliff in electric cars and trucks. https://www.cn...estment.html https://www.au...2024/697670/ https://arstec...ion-with-gm/ As usual, Leftist's Utopian fantasies inevitably run up against hard economic / market reality.

That's more informative than the memes.

I will put the Toyota chairman's remarks aside for the moment, and react to the reports from CNBC, Automotive Dive and Ars Technica.

These reports are all from October, which is fairly recent. Together, they cover Ford, GM and Honda. And each of the reports is a "glass not empty" with respect to EVs:

quote “We’re not moving away from our second generation [EV] products,” [Ford] CFO John Lawler said in a media briefing Thursday. “We are, though, looking at the pace of capacity that we’re putting in place. We are going to push out some of that investment.” Lawler said that Ford will postpone about $12 billion in planned spending on manufacturing capacity for EVs, including a planned second battery plant at a new campus in Kentucky. But, he noted, construction of Blue Oval City – Ford’s new EV manufacturing campus in Tennessee – will continue as originally planned. “The customer is going to decide what the volumes are,” Lawler said. “Ford is able to balance production of gas, hybrid and electric vehicles to match the speed of EV adoption in a way that others can’t.”

quote GM also said it’s ramping up EV battery production at its Ultium Cells factory, a joint venture with LG Energy Solutions, in Ohio. The company says it more than doubled Ultium platform production in the third quarter and expects the plant to reach its full capacity of 36 million cells a year by the end of 2023. GM said new high-capacity module assembly lines led to the production increase. “By mid-year [2024], we expect that modules will no longer be a constraint and we will be focused on building to customer demand rather than setting new production targets,” Barra said.

quote Honda and GM are still working together on other joint projects, though. The Honda Prologue and Acura ZDX are a pair of electric crossovers that use the same platform as the Cadillac Lyriq and Chevrolet Blazer, and both are still happening. They'll even feature Apple CarPlay and Android Auto, which GM has controversially chosen to eliminate from its cars from model year 2024 onward. GM and Honda are also partners—together with BMW, Hyundai, Kia, Mercedes-Benz, and Stellantis—in a new North American fast-charging network. The seven OEMs plan to deploy 30,000 fast chargers in the US and Canada starting in 2024.

"The funeral of Road Vehicle Electrification will not be televised."

[This message has been edited by rinselberg (edited 01-25-2024).]