… in an American lithium mining company:
And they mine lithium where?
It appears to be in Nevada, and by some reports this recently-discovered lode would be the second largest cache of that mineral in the world.
The parent company of Lithium Americas is Chinese owned Gangfeng Lithium.
To put things in perspective, the company has been exploring the land since 2007 so it has taken 16 years to get to this point… and they haven’t started mining yet.
Do you think this would have taken 16 years in China or Africa?
From my red neck, dirty fingernail perspective I might consider one of the hybrids when they become a significant part of the used car market but it seems unlikely that an EV would ever interest me, FWIW. Zero to 60 time and seeming “greeness” don’t really seem too valuable.
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None can mine in mn. Too dangerous. Nevada is different?
With all due respect, you need to update your knowledge. My Lexus NX450h+ (a plug-in hybrid) can do zero-60 in 5.4 seconds. But, when I am driving it in a… more sensible… manner, the fuel efficiency is amazing. A couple of days ago, on a long highway drive, I got 64 mpg by using EV mode until I got to the expressway and then switching to HV mode.
My Prius got 50 mpg at 55mph. And upper 30’s at 70mph. I assume a suv hybrid gets lower mileage at 70-75mph? It ain’t magic. Even on a hybrid. Go faster, get lower mpg.
My expressway speeds yesterday ranged from ~60 for short stretches when traffic was congested, to 74 when the road was almost deserted, plus one or two brief surges to 78 mph. I couldn’t tell you what my average speed was, but I was doing more than 70 for most of the trip.
I think there was a Canadian firm that hard a new find. As yet to be announced but sounded like Canada. Mary needs a win.
Unless your battery charge level was as high when you calculated your mileage as it was when you left home, you are ignoring the cost of the energy to get you to the highway.
VDCdriver & oldtimer11; There are so many seemingly grand and likewise seemingly ungrand qualities that I just judge the situation based on the logical (to me) cost to benefit situation which appears that a basic hybrid wins.
There is little sense for GM and many other companies to get into the high voltage hybrid market since it is already saturated, mostly by Toyota. The original patent for the method by which torque from an electric motor is seamlessly blended with that of a gasoline engine has expired. The patent owner may have applied for extensions by enhancing the technology, I don’t know. Anyway, it’s not a good business for GM to enter at this point. Going for a longer term solution is a better way to extend GMs solvency. Toyota just started to address full EVs for cars and the wheels fell off, literally. They solved the problem now.
Everyone is entitled to his/her own opinion. IMO, a plug-in hybrid–although initially more expensive than a “basic” hybrid–will be more economical in the long run because of the much greater battery range, with resulting much lower gas consumption.
The gas engine in a regular hybrid runs either constantly or intermittently because of the limited (usually no more than 2 or 3 miles) battery range. A plug-in hybrid can run for a much longer distance w/o having to engage the IC engine, and because the vast majority of my driving is well within the (currently) 47 mile battery-only range, I don’t have the IC engine running very often.
I just checked my spreadsheet, and in the first 1750 miles that I drove, my vehicle consumed a total of 13.7 gallons of gas. I’ll leave it to others to do the math, but if you do, I think that you’ll be impressed.
Closely related to the thread name, there’s this article from one of the Web Lackeys:
https://www.cartalk.com/cars-content/dear-cartalk/gm-invests-billion-in-new-gas-motors
“If GM wanted us to think three years ago that it was a company with an all-electric future, why would GM be investing now in a new generation gas motor? And of all things, a big, honking one with eight cylinders?”
I have a possible answer:
Battery-electric propulsion is at it’s best in small, light vehicles.
Large cargo haulers, not yet ready for prime time.
Take the case of electric bicycles.
Compared to a small gas engine on a bike it’s a no-brainer.
Gas powered bicycles are noisy, highly polluting, and too smelly to bring into the house.
Vespa size scooters, electric is less of an advantage.
Motorcycles, probably a toss-up.
Step up in size/weight to a passenger car, and it took battery-electric a lot of development to compete with ICE.
Step up to a pickup truck and the battery-electric leaves a lot to be desired when the truck is used for it’s intended purpose: hauling stuff some distance.
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