Global warming, climate change, all these things are just a dream come true for politicians. I deal with evidence and not with frightening computer models because the seeker after truth does not put his faith in any consensus. The road to the truth is long and hard, but this is the road we must follow. People who describe the unprecedented comfort and ease of modern life as a climate disaster, in my opinion have no idea what a real problem is.
Hertz went from a comeback story to a mess all over again.
They got out of bankruptcy in 2021, tried to rebrand themselves as the cool electric future of rental cars, and then dropped almost three billion dollars in losses.
The plan was simple. Load up on Teslas and other EVs, save money on gas and repairs, and ride the hype.
The reality was brutal. Repairs were higher than expected, renters kept crashing the cars because they were way faster than the usual airport Corolla, and people on vacation did not want to sit around hunting for chargers.
Then the market turned on them. EV prices fell, Tesla cut prices, used EV values tanked, and Hertz was stuck with a massive fleet worth way less than they paid.
They started unloading cars by the tens of thousands, sometimes selling barely used models for half of what they cost.
The whole thing turned into a giant reminder that being early only works if the economics back you up, and for Hertz, none of it did.
Germany’s Blackout News here reports that only 4 electric car manufacturers world wide are managing to make a profit, three of which are Chinese: BYD, Li Auto and Seres. And all the rest “are struggling to survive.”
How Artificial Intelligence is Revolutionizing the World of Tesla
Germany’s Blackout News here reports that only 4 electric car manufacturers world wide are managing to make a profit, three of which are Chinese: BYD, Li Auto and Seres. And all the rest “are struggling to survive.”
Only four electric car manufacturers are managing to make a profit. Image generated by Grok AI.
“Chinese brands are increasingly taking the lead in the global market. More than 120 brands are competing in the electromobility segment,” reports Blackout News. “Many benefit from low production costs and massive government support. BYD is expanding aggressively, including in Europe, and is becoming a real threat to Tesla.”
Tesla still leads with an operating margin of 7.2 percent, but its growth has stagnated. China’s BYD is expanding aggressively and benefiting from innovation and government support.
Many other manufacturers, especially start-ups such as Lucid Motors and Rivian, are posting high losses. Traditional car manufacturers are also under pressure as electrification incurs high costs. The EU is forcing the switch to e-mobility by 2035, which increases the pressure to adapt. The future of the electric car market depends on innovation, scaling and political framework conditions.
If left to the free-market forces and consumer wishes, electric cars would fare very poorly. Few people really want them, and they really are neither good for the environment nor the economy.
A governor targeting one of the most popular entrepreneurs in the country and hurting his citizens to do so is unappealing to Americans in today’s environment. It will be even less appealing in 2028.
A governor targeting one of the most popular entrepreneurs in the country and hurting his citizens to do so is unappealing to Americans in today’s environment. It will be even less appealing in 2028.
Presently, California is taking significant steps to reinstate its electric vehicle (EV) rebate program. This initiative comes in response to the potential loss of all the federal tax incentives under the incoming Trump administration, which should help resolve the Biden-created market distortions.
Newsom clearly plans to “Trump-proof” California.
California Gov. Gavin News intends to exclude Tesla from the rebate program in a move that apparently targets Musk as “Enemy Number 2” in the progressives’ war on wrong-thinking Americans.
Tesla may be excluded from Gov. Gavin Newsom’s proposal to enact new electric vehicle tax credits if President-elect Donald Trump kills a federal rebate program for EV purchases, according to the governor’s office.
Newsom announced plans this week to reintroduce an electric vehicle rebate to replace the $7,500 federal rebate President-Elect Donald Trump has threatened to eliminate. However, under Newsom’s plan, the California rebate would exclude makers like Tesla, California’s largest electric vehicle manufacturer helmed by Newsom’s political antagonist Elon Musk.
The governor’s proposal could include a market share cap, and Tesla accounted for more than half of new EVs sold in California in the first three quarters of 2024, according to the California New Car Dealers Assn, the Los Angeles Times reported.
I suspect that the move is Newsom’s play to remain as relevant as he can, in order to sustain any presidential ambitions that he has for 2028. This is a rather hilarious move, as Newsom is happy to take credit for all of Musk’s many successes.
Gavin Newsom is claiming credit for Elon Musk’s success. This has to be one of the dumbest statements ever made in history. pic.twitter.com/IuErhXxNtw
“It’s one of the reasons guys like Elon Musk and others have become so damn successful,’ Newsom said in October. ‘It’s because we’ve set price signals, we’ve created markets, we’ve created opportunities for investments. We’re the number one manufacturer for a reason. We continue to be the envy of the world.”
Musk had a pithy response to the move: “This is insane“.
Musk, whose company is the only one that actually manufactures EVs in the Golden State, clearly felt singled out and slammed Newsom’s proposal. ‘Even though Tesla is the only company who manufactures their EVs in California! This is insane,’ he wrote on X. A Musk fan posted a video to the social media site showing Newsom actually gloating about being responsible for Musk and Tesla’s riches.
Even though Tesla is the only company who manufactures their EVs in California!
Dan Ives, senior analyst at Wedbush, said Newsom’s proposal could set off a “Game of Thrones battle” between the Democratic governor and Musk, the world’s richest person.
“This is clearly a political move of Newsom and California towards Musk which now has a front seat to the Trump White House and will be a key player in ultimately getting these federal tax credits wiped away among a myriad of other things on the federal front,” Ives said.
The Wedbush analyst said Newsom’s proposal runs the risk of Musk deciding to move more jobs from Tesla’s Fremont, Calif., plant to its Austin, Texas, Gigafactory.
Now, I would like all the subsidies to end…even for Tesla. However, targeting an individual company and its owner is not a good look for a person who aspires to be the leader for all Americans.
Furthermore, it runs the risk of Tesla manufacturing to a friendlier state. Tesla is one of the largest employers in Fremont, with a staff of over 20,000. Those people fund the businesses, the schools, and the state of California.
The loss of tax dollars from all the other firms leaving the state means California is currently facing a significant budget deficit. The Legislative Analyst’s Office projects a $68 billion deficit for the 2024-25 fiscal year.
A governor targeting one of the most popular entrepreneurs in the country and hurting his citizens to do so is unappealing to Americans in today’s environment. It will be even less appealing in 2028.
In a 2016 interview with photographer Steven Edson, CNN asked, “What makes a car sexy?”
Edson replied, “It’s because a lot of the parts of those cars are, in fact, sexy.” He cited the taillights on the 1959 Cadillac Series 62, which he described as “like rare ruby earrings.”
Most of today’s cars, however, Edson lamented, are “homogenous” and offer little of interest to the photographer.
Enter Elon Musk. In 2019, the Tesla Model Y completed the company’s long-awaited “S3XY” family of models – the S3Xyest cars on the road today. That’s one major reason they sold well. Even so, Carscoops admitted that whether Tesla’s S3XY family was sexy remained up for debate.
Maybe the sex appeal of the electric vehicle is wearing off. Tesla is slashing prices, Ford cut back production of its electric pickup and cut the price of its Mustang Mach-E, and General Motors is looking at bringing back plug-in hybrids. Even the EPA is toying with extending the timetable for the total phaseout of non-electric vehicles.
CNN has scrambled to explain why, or rather, “How EVs became such a massive disappointment,” even as they assured their fragile readership that “the American market for EVs is not collapsing.”
They tell us that industry experts blame vehicle prices, lack of charging capacity, and confusing tax credit rules as the reasons for the 15 percent gap between Bloomberg’s 2023 projected sales and actual sales.
But that’s not the whole story.
Chinese automakers have major advantages in manufacturing electric vehicles, thanks to that nation’s virtual monopoly on many components of EV batteries. In 2023 alone, Chinese motorists bought 8.4 million electric vehicles, 59 percent of global EV sales.
The Chinese are also busy marketing their cheaper EVs to Europe and other nations. Jo Nova reports that China shipped 1.3 million EVs to European Union nations in the last quarter – yet many remain unsold and sitting idle in car lots even though EU nations are offering huge subsidies. EV sales fell by 11 percent across the EU by 29 percent in Germany alone.
Bad as the market has been for battery-electric passenger vehicles, the market for electric vans is even worse. The British government’s ZEV mandate demanded that 10 percent of van sales in 2023 be EVs, but actual sales accounted for less than 5 percent of the market.
Association of Fleet Professionals chair Paul Hollick explained that “some fleets just don’t have a role for these electric vans within their business. Their payload and range requirements mean there is no operational profile for which the electric van can be practically used, or there is no suitable charging infrastructure.”
Even Elon Musk is having trouble selling the once-SeXY Teslas – enough that he just laid off 6,000 employees. Tesla produced nearly 47,000 vehicles than it delivered to customers in the first quarter of 2024. And Hertz is not only not buying more Teslas but selling the ones it has.
Biden Administration EV mandates are causing auto dealers problems, as most buyers still want a gasoline- or diesel-powered vehicle. So few, by comparison, want an EV that dealers (and manufacturers) are falling short of their mandated target ratios. How long before dealers have to institute lotteries or some other scheme to determine just who is allowed to buy a new car?
And that’s not all.
British journalists have found another shocking – and odd – fact about EVs. Researchers found that drivers of electric vehicles were twice as likely to be involved in a road accident with a pedestrian than drivers of petrol or diesel vehicles over the same number of miles driven. The report suggested that the vehicle’s quiet engines were a significant factor in higher fatality rates.
On top of that, quiet engines are just not sexy.
Then there is the story that a battery fire at a lithium-ion battery storage facility in Otay Mesa, California, had continued for six days despite 40 firefighters working to bring it under control. Firefighters noted that overheated lithium-ion batteries can trigger “thermal runaway,” a chain reaction that spreads from one battery to another.
While these batteries were stacked in a storage facility, the fire brings to mind the July 2023 cargo ship fire in the North Sea that destroyed hundreds of vehicles. Even though only 25 were electric vehicles, the fire reportedly started when one of their batteries caught fire.
Electric vehicle battery fires are just not sexy.
Neither are several of the other flaws in these “perfect zero-emission vehicles.”
Then we learned that the so-called “all-electric fire truck,” like the one Bernalillo County, New Mexico, bought for $1.8 million (thanks in part to a state grant), relies on a diesel engine to pump water to put out fires and even run the truck when the huge battery dies. An all-electric fire truck cannot run for the long periods needed to extinguish some fires (including EV fires).
But perhaps the most important reason for eschewing electric vehicles is the growing threat of widespread power outages as the electric grid is stressed by the power demands of artificial intelligence, Big Tech – and EVs. Californians have recently experienced days without power, and Michael Spence notes that “If power systems fail, it’s lights out for the entire economy.”
One final note. Clean Technica actually boasted that U.S. plug-in EVs consumed more electricity than the entire nation of Uganda in 2023. The Energy Information Administration reported that it took about 7,600 gigawatt-hours of electricity to keep U.S. EVs running in 2023 – almost five times the consumption in 2018. Imagine the drain on the electric grid with even more EVs.
And the arrogant West still demands that even Ugandans buy only EVs by 2030?
Is it really sexy to force developing nations (let alone the rest of us) into committing more electricity to electric vehicles than their grid can generate?
Der Spiegel reports: Germany e-car industry is a crisis headed for a catastrophe. New Tesla unsold cars now being parked in an old airfield.
Germany’s 2030 e-car target now a lunatic fantasy
Sales of e-cars in Germany are plummeting, signaling more trouble for the country’s move to a green society. Overall, for Q1 2024, EV sales declined by around 14.1% compared to Q1 of 2023. For Tesla, the picture is much uglier.
Though the country would like to blame something else other than its terrible policies, this misery is not due to the Ukraine War.
As Spiegel reports, The cars are just too expensive and impractical, and the government has stopped subsidizing sales.
35% drop in Tesla new registrations
Der Spiegel focusses on Tesla’s Gigafactory located in Grünheide, roughly 30 kilometers southeast of central Berlin. The once electrifying future for the e-car maker has since turned into a huge nightmare. Though the Grünheide plant continues to churn out e-cars, Der Spiegel looks at where the 100s of truckloads of e-cars are in fact being being shipped. Unfortunately for Tesla, many are not going to buying customers. In Q1 of 2023, 20,000 new Teslas were registered in Germany, according to Der Spiegel. But this year in Q1, only 13,000 were registered – a whopping 35% drop!
Storage at an old airfield
Der Spiegel reporters followed the Tesla transport trucks and discovered that many are being shipped to an old airfield for storage. In the report, a Tesla security officer, however, arrives (in an internal combustion engine car) and refuses Spiegel to make photos of the embarrassing situation (4:24 mark). Tesla management refuse to comment on the mass electric car storage.
Overall in Germany, e-cars of just about every type have lost their attractiveness, and buyers are shunning them.
Green fantasy
As the popularity of electric cars in Germany tanks, the governments 2030 target of getting 15 million e-vehicles on the road now looks like a lunatic fantasy.
Tesla Inc has temporarily cut prices of some of its Model Y cars in the U.S. until Feb. 29, less than a month after the carmaker cut Model Y prices in Germany.
Tesla Inc has temporarily cut prices of some of its Model Y cars in the U.S. until Feb. 29, less than a month after the carmaker cut Model Y prices in Germany.
Tesla reduced prices for its Model Y rear-wheel drive and Model Y Long Range by $1,000 to $42,990 and $47,990 respectively, representing a discount of 2.3% and 2% from previous prices.
Prices of the Model Y Performance variant and other models remained unchanged, according to the website.
New Model Y rear-wheel drive and Long Range model prices will be reduced for deliveries now through Feb. 29, Tesla said in a notice on its website, adding that that price would increase by $1,000 or more on March 1.
Tesla slashed prices of its Model Y cars in Germany last month, after most of its car production at its Berlin factory was suspended due to a lack of components after attacks in the Red Sea caused shipping disruptions.
In January, Tesla also warned of “notably lower” sales growth this year as it focuses on the production of its next-generation electric vehicle, code-named “Redwood.” The latest price cuts are expected to further weigh on Tesla’ margins, already hurt by a price war that started more than a year ago.
The latest price cuts come as Tesla is bracing for cooling demand and rising competition with a growing number of inexpensive EVs, such as those made by China’s BYD, which overtook Tesla as the world’s top EV maker in the final quarter of 2023.
There is no point in telling us we’ve got to get to net zero if you can’t tell us how we cope when we reach sub-zero.
There is no point in telling us we’ve got to get to net zero if you can’t tell us how we cope when we reach sub-zero.
It’s been a pretty cold week in the northern United States, with temperatures down to minus 18 Celsius in Chicago.
But it will have felt even colder, I dare say, if you have been standing around waiting to charge your Tesla. The Telegraph has the story.
One owner complained of waiting five hours in a queue to charge his vehicle as low temperatures sapped the batteries of electric cars and made it more difficult to charge them.
He said he counted 10 cars being towed away as they couldn’t be charged. In one case a motorist said he had plugged in his electric car for two days running, three hours at a stretch – and still his car was saying it had zero per cent charge.
There’s been a lot written about the cost and lack of range of electric vehicles but there is another issue which needs to be addressed as the Government tries to force more and more of them onto the road: resilience.
An electric car might be efficient being driven along on a warm summer’s afternoon, but there seems to be a loss of efficiency as temperatures plunge towards zero and below.
A failure of electric cars due to the cold might not matter too much when they are still mostly the playthings of the wealthy, but what happens if we reach a future where the tow trucks, delivery lorries and snow ploughs are electric, too?
We face being left with dysfunctional road transport just at the time we need it most.
Resilience is the long-forgotten element of net zero – and not just for electric vehicles. We are being sold a future where almost everything will be powered by electricity – without much thought being put into what happens if the grid fails.
Environmental activists who have declared war on “gas guzzler” cars have vandalised an electric-powered vehicle.
Environmental activists who have declared war on “gas guzzler” cars have vandalised an electric-powered vehicle.
The controversial group, who call themselves the Tyre Extinguishers, targeted a Tesla car in Clifton, Bristol.
The owner was out walking his dog while the group deflated his tyres and left their signature leaflet on the windscreen, which states: “Your gas guzzler kills.” The Telegraph has the story.
It does not mark the first time the activists have seemingly erroneously deflated the tyres of electric vehicles, with a similar incident on a Tesla in the London area of Notting Hill last year.
‘Strike fear’
The Tyre Extinguishers have previously said they want to “strike fear” into owners of “gas guzzling” SUVs.
The owner of the all-electric environmentally friendly Tesla said the incident had “something comical about it” but that he still felt “slightly violated”.
He told the BBC: “It’s ironic, because I was trying to do the right thing by buying an electric car. It’s ridiculous and inconvenient.
“I get why [climate activism] is happening, but I’m not seeing the point of this.”
In the same incident, the car of Mark Moran MBE, the chief executive of Hydrate for Health Ltd, also had his tyres let down.
‘Faceless bunch of eco warriors’
“Many [drivers] have been hit multiple times – mine twice for tyres and once for paint,” he said, adding that the group “are simply a faceless bunch of eco warriors who want to force their will upon people, with zero rational debate.”
This week, it had the proof. BYD revealed that it had sold 526,409 electric vehicles in the last three months of 2023, overtaking Tesla and ending the Elon Musk-run company’s eight-year reign as the world’s best-selling electric vehicle manufacturer.
By James Titcomb
Mayfair’s Berkeley Street is a mecca for luxury car gazers, dotted with showrooms displaying Ferraris, Bentleys and McLarens behind giant windows. Halfway down, across the road from the Rolls Royce boutique, sits a lesser-known name.
Last year the Chinese car company BYD opened its own glitzy showroom on the site formerly occupied by Jaguar Land Rover. The Telegraph has the story.
BYD’s cars cost a fraction of the others on Berkeley Street, but its presence among the world’s most desirable vehicles sends a message: it believes it can compete.
This week, it had the proof. BYD revealed that it had sold 526,409 electric vehicles in the last three months of 2023, overtaking Tesla and ending the Elon Musk-run company’s eight-year reign as the world’s best-selling electric vehicle manufacturer.
It was a milestone moment. After BYD surpassed Tesla, clips circulated online of a 2011 interview in which Musk mocked the Chinese company, chuckling dismissively when asked if they could compete (Tesla’s chief has now acknowledged them as a serious rival).
But as far as BYD’s billionaire founder Wang Chuanfu is concerned, it is just the start. The company, China’s dominant carmaker, is now plotting to take on the rest of the world, seeking to become one of only a handful of Chinese consumer companies to become a recognised global leader.
In August, Wang said the company would help “demolish the old [Western] legends and achieve new, world-class brands”. Its aggressively priced electric vehicles are gradually appearing on British and European streets.
BYD’s ascent has been rapid, but it is far from a newcomer. In the early Nineties, Wang, a chemistry graduate working as a Chinese government researcher, spotted an opportunity to develop new types of batteries being pioneered by Japanese firms, but with much cheaper Chinese labour costs. BYD, which he founded in 1995, soon became one of the world’s biggest producers of batteries for mobile phones, a business that made Wang a fortune worth hundreds of millions of dollars.
In 2003, the company bought out a struggling domestic car manufacturer in a bid to explore nascent electric vehicle technology, a move that shareholders revolted against. At the time, Chinese cars were seen as cheap, ugly and unreliable, and BYD’s early efforts were no different: “Have you seen their car?” Musk joked in 2011.
On Boxing Day, there was a totally burnt out car on the drive, and also a gas van outside, presumably checking the mains were safe. The last time we went past was, I believe, Saturday, so the fire must have happened between then and Tuesday.
By Paul Homewood
On Boxing Day, we passed this house on our way up to the common where we take the dogs. We go there most days, so were shocked to see this fire damage (photos taken today).
On Boxing Day, there was a totally burnt out car on the drive, and also a gas van outside, presumably checking the mains were safe. The last time we went past was, I believe, Saturday, so the fire must have happened between then and Tuesday.
We could not identify the burnt out car at the time, as we did not stop. But there is often a Tesla parked on the driveway.
The fire obviously has all the classic trappings of an EV fire. Note how the right side of the house is hardly affected. The garage must have been subjected to extreme heat, because it is hopelessly buckled out of shape.
This is not why I am making this post however.
For some reason, there seems to be no record or news at all of this locally. The South Yorkshire Fire Service keep a daily log of all incidents they have been called to, even down to wheelie bin fires. Yet they have no record at all of this fire. I have requested any information they have, but they have so far not responded.
The local newspaper, the Sheffield Star, also appears to have ignored the story, and there is no trace of the news on Google.
Is there some policy afoot to cover up stories of EV fires? It seems far fetched, but I can think of no other explanation.
You must be logged in to post a comment.