If you're holding-off on buying an EV

Diesel electric locomotives have no large storage battery, unlike that Ram.

But diesel-electric submarines do. A few countries still have D-E subs.

My 500cc single cylinder lawn mower isn’t that bad. Could be two cylinder. How many times to we have to say that EVs don’t eliminate CO2? All EVs are powered by coal, and coal makes CO2.

Not even all steamers were powered by coal. But an interesting idea, add an external combustion engine to an EV.

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HUH? Coal fired power plants account for only 19% of all electricity generated in the US. Where do you keep getting your misinformation from?

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From [[[ MISINFORMATION R US ]]]

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According to the book below some engineers in the early 1900’s were toying with the idea of a diesel engine that was fueled by a mixture of diesel fuel and coal dust.

I bet it’s terrible as far as pollution goes, compared to a recent car.

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And sticking a cheap generator in the trunk to charge the battery is the worst way, both for pollutants and CO2.

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I knew someone would say this. Tell me, in the last 5 years, which method of energy generation has accounted for the increase in energy production the most? I know no more nuclear plants were built.

All right I forgot about natural gas / coal plants. NG does make CO2 though.

edit: I’ll answer. Technically the answer is natural gas. But power plants shift between NG and coal, and coal is down, so over all it is renewables, and mostly wind power that has increased the most. The problem is, wind power is unstable and it needs coal or natural gas power plants to be operating along side it to cover the times when the wind isn’t blowing.

What is interesting is the US electricity production from 2007 until now has remained mostly flat. You wolud think that EVs would have caused that to increase. It must be that rising energy costs, and the adoption of things like LED lighting have caused people to use less electricity.

But still this can only scale so far. People can’t continue to use less electricity to make more available for EVs forever.

source: Electricity generation, capacity, and sales in the United States - U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA)

Tennessee is all over the board… lol

The majority of Tennessee’s electricity is produced by coal. Tennessee is one of the top hydroelectric-generating states east of the Rocky Mountains, producing 12 percent of its electricity from hydroelectric power. Tennessee generates over 30 percent of its electricity from nuclear power.

https://www.instituteforenergyresearch.org/states/tennessee/#:~:text=The%20majority%20of%20Tennessee’s%20electricity,its%20electricity%20from%20nuclear%20power.

You go. My car won’t start.

Audi Duo, they made a 100 production examples, plug in that could run in cities on electric and change to the Diesel seamlessly when needed, Limited demand due to cost but was inspired by places in Europe where you can only drive electric powered vehicles,

Not to mention starting a 500 CC single cylinder unless it had an electric starter.

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The clinic where I go for primary care has the parking lot covered with solar panels. How long to recoup the investment? I do not know. But I love being able to park in the shade, no longer getting into a car with a 140 degree interior.

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I don’t know why more stores like Walmart grocery stores ETC don’t go that way especialy in the south with the hot summers.

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Many of the rest stops on Italy’s Autostrada had canopies covering a portion of their parking spaces at least 30 years ago!

Of course, back then, they didn’t sport solar panels, but the comfort level of those parking spaces was far superior to that of the spaces that weren’t covered. When I observed this, I remember thinking that they were far more advanced than we are in this country… in some ways.

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We’ve put the deposit down and now on the list to get solar panels installed in a few months. We’ve had 4 estimates. There are literally dozens of solar companies in our area. I did a lot of research before I even picked the companies to get estimates. Everyone has a 4-6 month waiting period (they’re that busy). It takes them 1 day for 95% of the homes to install solar on. At most 2 days. If all the solar companies are this busy, then there is an estimate of 10,000 solar systems put on new homes within a 50-mile radius of my house every single year. It’s been this way for several years now. And this is the Northeast. Other parts of the country are seeing even more growth. And that just home solar sales. Towns spending money on Solar farms. Farmers are giving up some of their land to Solar farms instead of growing corn.

Wind power is growing leaps and bounds also. 20 years there was only 1 wind turbine (that I know of) in a 100-mile radius of where I live. There are at least 10 within 20 miles of my house today. In that 100-mile radius there are several dozen - probably many more (and growing).

Renewables are growing because it’s cheaper. I looked at solar 20 years ago and the payback was about 20 years. Today - it’s 7. Solar panels are far more efficient.

New report: Wind & solar energy tripled in U.S. over past decade (environmentamerica.org)

No they don’t. It’s a one-way switch. Once you switch a coal plant to NG you don’t go back. And NG is a LOT (by several magnitudes) cleaner then Coal. And that’s just the burning part. Mining the coal is another extremely dirty and dangerous job. And lets not forget about the byproduct.

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Thanks for doing the math, but you left out a number of electrical consumers that are necessary for a car to operate. You’ll need to power a heater/defroster and wipers, and I believe most states require things like headlights and turn signals. Also make sure the generator is operating ahead of time in a collision that requires airbags and seat belt retractors. :smile:

That’s just stupid. 2/3 of electricity is produced by hydroelectric and coal accounts for just 3% of power generation.

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I don’t feel so bad anymore. I said all EVs are powered by coal, which is false. Then you said 2/3 of electricity comes from hydroelectric, which is false too!