Re: Watt's the problem - Anti EV editorial column in San Jose Mercury News.

[Lee Hart <leeahart@earthlink.net>]

Scott Leavitt wrote:
> EVeryone, I hope this is considered appropriate material to bring to
> our list readers' attention.

I think so! It's a sample of the disinformation that gets used to
discredit EVs. I would hope that Scott, and others in California write
rebuttals to the San Jose paper that ran it.

It's interesting that its author, Bonner Cohen, isn't even a resident of
California. Why is he writing the editorial? What makes him an expert on
California's situation?
 
> [EV mandate is] the worst public policy decision... in recent memory.

Nice that he identifies his prejudices up front. 

> In 1990, the air board adopted a regulation requiring 10 percent of
> new cars and light trucks produced for sale in California to have zero
> emissions beginning in 2003...

So the auto companies have had 12 years to comply. Have they used the
time productively, or wasted it on lobbying and legal challenges?

> the air board also calculated the electric vehicles would cost just
> $1,350 more than their gasoline-fueled counterparts.

And that is still a reasonable estimate for the cost difference between
two similar mass-produced vehicles, one ICE and one EV. Subtract out the
cost of the ICE and all its related components, and add in the cost of
batteries, electric motor, and controller.

> The air board now concedes a freeway-capable ZEV will cost $20,000 more
> than a conventional car.

Except, hasn't there been a change in focus? The original assumption was
that EVs would be small, urban cars; like an EV version of a Ford Escort
or Geo Metro. Now, the pricing assumption is based on the large, heavy,
high-speed, hand-built, high-tech prototypes that the auto companies
built.

> the air board was predicting as late as 1996 that its ZEV mandate
> would lower smog-forming emissions by 14 tons a day by 2010, its
> staff now projects reductions of just one to two tons a day.

Again, isn't this because the assumptions changed? For example, heavy
high-speed sports cars and SUV EVs use more power, and by factoring in
SULEV gasoline cars, which produce less pollution? 

> Contrary to the expectations of the air board officials a decade ago,
> dramatic breakthroughs in battery technology have not taken place

That is demonstrably untrue. Today's batteries are far better than 10
years ago. As a consumer, just try to name a product whose battery isn't
dramatically better than it was 10 years ago. NiMH and lithium batteries
were a laboratory curiosity; now they are used by the millions. The
companies that developed them pointed to the California EV mandate as a
specific incentive to develop them.

> Currently, electric vehicles can go only 80 to 100 miles before they
> have to be recharged.

This range is completely adequate for a majority of drivers. Most people
drive less than 80-100 miles a day, and have access to a second car or
other means for longer trips.

> Recharging a zero emission vehicle is not like a quick stop at the gas
> pump, but an ordeal that takes between three and five hours.

The vast majority of EVs are recharged at home overnight, when the car
is just sitting there anyway. Plugging it in is as simple as plugging in
a hair dryer. Most EV owners much prefer plugging in at home to pumping
gas at a gas station.

> By contrast, a conventional car getting 25 miles to the gallon can have
> its 20-gallon tank filled and travel nearly 500 miles before refueling.

Note how all comments about EVs have prejudicial terms slanted against
them, while all comments about ICEs are exaggerated in their favor?
Recharging is an "ordeal", but ICEs go "nearly" 500 miles" before
refuelling. When was the last time anyone actually drove 500 miles
without refuelling? That's the exception, not the rule. Hardly an
objective argument.

> A ZEV will cost means a consumer will have to pay $37,826 for an
> electric Ford Escort.

Note the use of apparently precise numbers.

Companies have already sold electric Ford Escorts for far less than
this; and they had to buy the Escorts new, and remove all the ICE parts
themselves; adding labor and cost that wouldn't be present if done at
the factory.

> and access to only about 400 public charging stations throughout the
> entire state of California. (There are more than 12,500 gasoline
> stations in the state.)

Another red herring. Electric cars can plug into any electric outlet,
and there are *millions* of them. The public charging stations mentioned
here are *fast* charge stations, when you're in a hurry. There are few
because there are few electric cars. More will naturally be installed as
they are needed. It's nothing but a box and a plug.

If one wants to lie with statistics, with 5000 or so EVs on the road in
California, 400 public chargers means one for every 12 EVs -- a far
higher percentage than the number of gas stations per ICE vehicle.

> the zero emission vehicle will never be able to compete with
> conventional cars.

But, they don't have to. EVs are simply an alternative to conventional
cars -- they aren't intended to replace them completely. Just as we have
bicycles, motorcycles, buses, and trains. They don't compete;  they
supplement each other.

The ZEV mandate doesn't require people to buy them; only that the
manufacturers make them available for those that *do* want them. With
matters as they now stand, I can't buy one even if I want to.
-- 
Lee A. Hart                Ring the bells that still can ring
814 8th Ave. N.            Forget your perfect offering
Sartell, MN 56377 USA      There is a crack in everything
leeahart_at_earthlink.net  That's how the light gets in - Leonard Cohen