But, why? We WANT people to buy electric cars... It's like the patient isn't breathing, bleeding to death and the nephrologist wants us to test their kidney function.
Hello r/fuckcars folks, berating people for making reasonable choices within their environment isn't a winning strategy. EVs are a legitimate incremental improvement. Sorry we don't all live a bikable wonderland with good public transit.
I live in bikable wonderland. Good public transit is still pretty bad. Owning a car easily cuts your travel time in half even in a country with excellent transit and very car hostile policies.
They're an increnmental improvement, but to a dead end.
Saying that, they do have a somewhat hidden advantage - as it takes more effort and planning to drive any particular distance, EVs will reduce the amount of miles people drive.
Yes, exactly! Until we have the infrastructure to end car dependence we need to reduce the harm of carbon fueled personal vehicles. Electric cars aren't the solution, but they are a pretty good bandaid.
I agree but its just not practical in a lot of places due to idiotic urban planning. Euclidean zoning and urban sprawl have become the cancer of america. In many places, there are no places close by to just hangout. just my parent's place one has to drive (no sidewalks) 3 miles to get milk at he gas station and thats pretty good by american standards.
Until we fix that, (more mixed use zoning, higher density, consistent predictable and readily availale public transport options) cars are the only option for a lot of people
I agree heartily. In order to gain access to "good", reliable internet, I had to move to the former "new-money" part of town, which is now pseudo-affordable. There is extremely limited non-vehicular options. The road out of the subdivision has zero shoulder, a one-way bike lane, and no sidewalks. Local residents don't respect the pedestrian easement, and ignore the posted speed limit across low visibility hills.
The times I've walked that route, I've either been threaded with violence for "trespassing" or almost struck by vehicles. Never once has the bike lane or easement been unobstructed the whole way.
Other parts of the subdivision connect to a "greenway", but it is very broken up with missing sidewalks, and only has limited crosswalks. It really is only useful for getting to a nearby park (which is nice), but not for any essentials.
Some of the local residents (including myself) have been asking the city for some funding (or even to take advantage of grants) to improve the walk ability, but there is a smaller contingent of more influential folks that either threaten lawsuits should the city install sidewalks/walkpaths, or just take up tons of time so that everyone is tired and wants to go home by the time we get to speak.
While we've gained some visibility and good rapport, we've not really managed to change anything, and it's starting to feel futile.
Governments want their sweet, sweet tax - I hope you didn't imagine the future where one is charging their EV car tax free from offgrid PV installation or some similar nonsense - that's ridiculously non-green solution!
To counteract these needless cynical takes - someone has to maintain roads and roads are funded by taxes on gas and municipalities, which means vehicles that pay no taxes from gas of from the local municipalities are freeloading.
Moreover roads wear out to the fourth power of the vehicle's mass, which means if anything that light vehicles subsidize those heavier ones regardless of emissions.
Infrastructure spending is really not that big of an expense regardless of who's doing it.
Many/most roads are economically worthwhile (or are a low enough cost to be a justifiable luxury) on their own albeit some (mostly in rural areas) at lower standards of maintenance.
This not true - in the US most municipalities are financially underwater with regards to infrastructure maintenance costs, especially with road infrastructure.
1. There are some issues with heavy vehicles. They put more wear on the roads, they pose a greater risk to other drivers because of their higher potential energy in crashes, and they consume more energy (e.g. power plants have to burn more coal).
2. Current EV battery technology uses resources that have significant environmental impact. Smaller battery does less damage.
The goal of this proposed battery weight tax seems to be tweaking the trajectory of EV development towards an even bigger environmental win.
Isn't (battery) weight a proxy for what we really care about, energy consumption per covered distance? Seems like if you'd tax the latter, manufacturers would have more options to innovate around efficiency rather than just battery weight and provide lower-taxed vehicles. Battery weight will of course still be important to get consumption down, but perhaps there are other ways as well to make cars more efficient.
One example: a thing often overlooked is the efficiency of the onboard charger, which can incur a loss of up to 32% on for example the Renault Zoe [1].
If the idea is to replace gas taxes as a means of funding roads then the tax should be based on a combination of damage done by the vehicle (which is basically a tax on weight) and some efficiency multiplier. I’ve seen it mentioned in the past that governments can just check your odometer reading on a yearly basis and charge a tax on that but it’s probably just easier to tax the electricity at the point of charge (specifically for charging purposes).
Ideally this would encourage lighter vehicles to cut down on the initial “weight” tax as well as increase efficiency of the vehicle overall (more miles per kilowatt hour).
There’s obviously going to be a lot of headaches for farm use vehicles and people generating their own power and paying a tax on it but how else do you pay for roads and incentivize people to stop driving gigantic vehicles?
Pretty much the only vehicles that matter from an infrastructure wear and tear perspective are the heaviest traffic (which on every road that isn't a private driveway means commercial trucks).
If you want to tax that just tax based on the max GVW.
In the US at least, the gas tax (in concept, not really in reality) what we care about is wear on roads. Therefore a tax on gasoline was actually just a proxy for what we cared about, which was wear on roads.
Taxing battery weight is a better method in this instance, because wear is directly proportional to vehicle weight.
Probably the only useful thing in the article is highlighting that some EVs are so heavy that their stopping distance from 70mph can be a much larger distance than people would expect at over 200ft. It might be safer for the driver of that heavy vehicle but a 9000 lb truck rear ending you is going to be pretty rough.
Not to mention if EVs (especially SUV model EVs) become the norm, roads are going to get a LOT worse due to the inflated curb weight. It's already bad here in the south along many busy semi truck routes, but imagine all the small suburban roads having to be resurfaced sooner and sooner.
I keep seeing the _right_ claim the _left_ is coming for my truck with increased taxes based on weight. My 2018 GMC 1500 Crew Cab 6.5ft bed Light Truck weighs ~5,300 lbs.
I looked at the weight of some of these EVs and yikes 2,900 lbs for just the battery pack? 1.5 TONS? WeW.
I'm all for higher taxation on heavy and commercial vehicles to help with road maintenance and up keep. That being said I only drive my truck when needed <1k miles / year. I wouldn't even have the truck but where I live, the lack of access to rentals and friends with trucks. It's a need even though not needed often.
If weight taxes increase linearly in order to distribute road wear, heavy vehicles are a steal. The rule of thumb is that road wear increases scale with respect to the fourth power[1][2] of vehicle weight. Taxing at a linear rate would disproportionately affect lighter vehicles.
Seems rather short-sighted and unlikely to accomplish the authors goals. If we incentivize weight it seems we might end up with less safe batteries just because safer ones weigh just a little bit more. We could also lose efficiency and durability because running fewer batteries harder, or scrapping thermal management components, could reduce weight.
Why not simply tax vehicles relative to the wear that they induce on the road, i.e. total weight^4?
It'll be hard to implement a "gas tax" for electricity with so many people charging at home. Why not simply tax people relative to the maintenance costs which they incur?
If no one ever electrified a car, I feel the world would be better off so people wouldn't be mislead thinking electric cars are a green solution to transit. Trains, busses, and bikes are the green solution.
It's all relative, EVs have the potential to be greener than their alternative, but actual public transit and non-powered transport are always going to be better where they are available.
It's all too easy to disregard "good" solutions because they are not "perfect".
Even when I lived in range of the local public transport, it's 1/hour frequency, limitations on baggage, and limited hours meant that I pretty much only used it as an alternative to walking back, since it was marginally faster, and climate controlled. It's miles better than nothing, but it still pales in comparison to access gained from the use of a personal vehicle.
I biked and bussed to work for years via a transit center which was lovely, but my new job is local and a bike was just plain unsafe. I almost was hit by an oblivious car or malicious truck (seriously I was a bicycle doing 10 over the speed limit, theres no need to blow a diesel cloud at me just so they know they are faster...) every single day.
Without separate bike lanes like I had doing a more normal commute to the city, hecken nope! I love my EV.
Having read the above, I definitely agree that the Hummer EV is an exercise in American excess, just like the H1-H3 before it. I'm personally in the favor of miles traveled method, with modifiers for curb weight and anything else that impacts the intended uses of said tax. Specifically, I'd like to see an odometer based system charged at tag renewal (or in arrears, to make it more predictable).
Then reduce&repurpose the current gas tax for uses to mitigate externalities caused in post-sale use.
I'm also in favor of a similar externalities penalty for electrical generation (even though the current state of combustion generation is much cleaner than a typical ICE), so that economic forces are able to operate taking that into account.
It suggests that taxing the vehicle weight would lead to less safety.
In fact, previous CARB pollution controls have paid for themselves, just in the reduction in death as a result of lightweighting changes made to achieve the mpg goals.
Tax the vehicle weight. It's an externality.
If you care about some aspect of mining, tax or regulate that directly.
36 comments
[ 2.0 ms ] story [ 91.2 ms ] threadSaying that, they do have a somewhat hidden advantage - as it takes more effort and planning to drive any particular distance, EVs will reduce the amount of miles people drive.
Until we fix that, (more mixed use zoning, higher density, consistent predictable and readily availale public transport options) cars are the only option for a lot of people
Other parts of the subdivision connect to a "greenway", but it is very broken up with missing sidewalks, and only has limited crosswalks. It really is only useful for getting to a nearby park (which is nice), but not for any essentials.
Some of the local residents (including myself) have been asking the city for some funding (or even to take advantage of grants) to improve the walk ability, but there is a smaller contingent of more influential folks that either threaten lawsuits should the city install sidewalks/walkpaths, or just take up tons of time so that everyone is tired and wants to go home by the time we get to speak.
While we've gained some visibility and good rapport, we've not really managed to change anything, and it's starting to feel futile.
Moreover roads wear out to the fourth power of the vehicle's mass, which means if anything that light vehicles subsidize those heavier ones regardless of emissions.
Many/most roads are economically worthwhile (or are a low enough cost to be a justifiable luxury) on their own albeit some (mostly in rural areas) at lower standards of maintenance.
1. There are some issues with heavy vehicles. They put more wear on the roads, they pose a greater risk to other drivers because of their higher potential energy in crashes, and they consume more energy (e.g. power plants have to burn more coal).
2. Current EV battery technology uses resources that have significant environmental impact. Smaller battery does less damage.
The goal of this proposed battery weight tax seems to be tweaking the trajectory of EV development towards an even bigger environmental win.
One example: a thing often overlooked is the efficiency of the onboard charger, which can incur a loss of up to 32% on for example the Renault Zoe [1].
1: https://www.lachaineev.fr/ ( french )
Tax (curb - battery) weight then? So we can afford the 1000km vehicles we all say we need, while penalizing the heaviest and most inefficient EVs.
Ideally this would encourage lighter vehicles to cut down on the initial “weight” tax as well as increase efficiency of the vehicle overall (more miles per kilowatt hour).
There’s obviously going to be a lot of headaches for farm use vehicles and people generating their own power and paying a tax on it but how else do you pay for roads and incentivize people to stop driving gigantic vehicles?
If you want to tax that just tax based on the max GVW.
Taxing battery weight is a better method in this instance, because wear is directly proportional to vehicle weight.
Road wear is proportional to the fourth power of axle weight:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fourth_power_law
I looked at the weight of some of these EVs and yikes 2,900 lbs for just the battery pack? 1.5 TONS? WeW.
I'm all for higher taxation on heavy and commercial vehicles to help with road maintenance and up keep. That being said I only drive my truck when needed <1k miles / year. I wouldn't even have the truck but where I live, the lack of access to rentals and friends with trucks. It's a need even though not needed often.
That's the weight of the Hummer battery pack though. I think around 500kg is the more the norm, with a total curb weight of around 1500kg.
1. !
2. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/AASHO_Road_Test
It'll be hard to implement a "gas tax" for electricity with so many people charging at home. Why not simply tax people relative to the maintenance costs which they incur?
It's all too easy to disregard "good" solutions because they are not "perfect".
Even when I lived in range of the local public transport, it's 1/hour frequency, limitations on baggage, and limited hours meant that I pretty much only used it as an alternative to walking back, since it was marginally faster, and climate controlled. It's miles better than nothing, but it still pales in comparison to access gained from the use of a personal vehicle.
Without separate bike lanes like I had doing a more normal commute to the city, hecken nope! I love my EV.
Then reduce&repurpose the current gas tax for uses to mitigate externalities caused in post-sale use.
I'm also in favor of a similar externalities penalty for electrical generation (even though the current state of combustion generation is much cleaner than a typical ICE), so that economic forces are able to operate taking that into account.
It suggests that taxing the vehicle weight would lead to less safety.
In fact, previous CARB pollution controls have paid for themselves, just in the reduction in death as a result of lightweighting changes made to achieve the mpg goals.
Tax the vehicle weight. It's an externality.
If you care about some aspect of mining, tax or regulate that directly.