Hopefully it’s a temporary blip from EV incentives going away. We needed those incentives to smooth out the transition while EVs are still expensive, but with them being cancelled anyone on the fence had to consider buying in september.
Now we’ll transition slower and more painfully. We’ll continue pushing climate change, to our own detriment. Legacy manufacturers are already pulling back from EVs to maximize short term profit at the cost of viability on the global market. More people will be stuck for decades with obsolete technology and higher operating cost. We always seem to like doing things the hard way
It’s been 15 years, when exactly will EVs be cheaper? And why isn’t it yet? I hear from the tankies that it’s cause america won’t let us buy cheap Chinese EVs. If that isn’t why I don’t get it. We went from blackberries to batteries that can run a computer faster than a desktop of the era for multiple days, but we can’t sort out EVs? The core enabling technology (the transistors) aren’t even that expensive. The obvious answer is capitalism but which part?
We could be there now. Arguably we started being there.
I’d argue the technology is ready for EVs to be cheaper and we just need to scale. As long as legacy manufacturers focus on legacy technologies and EVs are an afterthought, we’re not getting anywhere. Too many companies want to copy Tesla’s approach: produce a compelling high end product and use that to fund a more mass produced product. It worked for them and now they’re cheaper than ever, but Tesla does not produce a full range of vehicles. It seems to be working for Rivian as well: we’ll see as their midrange products roll out. Even Lucid seems to be successfully following that model. But legacy manufacturers struggled to create a flagship model that was actually compelling. And teslas business model can’t work for everyone. And their strategy has always been a full range of vehicles, but where are they?
The car market has overall gotten more expensive than any of us want to admit, but the Chevy bolt is cheaper than any traditional Subaru. Hyundais/Kia has some great EVs that many people can afford. Chevy equinox EV may be in the sweet spot, if only it were a compelling vehicle. Non-US manufacturers seem to have compelling lower cost EVs that somehow never make it to the US, and I’m not just talking China.
As long as legacy manufacturers like GM prefer to focus on their $80k 9,300 lb monstrosities their choice is keeping EV prices high. But the Equinox and Bolt proves they can make EVs in the same price range as their legacy technology vehicles. And the only problem, the only reason they claim a loss on each one is that they haven’t sold enough to make back development costs in their short time frame. That’s not going to change until it’s a serious effort. Not going to change as long as it’s a second thought, compliance vehicle, because they’re forced to.
This is why the incentives were so important. It’s not just to speed up the transition but to establish a stable and rapidly growing market to sell such vehicles, so they more quickly reach the scale to support lower prices and higher profitability
Hopefully it’s a temporary blip from EV incentives going away. We needed those incentives to smooth out the transition while EVs are still expensive, but with them being cancelled anyone on the fence had to consider buying in september.
Now we’ll transition slower and more painfully. We’ll continue pushing climate change, to our own detriment. Legacy manufacturers are already pulling back from EVs to maximize short term profit at the cost of viability on the global market. More people will be stuck for decades with obsolete technology and higher operating cost. We always seem to like doing things the hard way
It’s been 15 years, when exactly will EVs be cheaper? And why isn’t it yet? I hear from the tankies that it’s cause america won’t let us buy cheap Chinese EVs. If that isn’t why I don’t get it. We went from blackberries to batteries that can run a computer faster than a desktop of the era for multiple days, but we can’t sort out EVs? The core enabling technology (the transistors) aren’t even that expensive. The obvious answer is capitalism but which part?
We could be there now. Arguably we started being there.
I’d argue the technology is ready for EVs to be cheaper and we just need to scale. As long as legacy manufacturers focus on legacy technologies and EVs are an afterthought, we’re not getting anywhere. Too many companies want to copy Tesla’s approach: produce a compelling high end product and use that to fund a more mass produced product. It worked for them and now they’re cheaper than ever, but Tesla does not produce a full range of vehicles. It seems to be working for Rivian as well: we’ll see as their midrange products roll out. Even Lucid seems to be successfully following that model. But legacy manufacturers struggled to create a flagship model that was actually compelling. And teslas business model can’t work for everyone. And their strategy has always been a full range of vehicles, but where are they?
The car market has overall gotten more expensive than any of us want to admit, but the Chevy bolt is cheaper than any traditional Subaru. Hyundais/Kia has some great EVs that many people can afford. Chevy equinox EV may be in the sweet spot, if only it were a compelling vehicle. Non-US manufacturers seem to have compelling lower cost EVs that somehow never make it to the US, and I’m not just talking China.
As long as legacy manufacturers like GM prefer to focus on their $80k 9,300 lb monstrosities their choice is keeping EV prices high. But the Equinox and Bolt proves they can make EVs in the same price range as their legacy technology vehicles. And the only problem, the only reason they claim a loss on each one is that they haven’t sold enough to make back development costs in their short time frame. That’s not going to change until it’s a serious effort. Not going to change as long as it’s a second thought, compliance vehicle, because they’re forced to.
This is why the incentives were so important. It’s not just to speed up the transition but to establish a stable and rapidly growing market to sell such vehicles, so they more quickly reach the scale to support lower prices and higher profitability