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Originally Posted by redpoint5
In the Chevy Bolt forum, people often spoke of how tragically behind Toyota is with regards to developing EVs. They predict the collapse of the company due to their lack of EV competence, and a skyrocketing of EV sales due any second now.
Meanwhile I'm countering that opinion by saying everyone else was too early, and that we can get excited for the growth of EVs when Toyota enters that market.
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I agree with you and Toyota (and Honda). Both Honda and Toyota can hit their fuel economy targets today without EVs. They don't have to sell EVs at small margins or a loss to avoid huge fines. That gives them the luxury of waiting for battery technology to improve and continue to decrease in price. They are both planning a big push mid-decade when battery prices are projected to be at the point were they can make a good margin on an EV. Meanwhile they continue to develop EV technology with hybrids.
Likewise the current EV market is pretty tiny so they really aren't behind. When we are past the early adopter phase and general car buyers are looking for EVs they will have EVs to sell.
They also make a very logical argument that if reduced CO2 is the goal we will see much great reduction putting almost everyone in a hybrid with much reduced CO2 emissions than a small fraction of the population EVs and everyone else just continuing to buy gas cars.
Quote:
Originally Posted by redpoint5
Then Chevy's EVs continued spontaneously bursting into flames prompting a 2 billion dollar recall...
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Which will cost LG a lot of money but I doubt it will hurt GM much in the long run. It seems the fires are a result of sloppy manufacturing not the underlying battery tech.
Quote:
Originally Posted by redpoint5
Us armchair quarterbacks are fools compared to those actually developing strategies for their respective companies.
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Very true. Enthusiasts want manufacturers to make what they want - not what is profitable for the company to make and not in many causes what the general public wants. You can see this with manual transmissions and EVs.
Car enthusiasts love manuals and can't see why manufacturers continue to drop them. They don't know (or don't care) that adding the option of a manual increases costs on every car sold so it makes no financial sense to keep offering manuals when the general public doesn't buy them. (Manuals have dropped to less than 2% market share in the USA)
Likewise EV enthusiasts can't understand why manufacturers aren't making a bunch of EVs. They don't care that profit margins are lower on an EV than a gas car. They also can't understand why general car buyers aren't falling over themselves to buy an EV. They don't get that most car buyers just want reliable transportation at reasonable cost. Gas cars work for that so few buyers see a reason to spend more money (at least up front) to buy an EV.