In 3 days the world will change.

You just realized this?

 

What do you mean we're all gonna die? People don't die, do they?

 

The Tesla can't go places my diesel truck can go.

 

Irminsul, are you proud of your fuel?

 

Good idea but......most if not all of the electric cars will have Lithium batteries. At the moment it does not make economic sense to recycle the batteries. It costs 5 times more for recycled lithium then the least costly brine based process. So no company would want to buy recycle lithium due to the cost. Hopefully in the future it will change, but at the moment they get dumped in big storage facilities.

The biggest lithium deposits are
in South America, namely Chile, Argentina and Bolivia. There are already partnerships between Toyota, Mitsubishi and Japan with some of these countries to safeguard the lithium supplies for their needs. So maybe in the future there will be countries that have the power over lithium as other countries have over oil.

Also unlike oil where the price fluctuations hit you in the pocket when filling up, with lithium it will impact on the total cost of the car.

There are more thing to think about than just being happy that Elon Musk is rolling out 5000 electric cars a week.

 

at 4$ a gallon for gas, I'm ready to go back to my Big Wheel

 

My money is on biodiesel replacing fossil fuels

Then with the amount of stuff we have to grow for that, we will really know what global warming means.

The rare metals required for batteries will make electric cars not viable

 

Is that you?

So the last time I filled up with gas I paid $2.57 per gallon. To get a comparison I put that through an inflation calculator to find out what that is in 1985 dollars, the year I got my license. Anyway it's equal to $1.11 which is about a dime more than I remember paying for a gallon back then. Fossil fuels are still a good bargain and will be around for as long as anyone on this forum is alive.

 

I'd love an electric car but they're kind of unobtainable for the average Joe especially since they're so new, can't get a used one for a decent price from what I've seen. If they can do something about the charging time I'd make it my go to for my next car. But for now I would just get a hybrid so at least I'm doing some good and not using as much oil.

 

While I consider Musk a pioneer and great asset to America and I LOVE the Tesla. I'm afraid it can't remain viable. In addition to the points already made, Tesla as a car company is not economically viable. It's already on the brink of economic collapse. And with advancements in petroleum recovery, plenty of oil to keep prices fairly low. Looking at the cost of the car, I can purchase any number of active hybrid technology cars at half the price, get 50 MPG, carry a family cross country and never stop at a charging station.

The Tesla car I will always admire, I just don't think it will survive.

However due to Tesla and Musk, the U.S. is dominant in the LI battery technology. And the spin offs will do better than the car they we're developed for.

Musk is his own man and a focused manager. Most successful companies are run by focused minds that know the formula to success like a mathematician knows math. They know how to get to planned end.

 

Energy falls freely from the sky seeming to encourage splurge.

 

You mean off roading?

 

Lithium ion batteries make sense to recycle, because of the more expensive cobalt and nickel in the batteries. This may change in the future with silicon replacing cobalt. One of the reasons Tesla built their gigafactory in Nevada is it's the largest source of lithium in the U.S. There is plenty of Lithium to go around even to power the world, but by that time better batteries will most likely have taken it's place.

There are a lot of things to think about, but I think it's about time oil loses it's monopoly on transport. In the future gas cars will be looked at as a phase similar to steam engines.

 

Gas prices have been up and down over the past 100 years, but they were generally going down until 2000. Since then it has spiked to all time highs. This reflects the fact that 80% of conventional oil wells are in permanent decline. The shale oil revolution still hasn't made a profit and is mainly being driven by cheap credit. Supply and demand are currently equal right now, but there will be a supply crunch in the next couple years due to lack of investment during the last price plunge. A new Saudi Arabia will be need to be put into production every 3 years just to compensate for the decline in conventional wells.

 

Musk has revolutionized the trucking industry with his electric trucks. Beside the electric aspects, he has proven that they can safely transport cross country using no driver. Brilliant. Changing the world of trucking by itself is a huge win for him. He has far more wins than losses but the man is shaping a new world in many ways.

 

Agree, trucking is even more important than cars when it comes to changing the world. The "convoy mode" is even cheaper than train transport. Brilliant.

 

To hell with that. We need our truckers not some fancy program

 

Keep those doggies rollin' rawhide

 

Not sayin' the truckin' industry don't need retooled, it just don't need retooled in this way. Our current shipping industry is unsustainable but to just put bots in charge of it's operations ain't gonna fix the problems

 

Then you know the Sun God's illusion , a reflection in the still pond ? Who but Frog would dive in hopeful and believing ... well ,
there is Mouse .