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Thread: The $5,000 electric car-5G battle vs. new energy vehicle battle

  1. #81

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    Re: The $5,000 electric car-5G battle vs. new energy vehicle battle

    Quote Originally Posted by dilettante View Post
    Considering the current large scale blackouts due to coal shortages, maybe 6 hours riding the charging bike for every 30 minutes of driving?
    According to the news, the electricity bill in Britain costs $400 a month, and some people have to do several part-time jobs to pay the electricity bill. Fortunately, during the years of the war between Russia and Ukraine, China never lost power. Electricity prices have not risen either. A computer can be turned on and off 24 hours a day, but only for a few hours during the day when the display is turned on. The electricity bill for a month of continuous power on is only $3.

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    Re: The $5,000 electric car-5G battle vs. new energy vehicle battle

    Quote Originally Posted by xiaoyao View Post
    According to the news, the electricity bill in Britain costs $400 a month, and some people have to do several part-time jobs to pay the electricity bill.
    Either your news source got it wrong, or you didn't understand what was reported. From October 2022 to March 2023, most homes in England, Scotland and Wales got a £400 non-repayable discount on their electricity bills.

    https://www.gov.uk/government/news/4...ds-this-winter


    Quote Originally Posted by xiaoyao View Post
    A computer can be turned on and off 24 hours a day, but only for a few hours during the day when the display is turned on.
    Last edited by Peter Porter; Mar 22nd, 2023 at 05:20 AM.

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    Re: The $5,000 electric car-5G battle vs. new energy vehicle battle

    I'm not sure where any of that is going. In the US, the cost of electricity varies quite widely by region, largely depending on how the electricity is generated. It also varies by time of day, with that variability differing by state, region, total average use, and any other factors people can come up with. Figuring out the cost of continuous usage of a computer would require understanding all of those factors. It might not be the same from one house to the next, and won't be the same from one state to the next. Aside from that, the amount of power drawn by a computer depends on what it is doing.

    So, what's the point?
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    Re: The $5,000 electric car-5G battle vs. new energy vehicle battle

    I think xiaoyao was saying that, in China, leaving a computer on is affordable, even when it's not in use. I'm not sure, language can be an issue but that's how I read it.

    I assume that the implied point was that in the USA/UK that's not affordable. If so, I think that's incorrect. I walk away from my machine all the time without worrying about it. Presumably the difference in cost is offset by the difference in median income. That's a bit of a guess though, I haven't sourced any figures to back it up.

    On the price hike in the UK... yeah, it's been very real. Our government has helped out by providing an energy payment to all of us but we're still seeing a considerable hike over last year and some people are struggling. We've got a bit of a kerfuffle over here at the moment where vulnerable people were having pre-payment meters forced on them and the government recently stepped in to put a moratorium on that (I think this is a case of solving the symptom rather than the disease and what they should be looking at is the minimum wage and income support levels but that's a whole 'nother debate)

    The major driver seems to be Ukraine but I, for one, think it's a price worth paying. Of course, it's fairly easy for me to take that position because I'm not suffering.
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    Re: The $5,000 electric car-5G battle vs. new energy vehicle battle

    It is hard to get to "the truth" because things just aren't so simple.

    Many things need to happen and may happen (or not) for any given desire or position to be borne out down the road in the near term.

    Some parts of the world are more amenable to EVs. Lots of things can favor them, especially if weather is mild, driving distances are short, and families are small. Some places also have an oversupply of electricity from wind and solar that just gets dumped today because storage isn't practical and peak supply doesn't match peak demand. Diverting that into EVs should be easy by controlling the EV fleet to refuse a charge outside production peaks.

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    Re: The $5,000 electric car-5G battle vs. new energy vehicle battle

    The places with the cheapest electricity in the US are those with extensive hydropower systems. The TVA region is the lowest...well, their cost of living and average wealth might be kind of low, too, so there may be other factors. The next is where I am.

    If we could economically store electricity, even for a matter of hours, that would be a significant improvement. Since that's a problem that doesn't seem to be beyond our ability to solve, I'm hopeful that something will work out.
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    Re: The $5,000 electric car-5G battle vs. new energy vehicle battle

    Yes, it seems that bulk-storage of grid power for 24 hours with low loss could make quite a difference, and even 8 to 12 could do wonders for solar and wind.

    Pumped hydro might be the largest capacity storage in regular use. But it has limitations on where it can be constructed as well as other concerns like costs and environmental impacts. On the plus side "self discharge" rates are low compared to batteries, without the hazard of chain reaction fires.

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    Re: The $5,000 electric car-5G battle vs. new energy vehicle battle

    especially if weather is mild
    That raised an eyebrow for me. Why would weather affect uptake of EVs?
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    Re: The $5,000 electric car-5G battle vs. new energy vehicle battle

    How Temperature Affects EV Range is an article by an industry source that paints the rosiest picture possible.

    Battery charging, charge retention, and lifetime degradation in hot and cold conditions are part of the problem. Another is the impact of climate control power use. Another is high EV vehicle weight vs. power when a car locks into limp home mode when charge falls below 25% or so. Add in snow or water on the roads and things can get worse.

    There are also battery and parasitic power drain issues around humidity levels.

    Not to mention the impact of being left stranded in various climate conditions that aren't even considered extreme. This gets serious because the probability of EV stranding rises in non-ideal climates.

    Things might be even worse in "milder" climates. An unexpected turn of weather may make things even harder on drivers unaccustomed to the rigors of a temperate climate.

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    Re: The $5,000 electric car-5G battle vs. new energy vehicle battle

    That's interesting. The finding that "most of it seems to be a result of climate control in EVs" turns it into a bit of a nothing burger because that applies to fossil fuelled cars as well. But it does sound like the direct impact on the battery is somewhat significant at least. I hadn't heard that.
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    Re: The $5,000 electric car-5G battle vs. new energy vehicle battle

    I can't go full EV, even without that. There are places I go where charging isn't an option, and the range simply isn't good enough. One of those places is so cold that they don't have any hydrants lest the dogs stick to them, which means that even conventional car batteries have issues with starting, while EVs would likely lose significant range in a place where you need excessive range...or a moose running on a treadmill.
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    Re: The $5,000 electric car-5G battle vs. new energy vehicle battle

    EV climate control systems are a significant drag both when cooling and heating.

    In conventional vehicles it's rare to hear somebody turn off their A/C to increase mileage, though not unheard of. Turning off the heating in winter just doesn't happen though since it basically uses waste heat. Neither one happens just to increase range, since refueling is so easy even without a week of trip planning.

    No so with EVs. They operate so close to the knife edge of exhaustion that winter driving means really bundling up and trying to get by with heated seats on low until even that has to be shut off. Shutting off headlights and taking chances is common too.


    This guy is pretty funny. He exaggerates, more so because he is in the UK where the hazards are small and you never far from help or out of cell phone coverage. In much of the world conditions are more extreme.


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    Re: The $5,000 electric car-5G battle vs. new energy vehicle battle

    Quote Originally Posted by dilettante View Post
    How Temperature Affects EV Range is an article by an industry source that paints the rosiest picture possible.

    Battery charging, charge retention, and lifetime degradation in hot and cold conditions are part of the problem. Another is the impact of climate control power use. Another is high EV vehicle weight vs. power when a car locks into limp home mode when charge falls below 25% or so. Add in snow or water on the roads and things can get worse.

    There are also battery and parasitic power drain issues around humidity levels.

    Not to mention the impact of being left stranded in various climate conditions that aren't even considered extreme. This gets serious because the probability of EV stranding rises in non-ideal climates.

    Things might be even worse in "milder" climates. An unexpected turn of weather may make things even harder on drivers unaccustomed to the rigors of a temperate climate.
    These problems seem to be manageable or just minor. At least to the Nordic countries. The top five EV usuage countries are Nordic. I don't know why, maybe high fuel prices or government incentives or maybe it's a mindset. The point is, they seem to being coping with all those issues.

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    Re: The $5,000 electric car-5G battle vs. new energy vehicle battle

    I did get caught in a snowstorm that I hadn't prepared for about 10 or 15 years years ago. It didn't actually close the road but it reduced the traffic to an absolute crawl. I was low on petrol and, while it would have got me home under normal conditions, it wasn't going to get me there under those conditions. I had to nurse the car through some country back lanes to a garage and I reckon I got there on fumes. I had no warm clothes or anything in the car and this was before I owned a mobile phone so, if I hadn't made it, I'd have been in some trouble.

    So I guess it can happen in the UK and in a fossil fuel car but I'm being really unfair there. It took a perfect coincidence of factors that's unlikely ever to happen to me again.
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    Re: The $5,000 electric car-5G battle vs. new energy vehicle battle

    Whenever I cross the Blue Mountains during the winter....or anything close enough to winter, I always bring something extra just in case. I had my alternator go out in a storm late one November. I turned around as soon as I could, but didn't make it off the mountain before the car died. I spent perhaps the next six hours sitting on the side of the road in a strong snow storm. The police would stop occasionally to check on me, but whenever they called a tow truck, the truck would end up picking up somebody else.

    Eventually, a platoon of plows came up behind me. The driver of the plow who had the breakdown lane stopped behind me and came over to see how I was doing. He then said he'd sit there until a truck showed up to get me, which did happen.

    During the whole thing, I was completely fine....because as soon as the car died, I whipped off my clothes, pulled on the full body wet suit I had in the car, then got dressed again. As it turns out 5mm of neoprene means not getting particularly cold while sitting in a snowstorm.

    Since that time, I've put my winter sleeping bag in the car when driving through those passes anytime from mid-November until April.
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    Re: The $5,000 electric car-5G battle vs. new energy vehicle battle

    Quote Originally Posted by dilettante View Post
    EV climate control systems are a significant drag both when cooling and heating.

    In conventional vehicles it's rare to hear somebody turn off their A/C to increase mileage, though not unheard of. Turning off the heating in winter just doesn't happen though since it basically uses waste heat. Neither one happens just to increase range, since refueling is so easy even without a week of trip planning.

    No so with EVs. They operate so close to the knife edge of exhaustion that winter driving means really bundling up and trying to get by with heated seats on low until even that has to be shut off. Shutting off headlights and taking chances is common too.


    This guy is pretty funny. He exaggerates, more so because he is in the UK where the hazards are small and you never far from help or out of cell phone coverage. In much of the world conditions are more extreme.
    The video makes a fundamental mistake that isn't covered. The issue isn't about an electric car, the issue is that we have built up a massive infrastructure around gas, but are only in the beginning stages of building up an infrastructure around electric. After all, people run out of gas all the time. For some people, it's routine. If you run out of gas at the wrong time, or in the wrong place, you won't be limping anywhere. You're just done. Fortunately, we have all this infrastructure, so you can generally get gas in even the most remote locations. His issue was largely that the infrastructure that he needed either didn't exist, or wasn't well maintained.

    On the other hand, look at what he ended up doing: Going to a hotel and getting what appeared to be a free charge there. Gas stations can't be located 'just about anywhere', but charging stations can be. We have to go to a certain location to 'charge' our gas powered cars. Those locations are all over the place, but we still have to go there. You don't charge at home, or at least not much (unless you have a very strange living arrangement), you don't charge at a hotel (though you can usually find a gas station in the vicinity, because they tend to co-locate), you don't charge at work. The cost of maintaining fuel tanks such that they don't leak and contaminate the underlying aquifer, is so significant that you simply can't put fueling just anywhere. With electricity, you can...we just have not, yet.

    So the issue with the video is largely that gas is ubiquitous, electric charging is not, yet, but gas isn't ubiquitous for free. We're just living in a time when most of the cost for gas is now sunk, while most of the cost for electric is ongoing.

    I'd also point out that turning off the A/C for fuel efficiency is not common, but turning off the A/C to keep your car from overheating is quite common in the more vertical states. Some cars don't have an issue with this, but I've been in plenty where it was necessary to cut the A/C on hills. Some vehicles do that automatically as the engine temperature gets above a certain point.
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    Re: The $5,000 electric car-5G battle vs. new energy vehicle battle

    I'd also point out that turning off the A/C for fuel efficiency is not common, but turning off the A/C to keep your car from overheating is quite common in the more vertical states. Some cars don't have an issue with this, but I've been in plenty where it was necessary to cut the A/C on hills. Some vehicles do that automatically as the engine temperature gets above a certain point.
    I had a Buick and that darn thing always had an overheating problem. during the 100+ days of summer around here I would have to drive with the heater running full blast to keep the car from over heating. That was fun. Luckily I was young. It would kill me if I tried that now.

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    Re: The $5,000 electric car-5G battle vs. new energy vehicle battle

    I drove from TN to OH in the summer with my thermostat not working by keeping the windows down and running the heat at full blast. It was a pretty miserable drive.
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    Re: The $5,000 electric car-5G battle vs. new energy vehicle battle

    If some automakers get their way, the band might go away entirely, as some say the frequencies don’t play nicely with electric vehicles’ motors.

    Some automakers are cutting AM radios from their EVs because electric motors can cause interference with the frequencies, leading to unwanted noises and poor reception. AM radio is one of the most widespread avenues for authorities to distribute vital information during an emergency. Senator Ed Markey from Massachusetts agreed, saying he wanted car companies to keep free radio access for public safety. Additionally, a group of former Federal Emergency Management Agency administrators called on Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg and congress to act to preserve the radio system.

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    Re: The $5,000 electric car-5G battle vs. new energy vehicle battle

    Quote Originally Posted by Shaggy Hiker View Post
    I feel that that is an important point. If every electric vehicle manufacturer uses a proprietary plug, it will be a nightmare for drivers. If everybody uses the standard 110V plug, then any outlet can be used....slowly. Asking everybody to work with US 240V standard outlets is probably going to kill some people each year. Our plugs aren't all that well designed. Still, we need a higher rated plug for fast charging, so there is a potential for every manufacturer to go their own way. A standard is necessary.
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    Re: The $5,000 electric car-5G battle vs. new energy vehicle battle

    AM radio having unwanted noise and poor reception???!?!?!? I'm SHOCKED! Shocked, I tell you!!

    Why there should be no static at all!

    I can see the point they are trying to make, but AM radio always did suck, which is what that song is about. Local emergency channels are at the top or bottom of FM, but those are all very low power, low range, broadcasts for things like local road conditions. Still, it makes no difference whether or not you broadcast on AM if nobody is listening to AM.
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    Re: The $5,000 electric car-5G battle vs. new energy vehicle battle

    Despite predictions of its demise in the near future, an AM radio station surprisingly has the most popular weekday morning show in New York City in January 2023 -- thanks almost entirely to people over the age of 50 listening to it.


    He also makes the point that broadcast radio is dying across the board among the young and gullible, FM as well as AM.

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    Re: The $5,000 electric car-5G battle vs. new energy vehicle battle

    I don't know why that makes them gullible. In Idaho, where we have plenty of mountains and not a whole lot of people, radio coverage is good in only a few areas. For the rest of the state, there's somewhere between little and none. I moved to satellite radio early on, so that I'd be able to listen to SOMETHING when I got out of the valley. That was a couple decades back. These days, there are so many options, I see little reason to listen to ad supported radio.
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    Re: The $5,000 electric car-5G battle vs. new energy vehicle battle

    An interesting topic:



    Not entirely an EV topic, but related.

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    Re: The $5,000 electric car-5G battle vs. new energy vehicle battle

    Whew:



    I've heard of the growing global e-bike waste problem. I hadn't heard as much about the EV problem.

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    Re: The $5,000 electric car-5G battle vs. new energy vehicle battle

    It's pretty understandable, really. Recycling a lump of steel is relatively easy. The more complex the vehicle, the more complex the composition of the components. Some of that is readily recoverable, but much of it is not, at least not yet. For example, lithium solid state batteries are superior in performance characteristics to lithium ion, but they take somewhere around five times as much lithium, and at this point there's no viable way to recover that at end of life.

    That's a situation that is sure to change because...economics and scale, but until it changes, there will be an issue. There rather is for all used electronics already.
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    Re: The $5,000 electric car-5G battle vs. new energy vehicle battle

    What's so understandable about creating massive numbers of EVs, then barely using them, finally parking them en masse to rot? All to replace them with another round of manufacturing, then rinse and repeat?

    Of course they don't meet safety or durability standards of the civilized world, so it isn't as if they could be sold elsewhere.


    None of that is inherent to EVs. It's mostly the economics and perverse incentives of a centrally-planned socialist state.

    EVs certainly have the potential, in theory, to outstrip conventional vehicles in lifespan. But they aren't even close yet even before you consider their fast obsolescence, reminiscent of cell phones and tablets. How soon do parts become unavailable? Are 3rd party replacements ever going to become a serious thing?

    What about software updates that stop at some point? What about software bloat exceeding the hardware even before that? This isn't EV-specific though it appears to be EV-critical.


    Most of this is not the EV's fault. But they are the EV reality.

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    Re: The $5,000 electric car-5G battle vs. new energy vehicle battle

    Quote Originally Posted by dilettante View Post
    What's so understandable about creating massive numbers of EVs, then barely using them, finally parking them en masse to rot? All to replace them with another round of manufacturing, then rinse and repeat?
    Not trying to be TOO sarcastic, but isn't that pretty much the China way, currently? Mass production keeps the economy going. Mass consumption...is not necessarily required, but mass replacement certainly is.

    Also, the thread title talks about a $5000 electric car. That just SHOUTS quality, doesn't it?

    I guess that's pretty much what you were saying, just with a different flavor of sarcasm.

    Some parts of those cars should be simple to recycle. The most notable part would be the copper in the motors. The bodies may be nothing more than composite, but the motors should be pretty valuable just for the metal components alone.
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    Re: The $5,000 electric car-5G battle vs. new energy vehicle battle

    Buy a car in October 2021, (US$10,000) about 60,000 yuan, this year will cost 75,000 yuan (US$12,500)
    The price of new energy vehicles has increased a lot. There are also cheap cars, there are also expensive ones, and there are many cars with the right price.

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    Re: The $5,000 electric car-5G battle vs. new energy vehicle battle

    Quote Originally Posted by xiaoyao View Post
    Buy a car in October 2021, (US$10,000) about 60,000 yuan, this year will cost 75,000 yuan (US$12,500)
    The price of new energy vehicles has increased a lot. There are also cheap cars, there are also expensive ones, and there are many cars with the right price.
    Sounds like the story of Goldielocks and the Three Bears ... this car it too expensive. This car is too cheap. Now this car is juuuuust right.

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    Re: The $5,000 electric car-5G battle vs. new energy vehicle battle

    In China, there is no need to buy a Samsung or Apple phone. That one costs $1000-1500. And buy Xiaomi or other brands for only 300-500 dollars. Just change one for 2 years, there is no need to buy an Apple 4 phone for 5 years, someone used to do this.
    It's just that Xiaomi phones have risen from $300 to $700, and the price has doubled after the company went public.

    In China, a lot of things are fast consumption.

  32. #112
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    Re: The $5,000 electric car-5G battle vs. new energy vehicle battle

    The price of lithium has gone haywire over the last few years. I had heard that it went up by a factor of 5 in the last year, which was kind of correct, depending on exactly when you looked. From spring 2020 to spring 2022, it jumped from a bit over $40K/ton to over $600K/ton, but since then it crashed back down to $170K/ton, then doubled, all in just a few months. I would assume that battery manufacturers are locking in long-term prices, but with fluctuations being what they are, the price they lock in may or may not be considered good just a month later.
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    Re: The $5,000 electric car-5G battle vs. new energy vehicle battle

    Probably lots of factors beyond materials costs per se: huge drop in exports, freefalling labor participation, fastest rate of population aging in the world, less agility in currency manipulation, drop in foreign investment, ripples from the real estate crashes, several waves of large scale bank runs, etc.

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    Re: The $5,000 electric car-5G battle vs. new energy vehicle battle

    All true, but I'm still inclined to blame the material cost. Some of those factors seem like they ought to drive prices down, if that's even possible, so they might net out to nothing much. Hard to say, though. Macroeconomic issues are always opaque.
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    Re: The $5,000 electric car-5G battle vs. new energy vehicle battle

    Well good news, it looks like there is enough lithium in the western hemisphere to make a difference.



    It just means shutting up a few indigenous groups.

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    Re: The $5,000 electric car-5G battle vs. new energy vehicle battle

    Lithium production has increased five fold as the prices have skyrocketed. Of course, production will follow demand, but production has to increase massively to really bring prices down.

    It would be depressing, except that it's lithium.

    I was also thinking more about the disposable cars. China has roughly four times the population of the US. If they are getting cheap battery powered cars...the number that will be disposed of is going to get to be far higher than in the US, just because of the numbers. We have so many junked cars already, it may just be that disposable cars really aren't all that surprising, considering the volume that they can consume, the cars don't have to be all that disposable to still appear as disposable.
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  37. #117
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    Re: The $5,000 electric car-5G battle vs. new energy vehicle battle

    Maybe you missed the part where a lot of those dumped cars had like 30 miles on the odometers and are about 2 years old.

  38. #118

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    Re: The $5,000 electric car-5G battle vs. new energy vehicle battle

    In the past, China was required to force cars to be scrapped within 15 years.
    The price that was recovered could be as little as $100. But I dare not sell scrap iron, so I can sell it for 500 US dollars. I am afraid that the engine will be removed or the whole car will be driven to kill people. In the end, I may find the original car owner and demand compensation.

    Now China requires 600,000 kilometers of scrapped cars, which is a bit more reasonable. After all, most people can't drive so many miles.
    Because the car has been driven for a long time, it consumes more fuel, and the price of gasoline in China is too high.

    In the United States, the electricity cost may be 0.7 US dollars per degree, but in China it only costs 0.06 US dollars, and the price is only 10% of that in the United States.
    But the price of gasoline in China exceeds that of the United States.

    The wages of Chinese people may only be 10-20% of that of Americans.

  39. #119
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    Re: The $5,000 electric car-5G battle vs. new energy vehicle battle

    Self driving is another EV-adjacent issue. Here's a look at the state of it, from people of the target demographic who take a very pro-EV stance in general.



    The conclusion seems to be "vastly more stressful than driving."

  40. #120
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    Re: The $5,000 electric car-5G battle vs. new energy vehicle battle

    Quote Originally Posted by dilettante View Post
    Maybe you missed the part where a lot of those dumped cars had like 30 miles on the odometers and are about 2 years old.
    Yes, I did, in which case I revert back to the disposable nature of a vehicle at that price point.
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