[RM7]

Originally Posted by Fundguy1

Doesn't bother me a bit they are there. It does bother me that my money is buying them.
Let me check off the counter points to your points

Evidently it does, when you can't resist showing how misinformed you are on the subject.

1. It uses electrical power. Problem here is the grid is not prepared for a significant increase in useage.

It's not a problem, as I said before, these cars actually exist, are on the road, driving around. I'm sure you've seen them if you are driving a billion miles every day. Are there upgrades that will be necessary as we move forward with more? Sure, but infrastructure doesn't last forever anyway, as pointed out elsewhere, charging occurs off-peak, so you could argue it makes better use of the existing grid.

2. Maybe overall it is including the transport of fuels etc. Not sure of that though as I have seen studies where the amount of energy required to generate and deliver the electricity uses more fossil fuels than the current ICE way. And the gas infrastructure must remain now as all gas cannot be replaced by electrics. The gas infrastructure is there already. The electric is not. Finding a charge station can be daunting and inconvenient comparitively.

Not sure how to make any sense of this. Sounds like you are rationalizing here. Burning fuel to move fuel is never a good idea if you can burn it in one location and get the energy out in a more efficient way. Wasting money for the sake of wasting it is dumb. You've seen studies, I've seen studies. ICE engines are around 20% thermal efficiency. But, like I said, this doesn't count all the fuel/energy you use trucking fuel around, storing it, pumping it, paying for the gas station, etc., hell, you waste energy trying dole out multiple grades and types of fuel. Burning fossil fuels, natural gas in this case, at a modern gas-turbine power plant, yields a thermal efficiency around 65%, and all you do is beam it out on the grid. If it's a renewable source like wind, solar, hydroelectric, etc., then you are doing even better. That's really the true genius, it allows flexibility for power-source by region. In some regions, they may be able to get significant power from water run-off, in other locations, it may be a nuclear power plant, rather than something like hydrogen that would tie you to a new and expensive infrastructure system to truck and store, not to mention the energy spent extracting. Not only that, but reducing our reliance on foreign oil, or maybe in a case you would definitely support, allowing our military to have more oil for staying deployed eternally.

3. Its works for some, definitely not all. What about trucking, towing, or soneone like ne who drives over 500 miles a day a dozen or more times a month? Good for city commuters but not for a large subset of the population.

And if everyone had the same habits as you, that would actually mean something in reference to where I said ranges for electric vehicles have made it into the useful realm. Since they do not, it only means you are a unique snowflake.

4. He did do a good job at this. But that's not an argument to buy his product.

It wasn't an argument to buy it, it was an argument to show how much of an achievement it was to get electric cars out on the road as a practical form of transportation, instead of something more akin to science fiction.

So again, maybe in 20 years when we have 3 min charge times, ability to have level torque amounts at speed, towing, charging stations as prevalent as gas stations, 400+ mile range, a grid that can handle the power, and competitive pricing without subsidies and I'd change my mind.

I'm not trying to convince you to buy one, I'm simply showing how they have become viable transportation for a large number of people, off the drawing board, off the conceptual stage, and into the real world, where they are driven every day. Going back to stuff like the GM EV1, this is so far ahead it's not even on the same planet, so while some of the previous attempts couldn't be taken seriously, the Tesla models are actually out there and doing it. That is quite an achievement IMO.