
German push to ban combustion-engine cars by 2030 wins support - jseliger
http://uk.reuters.com/article/us-autos-emissions-germany-idUKKCN1280G7
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j-pb
> A switch to sales of only zero-emission cars puts thousands of German auto
> industry jobs at risk since the powertrain of an electric car requires only
> a tenth of the staff to be assembled when compared with a combustion-engined
> equivalent, which needs more workers to assemble cylinders, spark plugs, and
> gearboxes.

The stupidity with wich we argue for retaining useless jobs is baffling.

To quote Volker Pispers. "If you tell the minister of the internal that all
those anti terror actions treated jobs in the TNT rod industry. Then you'll
really put him in a dilemma."

~~~
brbsix
> The stupidity with wich we argue for retaining useless jobs is baffling.

What do you mean by 'retaining useless jobs'? We aren't talking about
subsidizing carriage makers or wheelwrights here. We're talking about jobs
that will be lost as a direct result of legislation, not market obsolescence.

~~~
grecy
> _We 're talking about jobs that will be lost as a direct result of
> legislation, not market obsolescence_

Of course. It's legislation that will make the world a better place for
everyone to live.

Just like all the jobs that were lost when asbestos was legislated to be
illegal, or a thousand other examples.

~~~
Pica_soO
Not here in germany. Legislated but very happy. Dont have to shiver in fear of
trumpzilla because the holy st. market didnt bring those outsourced jobs back.

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Reason077
_> the powertrain of an electric car requires only a tenth of the staff to be
assembled when compared with a combustion-engined equivalent, which needs more
workers to assemble cylinders, spark plugs, and gearboxes._

This is why an EV-dominated future is inevitable, even without the
environmental considerations. Fossil vehicles simply won't be able to compete
on cost.

~~~
Gibbon1
That is a claim I saw, Electric cars are reasonably competitive now even
though production numbers are a tiny fraction of the market. Every time the
number of cars sold doubles the cost drops by 15-20% (learning rate). Doesn't
take a leap of genius to realize gasoline cars won't be competitive in 15
years.

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petre
Then we'll just build steam engines again. Maybe nuclear instead of coal-
fired? The Germans haven't banned those, they just got quickly replaced by
ICEs. Why ban? Why not just let the market handle things?

~~~
Sylos
Because there's a good chance that the economy couldn't handle it on their
own, or that they would take very long.

There's the chicken-egg-problem of no one driving electric cars, therefore no
one building charging stations, therefore no one buying electric cars.

This problem isn't going to solve itself without someone investing a lot of
money into building charging stations. And so far, such an investment was an
extreme risk. There was no guarantee that you'd make a dime off of your money.

With this ban upcoming, you're essentially guaranteed to make money in at most
15 years.

~~~
petre
Maybe electric cars are not that great then? If an electric car would cost
somethilng like a regular car and offer 600 km range on a "tank" full of
electricity or hydrogen, everyone would buy one without the need of banning
regular cars. This is exactly how railway steam engines lost ground to diesel
and then to electric. Electric cars already have other advantages such as the
lack of needong a gearbox, very good torque/seed characteristic which enables
fast acceleration.

I'm all for electric cars, but outright banning regular cars at EU level just
feels plain wrong. What about forcing this upon other less wealthy EU member
states, just like they did with migrant quotas? Selectively banning them at
city level by the local authorities due to pollution and noise is a much
better idea.

~~~
dsfyu404ed
>What about forcing this upon other less wealthy EU member states, just like
they did with migrant quotas

This. If you can handle the economic fallout from doubling down on teslas,
volts and leafs and legislating away everything else then good for you but
don't make everyone else do it.

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Bobblebobble
Penalizing emissions directly through gasoline and emissions-based road taxes
would be a vastly cheaper and simpler way of reaching the same objective. What
can be done to make this more politically palatable?

~~~
dogma1138
No it won't it would harm consumers and businesses because these do not offer
alternatives directly.

A global gasoline tax would hugely inflate the prices of good and services
without doing anything to reduce emissions.

A gasoline tax that only affects private car ownership would have even a
smaller environmental effect while negatively affecting non-urban residents
pushing even more people into densely populated cities.

Ban on combustion engines (in new cars sold) isn't as bad as long as there an
industry wide cooperation to provide an alternative, it doesn't not affect
existing cars and services dependant on gasoline while providing a constant
reduction in emissions as more and more zero emission vehicles are put on the
road.

~~~
cashmonkey85
Carbon emissions, smog and noise pollution are externalities and not reflected
in the market. This creates the huge inefficiencies we see in the economy
today with combustion cars still being produced. As Bobblebobble said the most
efficient way to correct this is with a tax.

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trevi
Other European countries are moving in the same direction.

The Netherlands is the one in which such a law seems likelier to be passed,
also because of significantly less lobbying from the car industry (no major
manufacturers, as opposed to Germany with Volkswagen, the second largest in
the world).

[http://www.independent.co.uk/environment/climate-
change/neth...](http://www.independent.co.uk/environment/climate-
change/netherlands-petrol-car-ban-law-bill-to-be-passed-reduce-climate-change-
emissions-a7197136.html)

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B1FF_PSUVM
In Europe they went after the large engines with a heavy tax cudgel.

The result was turbo-diesels and direct injection, which produce deadly
particulates, not to mention ever fiddlier motors.

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programminggeek
You know, sometimes it would be better to just let market forces do their
thing. The downstream effects will be interesting and far reaching.

Not sure if that is a good or bad thing.

~~~
erikpukinskis
If you let the markets do their thing, you'll get a combination of actors
focused on all timescales: some trying to get returns this year, some over the
next 5 years, some over the next 50 years.

However, sometimes the actions taken by those seeking 1- or 5-year returns
actually decrease the total amount of returns available over the 50 year
horizon. This is a tragedy of the commons situation, and it may behoove a
government to step in and remove the incentives for the short-term investors
so that society can reap an overall larger profit.

Whether this is one of those cases I do not know.

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sverige
Collectively, computers consume far more energy than transport and so
contribute more to emissions. Perhaps they should be banned.

~~~
rwmj
Source for this claim?

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tiatia
By 2040, computers will need more electricity than the world can generate. So
says the semiconductor industry's last ever communal roadmap

[http://www.theregister.co.uk/2016/07/25/semiconductor_indust...](http://www.theregister.co.uk/2016/07/25/semiconductor_industry_association_international_technology_roadmap_for_semiconductors/)

~~~
rwmj
That's not a source for the claim "computers consume far more energy than
transport and so contribute more to emissions".

~~~
dogma1138
Computers use about 13% of the world's electricity.

Electricity production is about 25% of the world's greenhouse emissions,
transportation is about 14%, so currently this isn't correct but within 10-15
years it potentially could be, of course it is dependant on the energy sources
for both electricity production and transportation or to be more exact their
share relative share of greenhouse emissions remaining proportionally similar.

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rhabarba
Ha, yes, because, you know, burning coal for energy is better for the
environment than burning gasoline.

~~~
erikpukinskis
No, it's approximately the same. If you get your electricity from 100% coal
your emissions will be about the same as a gas burning car.

Most places don't use strictly coal for electricity generation though.

~~~
cnvogel
Yes, maybe you even burn more fossil fuel because of transmission loss. But
one might still gain on better filtering of dust/particulates in the exhaust
which is a major problem in German inner cities.

(I'm not advocating the use of coal energy to power electric cars, just
mentioning that there are more aspects.)

~~~
witty_username
Coal plants can run more efficiently though.

