Only in California. This is some crazy stuff...

[XX Case XX]

https://www.msn.com/en-us/weather/topst ... plocalnews

Arizona's looking really good about now...

___________
Mike

[Doc B]

Maybe I'll celebrate with a new pickup and AR that year.

[XX Case XX]

Maybe I'll celebrate with a new pickup and AR that year.

___________
Mike

[Railsplitter]

That's what I was thinking. Maybe I'll buy a brand new car the year before and it will last me the rest of my life. Hopefully not but I can prolong it as long as possible.

[Sharpnshinyknives]

I think I will set up a car dealership just across the border in a neighboring state to sell cars to CA residents who don’t want to comply.

[New_Windsor_NY]

Arizona's looking really good about now...

I'm amazed that people are surprised by this or find this "odd." This is par for the course.

[Doc B]

I'm assuming since it says passenger cars...trucks will be exempt. I don't see how electric could meet the needs of the huge numbers of farmers, ranchers, construction folk that require 3/4 trucks, to haul their big trailers around. So, for those that can't afford a $60,000 truck...the others will be stuck with a $35,000 electric thing, that has to be plugged in somewhere. I'm guessing the emission savings will be offset by the number of folks that will driving big trucks around, to avoid forced electricity. Skip, I don't find it odd, at all. As you say...par for California. My wife is from northern CA. She likes to say..."where the fruits and nuts are grown...not, where they live."

[TwoFlowersLuggage]

That's OK, by 2035 there won't be anywhere worth going...

[zzyzzogeton]

I'm assuming since it says passenger cars...trucks will be exempt. I don't see how electric could meet the needs of the huge numbers of farmers, ranchers, construction folk that require 3/4 trucks, to haul their big trailers around. So, for those that can't afford a $60,000 truck...the others will be stuck with a $35,000 electric thing, that has to be plugged in somewhere. I'm guessing the emission savings will be offset by the number of folks that will driving big trucks around, to avoid forced electricity. Skip, I don't find it odd, at all. As you say...par for California. My wife is from northern CA. She likes to say..."where the fruits and nuts are grown...not, where they live."

If you read down through the article linked above, it says that "medium and heavy duty vehicles will be emission free by 2045".

One of the problems with all this "emission free electric vehicle" crap is that no electric vehicle will ever have the range of a fossil fueled vehicle, nor will they be "refuelable" quickly. Even Tesla's tech will only get about a 300 mile range (370 on the Long Distance model) and takes 1 to 2 days to recharge at home on 110v and 5 to 12 hours with a 240v charger. A supercharger model charger will recharge a Tesla in 30 minutes to an hour. How long will you have to wait to get hooked up?

Want to control the people? Don't let them be able to go anywhere fast. It will take people up to 9 days to drive across Texas. Assuming you can find a charger somewhere between Ft Stockton and El Paso that is open at night.

Another set of problems - environmental waste from producing the batteries, recycling the batteries, getting rare earth elements needed for the electronics from China (primary source of most of them).

If they can't make the cars, you can't buy one, so you can't go anywhere and are dependent on the government to provide you with transportation.

[Sharpnshinyknives]

So California is experiencing black outs because of the green energy mandates. They are shuttering gas power plants and won’t let a nuclear plant be built so there isn’t enough power now. So as CA moves more and more green, they want to add millions and millions of cars that need to be charged every day from this energy source that isn’t keeping up with demand now. Does anyone else see the insanity of this? The people of CA will be absolutely bleed dry from high priced electricity in the future. I guess you get the government you voted for. Good luck.

[Gunsil]

I have no idea what you guys have a problem with here. If they have batteries that can power a car or pick-up truck for a thousand mile drive who cares? The world will run out of oil and gasoline sooner or later and electric cars can easily be much more powerful than internal combustion engine vehicles. Plenty of modern electric cars can do 0-60 under 3.5 seconds with top speeds over 160 MPH. They are more quiet to drive, have all amenities, and plenty of power, what's not to like? Right now the only drawback is travel distance between charges, if they solve that one it is a no-brainer that they will be better. By the way, I was a Porsche master mechanic most of my life and a motor head, but if there is more power and better handling to be had I say bring it on!! Ford already has electric pick-ups and check out Rivian Company, looks like they're making a cool pick-up. Grow up, stop whining, and get with the times guys!! Y'all sound like the folks who complained when gas powered cars replaced horse and buggies.

Sharp and shiny, what the heck are you talking about charging every day? Many folks don't drive more than ten miles a day and right now most electrics get 250 miles per charge, which means they would only need a charge every twenty days, if your driver did twenty miles a day they would only have to charge every ten days. I think they will likely have the technology to go a thousand miles by 2035, making the argument moot. I like to drive, own a classic Porsche, but I like to drive cross country too, doing 6-700 miles a day, so right now I have no use for an EV, but if they make one that will go a thousand miles and charge in a few hours while sleeping, bring it on!!

What scares me more are self driving cars. When all cars are self driving they will know the speed limit and you won't be able to go any faster than the limit and you will be tracked all the time. THIS is a problem to me, and it too is coming.

[bladeguy58]

Yeah and ever scarier is I'm gonna bet that in 4 years he's gonna run for President!
Bladeguy!

[Sharpnshinyknives]

I have no idea what you guys have a problem with here. If they have batteries that can power a car or pick-up truck for a thousand mile drive who cares? The world will run out of oil and gasoline sooner or later and electric cars can easily be much more powerful than internal combustion engine vehicles. Plenty of modern electric cars can do 0-60 under 3.5 seconds with top speeds over 160 MPH. They are more quiet to drive, have all amenities, and plenty of power, what's not to like? Right now the only drawback is travel distance between charges, if they solve that one it is a no-brainer that they will be better. By the way, I was a Porsche master mechanic most of my life and a motor head, but if there is more power and better handling to be had I say bring it on!! Ford already has electric pick-ups and check out Rivian Company, looks like they're making a cool pick-up. Grow up, stop whining, and get with the times guys!! Y'all sound like the folks who complained when gas powered cars replaced horse and buggies.

Sharp and shiny, what the heck are you talking about charging every day? Many folks don't drive more than ten miles a day and right now most electrics get 250 miles per charge, which means they would only need a charge every twenty days, if your driver did twenty miles a day they would only have to charge every ten days. I think they will likely have the technology to go a thousand miles by 2035, making the argument moot. I like to drive, own a classic Porsche, but I like to drive cross country too, doing 6-700 miles a day, so right now I have no use for an EV, but if they make one that will go a thousand miles and charge in a few hours while sleeping, bring it on!!

Has anyone done the math on the electric usage? I agree not everyone needs to charge every day, but there will be millions of people plugging in their cars every day that aren’t doing that now, so it’s going to strain the system, which is already straining under 40% of the power coming from wind and solar. You don’t have to be a rocket scientist to see the problem that’s coming. The battery technology may never deliver the kind of range that they will need in a country that is thousands of miles from border to border. I’ve been hearing the promise of this mind blowing range for batteries for over 20 years. Believe me I have looked into a lot. I had clients trying to figure out how to make money investing in this great battery technology for over 20 years and it doesn’t exist. If you have insight into something new, please inform me.

Edit. Sorry I messed up this post. I didn’t realize I was posting in the middle of your post.

[Mumbleypeg]

I have no idea what you guys have a problem with here. If they have batteries that can power a car or pick-up truck for a thousand mile drive who cares? The world will run out of oil and gasoline sooner or later and electric cars can easily be much more powerful than internal combustion engine vehicles. Plenty of modern electric cars can do 0-60 under 3.5 seconds with top speeds over 160 MPH. They are more quiet to drive, have all amenities, and plenty of power, what's not to like? Right now the only drawback is travel distance between charges, if they solve that one it is a no-brainer that they will be better. By the way, I was a Porsche master mechanic most of my life and a motor head, but if there is more power and better handling to be had I say bring it on!! Ford already has electric pick-ups and check out Rivian Company, looks like they're making a cool pick-up. Grow up, stop whining, and get with the times guys!! Y'all sound like the folks who complained when gas powered cars replaced horse and buggies.

Sharp and shiny, what the heck are you talking about charging every day? Many folks don't drive more than ten miles a day and right now most electrics get 250 miles per charge, which means they would only need a charge every twenty days, if your driver did twenty miles a day they would only have to charge every ten days. I think they will likely have the technology to go a thousand miles by 2035, making the argument moot. I like to drive, own a classic Porsche, but I like to drive cross country too, doing 6-700 miles a day, so right now I have no use for an EV, but if they make one that will go a thousand miles and charge in a few hours while sleeping, bring it on!!

Assuming all that is true, then the free market will drive the conversion to electric vehicles, just as it did the conversion from horse and buggy to gasoline powered transportation. We don’t need any grandstanding moron politician edicting the change.

Ken

[cody6268]

In my opinion wiht goverment officials--I think the best way to prove they are truly incompetent and unfit for the job is to pass expensive, extensive, and nearly impossible to implement policies that are wholly unworkable. We've seen it with the Green New Deal, and then this thing. I'm not even getting into my views that global warming is intentionally overhyped and made to sound more extreme than it really is(I follow the Dyson view) and models are exaggerated. Remember all of Al Gore's claims about NYC being under water?

In my opinion, as things are now changing with tech at an incredibly fast pace, and as battery and charging tech research is evolving constantly, we will see electric cars far superior to ICE vehicles. But not right now. One, charging infrastructure isn't that good. First (and still only almost ten years later) charging stations I have seen are an hour and a half from my place.

The real problem is the power grid. They want to get rid of nuclear and all fossil fuels. The renewable sources don't output nearly as much. When you switch all the cars over to electric, that's going to put even more stress on the grid. This is why I say hydrogen is a better alternative. Number two is depreciation. Batteries wear out with age due to the laws of science and thermodynamics and entropy. My great-aunt got a huge discount on a 2013 Subaru XV Crosstrek Hybrid that was a lease return in 2015. It's depreciated at a rate far more than standard Crosstreks do (and Subarus, as you know, don't depreciate that bad). And then, battery disposal. Nickel, cadmium, mercury, nickel, lead, lithium. All found in batteries and seriously nasty stuff to the environment and people.

[TwoFlowersLuggage]

I read an interesting article that talked about a problem that isn't talked about very much: energy storage. One of the big issues with our infrastructure is that a lot of the power generation capacity is wasted because we cannot efficiently store the electrical power once it is generated, and we also lose a huge amount of power trying to get it from the point of generation to the point of use. Solar is a perfect example of this issue. Solar could be much more useful if we were better at storing solar-generated power so it could be used when the sun isn't shining and transferred more efficiently to the areas where the sun isn't shining. Instead, what happens is that we have excess energy at some times and in some places, and energy shortages at other times and other places.

And, of course, the batteries are the real problem with EVs. Battery technology has not significantly changed in decades. Do you know what is inside a Tesla battery pack? Over 7,000 Panasonic 18650 lithium ion cells, that are just like you will find in most rechargeable flashlights and all laptop battery packs. It's not some magical battery - they are cheap as dirt.

There are some newer tech batteries being worked on, but nothing that is a quantum leap over Lithium ion. The most interesting is the super capacitor technology. These are amazing because they do not require the long recharge times like batteries. You hook them to a big enough power source, and they are charged almost instantly. The trick it to get them to discharge in a controlled way that doesn't fry you to a crisp...

[kootenay joe]

The real answer is: don't make unnecessary driving trips. There is an environmental cost whether vehicle is gas or electric.
There is no doubt that Earth is suffering from our resource extraction & use in addition to our population of nearly 8 billion people.
The 'heyday' of "do whatever you want whenever you want to" is over. There is an environmental cost to all the stuff we buy and most of it we don't actually need. The intensity of wildfires, hurricanes, etc. is increasing because of human activity. We all need to act more responsibly.
kj

[1967redrider]

This thing looks way better than a Tesla, in my opinion.

[bladehound]

California is like a box of granola, take away the fruits and nuts all that's left is the flakes.

[Waukonda]

This thing looks way better than a Tesla, in my opinion.

Another, of a recent string of great photos from you, John. Would love to see and hear that thing highballing down the tracks!

[1967redrider]

This thing looks way better than a Tesla, in my opinion.

Another, of a recent string of great photos from you, John. Would love to see and hear that thing highballing down the tracks!

You and me both, brother! Not to hi-jack the thread, but Western Maryland Scenic Railroad is about 95% finished in restoring C&O 1309 articulated Mallet, it's a 2-6-6-4 I believe. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chesape ... _Ohio_1309

The above loco is only a 2-8-0 for comparison.

[bighomer]

a big 8 wheeler rolling down down the track.

[KnifeSlinger#81]

I guess Newsom thought Californians weren’t leaving the state fast enough so he gave them yet another reason.

[Mumbleypeg]

Electric powered cars have been available from mainstream automakers for about 10 years. To date they account for just 1.5% of the market, despite generous government subsidies averaging $7500 per vehicle. In California the state government adds $2500 on top of the federal subsidy. So we as taxpayers are paying for electric vehicles whether we like it or not! (It’s for the “greater good”, don’t you see?)

BTW when the onboard battery wears out, they typically cost between $4000 to $6000 to replace.

Ken

[TwoFlowersLuggage]

California is still the most populous state in the country, with ~12% of the US population. That is more than the combined population of these 20 states:  Utah, Iowa, Nevada, Arkansas, Mississippi, Kansas, New Mexico, Nebraska, West Virginia, Idaho, Hawaii, New Hampshire, Maine, Montana, Rhode Island, Delaware, South Dakota, North Dakota & Alaska.

The top 4 states (CA, TX, FL & NY) represent 33% of the US population.

California is also 14.6% of the total GDP of the country. That's 66% more than the #2, Texas.

If California were a country, it would have the 5th largest GDP in the world, right between Germany & India.

You may not like the California politics, but there is no denying the importance of the state to the country as a whole.