
The Electric-Car Boom Is Real - prostoalex
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2017-04-25/electric-car-boom-seen-triggering-peak-oil-demand-in-2030s?utm_content=buffer33505&utm_medium=social&utm_source=facebook.com&utm_campaign=buffer
======
awjr
More interestingly is that the EV does not help solve congestion. They take up
the same space as an ICEV.

Raleigh now sell more electric bikes than normal bikes. That's where the real
'revolution' is occurring.

If you live in a city and your commute is in the 0-5miles range, they are
simply the fastest way of getting to work during rush hour. You might not like
the idea of a hot sweaty cycle ride to work. Neither did I.

Seriously pop to your local bike shop that sells these things and try one. In
my case, I've stopped using buses and taxis, sold one car, and gone down to a
one car family. It's saving me a fortune.

Would definitely recommend the mid-drive over hub-drive eBikes. They produce
more torque. If you live in a hilly area, try and get a bike with at least
60nm of torque. Some top out at 90nm. Just means you can cycle up those 1 in 2
hills one handed.

~~~
dgregd
That's why I would like to see a hybrid of a electric van and Uber as a new
city bus. The bus should have 6 doors and separated passenger space. So each
passenger would have its own private space. Travel time should be much shorter
due to using fast lanes and low number of bus stops. During rush hours the bus
should take 5 passengers (6 with self-driving technology). Because of small
size it should economic enough to use the bus only for one passenger, even in
suburbs. Uber like software should be used for costs optimization, for example
you could wait for the bus in front of your house or walk 500 meters closer to
the main road to save $5. All needed technology already exists. No need to dig
tunnels.

PS. In Central and Northern Europe bikes are only useful for 4 months a year.

PS2. I don't want to discuss how many days per year someone can ride an e-bike
to work. Some sort of public / car transport is and will be needed. There is
no much innovation in public bus transport therefore I described the idea
about electric van / Uber hybrid.

~~~
pjc50
> 6 doors and separated passenger space

> small size

These are conflicting requirements. The minimum size for 6 doors is probably
about the size of a long-wheelbase Transit van, only a little smaller than a
normal bus.

I'd love to see someone try the commuter multi-drop-mini-bus system; it's
implemented informally in various ways already that don't have multinational
branding. Won't help in _really_ dense cities like London where traffic is at
walking pace, but potentially useful in other places.

~~~
dgregd
> The minimum size for 6 doors is probably about the size of a long-wheelbase
> Transit van

Depends on the mini-bus layout. 7-seater VW Touran (4527 mm long) has 5 doors.
So maybe it possible to build 5 m long van with 6 doors, with 2 on the back.

> Won't help in really dense cities like London where traffic is at walking
> pace

Dedicated lanes and some regulations will be needed. For example mini-bus
shouldn't be allowed to enter crowded routes unless it has 3 passengers. So
two people would have to wait 5 min for the third passenger and so on. Or it
can be used to transport people from suburbs to subway stations in cities like
London.

------
cowmix
I remember during the 2004 presidential election I was was on some political
forums arguing how EV would reach tipping point in sales and technology within
about 10 years. All these people would go on and on about how batteries will
always be expensive, the laws of physics state EV will never truly be viable,
EVs are slow, batteries are undependable, EVs pollute more, etc, etc.

One by one all those reasons have be discredited. The EV was and is
inevitable.

~~~
terravion
It is amazing to watch Wright's Law in action as volumes grow to saturation,
pulling down the price, to drive saturation. It will be interesting to see if
batteries are like processing with self-generating demand, or if it is like
prior industrial technologies that seem to hit ceiling based on some sort of
inherent demand limit. It is hard to imagine wanting 3 electric cars...

~~~
thrownblown
So the analysis focuses on a single variable: cost, specifically the
inflation-adjusted price of one “unit.” (A “unit” is itself sometimes a fluid
concept in a rapidly changing field. Consider what “one transistor” meant in
1969, and what it meant in 2005.) So, for example, recasting Moore’s Law to
translate computing power into unit cost morphed the familiar “computing power
doubles every 18 months” into “transistor costs drop by 50 percent every 1.4
years.”

(Wright's Law is surprisingly hard to google)

source: [http://spectrum.ieee.org/tech-talk/at-work/test-and-
measurem...](http://spectrum.ieee.org/tech-talk/at-work/test-and-
measurement/wrights-law-edges-out-moores-law-in-predicting-technology-
development)

~~~
icc97
That article has really good examples of the problems of overfitting. Better
than the standard abstract data science stuff I've seen anyway.

------
cobookman
I've been amazed that the Chevy volt isn't selling more units.

You get 53 miles electric and 42 mpg. Unlike the i3 with rex you can go full
speed on gas. And unlike the Toyota Prius plugin, the gas engine is purely an
electric generator.

The car after incentives and dealer rebates is 20k. GM also offers 0 down 0%
financing over 60 months.

It's a great commuter car as the 53 miles is more than enough to get to work.
at work you charge up and you've got enough to go home. If you want to go on a
road trip you still have the gas engine.

~~~
dangoor
I've been looking at plugin hybrids recently and the Prius Prime looks to me
like an interesting competitor to the Volt (and it's a very different beast
from the old Prius plugin). It has half the electric range of the Volt, but
it's more efficient and (something that matters to me because we like car
camping) has more cargo room. The Prius Prime gets a full charge in 5.5 hours
on 120v.

Regardless, these both seem like awesome cars and I'm excited that there are
cars that give you both electric drive every day and the ability to go as far
as you want using gasoline.

------
Ensorceled
I think these estimates are very conservative, try to imagine what the sales
curve for "cars burning unleaded gasoline" would look like. Once the
technology becomes comparable, including infrastructure for battery swaps,
regulation will take over.

I imagine large cities will just say "no fossil fuel burning vehicles in the
downtown core" and "taxis must all be electric" and those numbers will change
dramatically. Fossil fuel cars will simply be banned in many (most?)
countries.

That's not even accounting for the role self-driving vehicles will play, which
will kick in long before 2040. There is no need for a full level 4 vehicle to
ever be fossil fuel powered.

~~~
toretore
There's one thing I've been thinking about that I don't see anyone else
talking about, which is the role of hybrids in the decline of the ICE.

I don't think it's a stretch to imagine that most cars sold in 5 or 10 years
will be at least hybrid electric. As battery prices continue to fall, it will
make sense to include some electric capacity in addition to an ICE. So let's
imagine a future where most new cars have a relatively modest 20 kWh battery
with a range of more than 100 Km:

Most people, most of the time, drive short distances that will seldom require
the use of the combustion engine and its fuel (many hybrids today come with
special fuel tanks to prevent the fuel from "going bad"). Buying fuel will
become an increasingly rare thing, and people will start to think of it as an
expensive inconvenience. The current ICE fleet is reliant on a large, complex
and expensive infrastructure to provide this fuel, and as people buy less and
less of it, maintaining it will become less and less sustainable. As fueling
stations start closing and the fuel prices go up (will they? I'm not sure
about this point), it will become even more costly and inconvenient to fuel a
hybrid, perpetuating the cycle.

At some point, the idea of a noisy, dirty ICE running on expensive, hard-to-
get fuel will become so unattractive that it's no longer a viable option for
most people. While this decline is happening, the cost, range and performance
of all-electric will improve to the point where there really is no other
reasonable choice.

~~~
6d6b73
There are a lot of similar "long tail" reasons that explain why once cost of
electric cars is on par with ice's electrification will speed up. To add to
your "gas station" example, most of these stations make profit not from
gasoline but from other stuff they sell like cigarettes, sodas, chips etc.
Once the traffic decreases, the profitability will drop substantially so their
demise will be faster than if you only consider gasoline sales.

My predictions: \- once electric school buses are available parents will push
for their quicker adoption so their kids don't have to breath in the diesel
and its waste products.

\- since electric cars require less maintenance automotive parts stores and
car service centers will be hit. No need to change oil every few k miles. No
need change your muffler, transmission fluid etc. This will make ice parts
availability to drop and price to increase.

\- if Tesla is successful with its direct sales other manufacturers will
eventually follow. Number of dealerships will drop

\- some stores like Costco offer gas discounts for their customers. If they
see that number of electric cars is increasing they will replace that with
free charging spots for the best customers.

\- electric cars will (presumably) not be required to do emission testing,
which in turn will require states to lower number of emission testing centers.
After a while it's possible that these emission centers will be few and far
between, an emission testing will become even bigger annoyance that it already
is.

\- Once number of gas stations starts dropping all of the trucking companies
that deliver gas will have harder time making profits. After few of them go
bankrupt, gasoline deliver will be more expensive.

\- Once sales of gasoline substantially decrease, refineries will have more
trouble selling their products, so new refineries will not be build. This will
again increase price of gasoline but also the price of heating oil.

\- After electric cars hit 10% of the market, ICEs will be considered a "new
smoking". Peer pressure will keep growing, having an ICE will be uncool.

\- once oil companies stop being as profitable people on the stock market will
start moving their money to other stocks. This will force these companies to
stop their dividends, which in turn will make them even less attractive.

\- states will have to increase taxes on gasoline to make up for the lost
revenue. Eventually electric cars will be taxed in some way but before that
happens gasoline will become even more expensive.

\- once oil production is in decline because of decreased demand, countries
like Russia and Saudi Arabia will have to deal with huge economic problems
that could lead to crash of their economies. This will make access to oil even
harder raising the price of gas even more.

\- electric cars will lower cost of batteries, which in turn will make them a
better solution for power tools, lawn mowers etc.

~~~
WorldMaker
«To add to your "gas station" example, most of these stations make profit not
from gasoline but from other stuff they sell like cigarettes, sodas, chips
etc.»

I think this is why the Convenience stores may (again) out last the pumps
outside them. On long road trips, bathroom breaks and snacks/food will still
be useful, even in an electric future.

As you also note, the new convenience store is the supermarket and the
supermarkets are also best setup to electrify large parking grids as the
transition happens.

------
ProfessorLayton
What seems to be particularly interesting about this is the response from the
incumbent automakers. It seemed like they were dragging their feet (they
were), but more likely they were waiting for the technology to be affordable
for the mass market.

The much fabled EV1 apparently cost GM around 250K apiece [1]. So while it's
easy to criticise them and other big automakers for resisting electrification,
the tech really wasn't ready until very recently. They basically sat back and
left someone else take the risk before jumping in. And now their
electrification goals seem pretty aggressive considering the infrastructure.

[1] [https://www.hemmings.com/blog/2013/06/27/cars-of-futures-
pas...](https://www.hemmings.com/blog/2013/06/27/cars-of-futures-past-gm-ev1/)

~~~
mixedbit
This seems very high, maybe they included research and infrastructure cost in
this 250k/unit estimation?

~~~
pjc50
This "NRE" should always be included in the cost of manufactured goods. It's
why things like the B2 and F35 are so expensive.

GM only made just over 1,000 EV1s, they were practically hand-built. Such a
small run gives them the same kind of cost structure as boutique sports cars.

------
OliverJones
I'm an EV customer, in a cold climate, far from the Tesla factory and the
smooth roads of the Bay Area in California USA. So I've had some experience of
the reality of working with this new tech.

Let's do the future-perfect exercise. Let's imagine looking backward from a
point in history when 90% of new vehicle sales (by unit) are EVs.

What happened in those years? 1) power cells (the component parts of
batteries) became genuine microelectronic parts with fine structure in their
insides -- deep submillimeter gaps between anodes and cathodes. That
understanding about their manufacture put their cost-per-watt on a Moore's Law
kind of curve about nine years ago.

2) vehicles routinely get field upgrades to their battery packs.

3) there's major competition between battery remanufacturing plants and
stationary power storage makers for the used battery packs, complete with spam
and robocalls begging for the old batteries.

4) the power grid companies, in every US state except Wyoming, have now
integrated their distribution systems so there's distributed control over
time-shiftable load. In other words, EVs have grid smarts in them and charge
when the spot price per kWh is lowest in their neighborhood. It's an
auctioning service.

5) in Wyoming there's a pirate electricity auctioning service available via
encrypted wireless and Tor to work around the pro-coal lobby's laws.

6) truck stops, everywhere except Wyoming, now have megawatt-level charging
facilities. Trucks don't use I-80 to get across the Continental Divide any
more.

7) Public housing projects have been compellled to offer EV charging.
Apartments without EV charging facilities are now considered substandard.
Their slumlords have to discount them at least $200 per month (in 2017)
dollars to find tenants.

8) An open standard -- called "STREETNET" \-- for vehicle-to-vehicle
communication has developed with multiple communication channels. An important
channel is modulation in brake-light and running-light intensity. That means a
vehicle can announce its status to the vehicle behind it.

9) STREETNET has virtually eliminated compression-wave congestion on limited
access highways, by helping drivers and autodrive systems see the big picture
and synchronize their speeds and acceleration.

10) Commuter rail is all electric and autodriving, and has been for five
years.

~~~
lootsauce
Love the brake light idea, simple solution. A radio signal would be one of
many, the one directly in front of you needing to be differentiated from the
one behind or to the side or on a side street requiring a much more
complicated system and protocol that might never be agreed upon and be
expensive to implement for retrofitting legacy cars. It makes up for in
simplicity what it lacks in features and that could really drive adoption.

~~~
OliverJones
Yeah, combined with short range radio you could get a useful system. The
lights would announce the sender's vehicle ID (new random number each trip for
privacy) and speed / acceleration / whatever from three or four vehicles up
front. The radio could announce more detailed vehicle-id-tagged information. A
car's receiver can easily filter out unknown vehicle ids.

Random vehicle IDs are probably vital to acceptance.

------
samcheng
Anyone who doubts this should go test drive a Tesla.

Smooth, controllable, quiet, but surprisingly-strong acceleration, coupled
with the fact that you never have to go to the gas station, make an EV with
>200 miles of range a better driving experience than a gas/diesel vehicle,
regardless of eco-benefit.

A corollary of this is that residential solar will also become much more
attractive. An EV adds maybe $50 per month to your electricity bill; that
additional demand makes the math for a solar installation really obvious
(particularly with net metering).

~~~
flexie
I agree but would say a 300 mile range is where the tipping point will be for
most people, unless we have a much more dense supercharger network. I haven't
been driving anywhere near 300 miles in a single day in the last year and I
wouldn't expect to do it without one stop at a gas station, restaurant or rest
area. But 200 miles is well within what one does in a strech without stopping,
and I've probably done 200 miles in a single day 10 times in the last year.

~~~
closeparen
I wouldn't mind having to recharge frequently. I mind the anxiety about
whether I'll even be _able_ to recharge, and how much of my day I'm going to
lose waiting for access to a charger.

The 1-2 EV stations in modern garages might cut it while there's hardly ever
even one EV parked there, but if adoption outpaces charger installation,
they're in for a rough time.

If just three people are in line for a public charger, each needing 30 minutes
with it, that's a 90 minute wait.

~~~
sokoloff
It's a 90 minute wait iff people execute the handoff like passing a baton in
an Olympic relay race. In reality, driver 2 is going to wander off to run a
quick errand or get some food (because they can't be sure driver 1 will be
ready to drive off at 30m00s000ms), and there will be significant "slippage"
in the queue draining.

------
Theodores
I recently watched two episodes of 'Fully Charged' on YouTube that featured
real motoring journalists singing the praises of electric to the extent that I
don't think that they are really interested in old fashioned cars in quite the
same way. One of the guest journalists was Rory Reid of Top Gear fame and I
have since warmed to the guy and rate him (rather than think he is some Top
Gear sad petrol head person). The other was the guy from the UK Channel 5
motoring show - Johnny Smith - and, again, he knows his electrics:

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PDoItji6Gdo](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PDoItji6Gdo)

These people are important influencers and they are not making the sad 'Top
Gear' jokes about electric cars. Check out how the Renault electric sports car
is 'sold' in the above video, why would you buy a conventional hot hatch when
you can have something with serious performance that is pretty handy for
getting the child seat and baby gear around? These motor journalists also seem
pretty pleased with the quiet, the 'brrm brrm' noises are not important unless
that is all a car really does, along with lame power slides around a deserted
level airfield.

My favourite phrase learned from electric car journalism is the 'guessometer'
the range the car apparently says it has.

Electric cars are great however I think that autonomous and electric cars will
make roads safe again, so pedestrians and cyclists can use the road without
fear of instant death. We will be able to lower the arms race of driving
around in tanks, therefore electric bikes will make a lot of sense as will
pure pedal bikes. My estimate is that the liner for the front 'trunk' on a
Tesla weighs as much as my bicycle so there is a long way to go before I
upgrade to a fancy electric car to 'go greener than I am'.

~~~
maxsilver
> (rather than think he is some Top Gear sad petrol head person)

For what it's worth, _even they_ are slowly coming around to electrics.

[https://www.topgear.com/car-news/james-may/james-may-his-
new...](https://www.topgear.com/car-news/james-may/james-may-his-new-bmw-i3)

------
panzer_wyrm
You should check out China. The speed they are electryfing their land
transport makes breakneck looks like a crawl. It is full with electric bikes,
mopeds, small cars, large cars, busses...

Not sure if party decree or self driven but very impressive.

~~~
Markoff
you need very expensive license plate and driving permit to drive car or
motorbike, most of Chinese have neither of these, thus popularity of ebikes
(no driving permit, no license plate) especially since most of Chinese are
stuck all year in megacity they live in and go outside maybe twice a year
(spring holiday to see parents, national CCP holiday to travel abroad or
around China), electric cars in China are even bigger niche than in West,
since even car ownership is extremely low and undercapacitated infrastructure
can't deal already even with low car ownership

------
Animats
The winner in this may turn out to be GM. Chevy Volt sales are doing well, and
Chevy Bolt sales are starting to climb.[1] Some months, GM outsells Tesla in
electrics.

[1] [http://insideevs.com/monthly-plug-in-sales-
scorecard/](http://insideevs.com/monthly-plug-in-sales-scorecard/)

~~~
samcheng
The article is about a major tipping point in the industry. There probably
won't be a single winner - all of the major auto manufacturers already offer,
or are developing, EVs. Drivers are expected to choose those electric models
in increasing numbers.

From my perspective, a big loser would be Toyota. They seem to have invested
heavily in hydrogen fuel cells, which appears to be the wrong technology for a
number of reasons, and squandered the significant lead they had with the
Prius. It's too bad; they were among the first to mass produce automotive
battery packs. A plug-in hybrid Lexus RX would compete directly with Tesla...

~~~
twblalock
I would lump Honda in with the losers too -- they have also invested in
hydrogen cars, and I think the only electric car they've ever made is an EV
version of the Fit, which you may see driven by the maintenance staff at a
college campus near you.

I might also lump Nissan in with the losers -- what have they done since the
Leaf, which is now totally outclassed in terms of range?

I'm actually more optimistic about Ford and GM, which are investing heavily in
electric cars and self-driving cars, than I am about the Japanese brands.

I say this as a happy Toyota Prius owner. I like my car, but I think electric
self-driving cars are where the money is going to be in the future, and I wish
Toyota would make a better effort in that area.

~~~
mikekchar
I don't think it will take Toyota and Honda long to get on the bandwagon.
While they did take a wrong turn with hydrogen (and that's blatantly obvious
in Japan where the Nissan Leaf is starting to become popular), they have
invested _really_ heavily in electric drive train cars. It's not like they
have to start from scratch.

The _really_ big loser among the big boys in Japan is Mazda. They are
reportedly _just_ getting into hybrid vehicles in 2019 and while they are also
planning a "bespoke" electric vehicle, I really don't think they are taking it
seriously (could be wrong).

Mitsubishi has a production electric vehicle that I've seen from time to time
in Japan. Again, the Leaf dwarfs it in terms of popularity (at least out where
I live), and I'm still not sure what to make of it. I've never seen one when
casually looking into a Mitsubishi showroom, and I don't think they really see
it as mainstream. If you go to a Nissan showroom, though, the Leaf is front
and centre.

It will be interesting to see where it goes. I personally predict that Japan,
as a nation, will go electric far before the US does. The distances that
people drive here are typically quite short because the speed limits are very
low. A lot of people would consider 100km to be quite a long drive. I've also
seen charging infrastructure pop up here (mostly in luxury hotels, but also in
many businesses and apartment buildings -- alas not the one I live in).

~~~
twblalock
I just got back home to San Jose after a few weeks in Japan, and I see far,
far, far more hybrid and electric vehicles on the streets here than I saw in
Japan.

Part of the problem is that few Japanese homes have garages (I mostly saw
carports, if anything), and few Japanese apartments have any kind of
guaranteed parking.

Where are you going to put the charger in Japan? Are you going to install it
outside where it will be rained on? If you live in an apartment, are you going
to buy a huge extension cord and drag it out to where you parked your car a
few blocks away? I suppose the main advantage in Japan is that the charger is
very unlikely to be stolen, but still.

~~~
toephu2
Japan's public transportation is great, most people don't even need cars
there.

~~~
kalleboo
The public transportation is great here, but where I live most families still
have cars. Not all of Japan is Tokyo.

Japan has a vehicle per capita of 591 cars per 1000 ppl vs the US 797/1000,
which is a lot lower but also far far from "nobody has a car".

------
awjr
One other consideration to make, once EVs dominate the road space, in many
countries, significant levels of tax revenue are generated through petrol
receipts. This will no longer be the case and will probably require a move to
road pricing.

~~~
jurgemaister
This will probably be more than outweighed by the savings in public health due
to less pollution. Air pollution kills and harms so many people every year.

~~~
gambiting
Sure, but I have _zero_ confidence that policymakers will look at it this way.
We all know that budgets are largely non-transferable between departments, so
just because we are spending less money on health issues I can guarantee no
one will transfer this money over road maintenance. That's not how it works.

~~~
sokoloff
Nor should it work that way automatically, IMO. We need a certain amount to
spend on X and an amount to spend on Y.

If X becomes cheaper, the right thing to do (IMO) is to return the savings to
the people, not to spend the surplus on Y or find a new Z to spend it on. If
the people want to choose to spend more on Y or Z now that they've seen the
savings on X returned to them, that's perfectly rational possibility, but
shouldn't be automatic.

------
CalChris
I have a Leaf and while my next car will have longer range, it will be
electric.

------
danderino
"EVs will make up 15 percent to 30 percent of new vehicles by 2030, after
which fuel “demand will flatten out,” Couse said. “Maybe even decline.”"

Not exactly amazing.

------
_ph_
Great news. Beyond the direct savings in CO2, and of course zero emissions
inside cities, electrical cars play an important role in shifting towards
renewable energy. Electrical cars do not only add their own storage capacity
to the grid, mass production of electrical cars is going to push battery
prices further down. For switching to an all-electric car market, battery
production has to increase about 100x, with the corresponding consequences on
the prices.

There will be an interesting point in time, when electrical cars are just a
fraction of the market, but prominent enough, that they are considered
desirable by a large part of the buyers. Once this point is reached, there
will be strong pressure on combustion engined vehicles, as they might still
sell based on peoples needs (mostly price, range) but no longer the fancy
desired technology which causes people to buy the more expensive and fancy
models.

~~~
DrScump

      Electrical cars do not only add their own storage capacity to the grid
    

I was not aware that this is happening in the USA now.

~~~
_ph_
Their collective capacity is to low (as there are to few electrical cars) to
appear on the radar of the utility companies yet, but as their numbers
increase, they become important parts of managing the grid. Just controlling
the charge time and speed of a million electric cars gives easily a gigawatt
of regulation power.

~~~
DrScump
No, I meant in terms of autonomously directing chargers to pull power _out_ of
vehicles and back _into_ the grid, as the comment implied.

------
6d6b73
I think 30% by 2030 is overly pessimistic. I'm simply guessing but since
average age of the car on the road in the US is about 10 years, cars bought
today will be off the roads by 2027. In ten years it's reasonable to expect
that every car manufacturer will have an electric car in every category for a
price comparable to regular ICE. Considering environmental and health benefits
of electric cars, together with factors like prices of gas, increase in power
produced by solar panels etc it does not make sense to think that most people
would decide to get the worse option (ICE). I think by 2030 90% cars sold will
be electric.

------
rdiddly
Annoyingly fallacious headline. Illustrative example: The Rapture Is So Real
Even Non-Christians Say It's Coming.

Bad habit to evaluate the reality of a thing by how many & what kinds of
people say it's "coming."

And this basic skepticism is well-deserved here, because there's no way
hauling around your own 2-ton machine to get places, is ever going to be
sustainable, no matter how it's powered.

------
davidp
One of the bigger delays to adoption in higher-density areas will be the
problem of retrofitting residential parking with charging stations. Condo
associations and rental companies won't spend money to install them until
their residents are all but begging for them. Adoption in suburbia is
relatively straightforward in comparison.

~~~
greglindahl
That's what laws are for.

------
icc97
This Tesla Sweden post [0] was doing the rounds a couple of years ago, on the
novelties of driving a petrol car when all you've ever driven is an electric
one.

[0]: [http://teslaclubsweden.se/test-drive-of-a-petrol-
car/](http://teslaclubsweden.se/test-drive-of-a-petrol-car/)

~~~
Neliquat
Thats pretty ham fisted.

------
owlninja
Is there any sort of powerful electric truck in the works? With real towing
power?

~~~
6d6b73
[http://bollingermotors.com/](http://bollingermotors.com/)

------
RichardHeart
The model S is the quickest, safest production car ever made. It's even adding
to its safety lead, getting safer over time. It may soon be able to make you
money ride sharing while you're not using it.

Include things like, no oil to change, cheaper to fuel up, awesome giant
touchscreen for nav and control, great all wheel drive option, extra trunk
space in the front, low center of gravity, it really all starts to add up to
awesome.

~~~
mixmastamyk
Yes, unfortunately privacy doesn't appear to be an option.

~~~
RichardHeart
Your cell phone, license plate readers, the black box recorded data in event
of crash... In the future, other peoples in car camera systems narcing on you.
I'm not sure how much longer one will be able to remain private, whether you
drive an electric car or not. That being said, it would be great to have an
option to drive one's vehicle privately.

~~~
Neliquat
Pointing out other issues does not make this one less valid. I am sorry you
gave up, others have not.

