© Eric Peters Auto

http://www.ericpetersautos.com/2017/09/11/cant-beat-em-ban-em/
Since they can't sell electric cars - not enough of them, anyhow - and not without subsidies so huge they amount to outright bribes - the solution appears to be to outlaw all cars except electric cars.

This is no joke.

There are IC engine No Go Zones in Germany and France. The Brits have just decreed a ban on the sale of internal combustion-engined vehicles period, beginning in 2040 - which sounds like a long time from now but isn't - because car companies begin designing cars about ten years before they see the light of production and so this fatwa means the car companies are on notice that the current generation of cars they are selling is either the last or the second-to-last generation of cars they will be selling . . . at least insofar as they are powered by internal combustion.

And so, they won't be wasting resources to design and build the next generation.

It's not just Britain, either.

If it were, the madness could be contained. Instead, the madness metastasizes. India (well, the government of India) wants all IC engined cars off the road - or retrofitted with electric drivetrains - by 2030, which is only about ten years away and so just over the horizon as far as product planning cycles go.

And now the commissars in China have announced they are all in . . . or out - depending on your point of view. The world's largest market for cars and the world's largest manufacturer of cars.

Same 2030 extinction-by-decree date.

That is comment worthy.

More than a century ago, it was not necessary for any government to decree that horses and buggies - and the first electric cars, for that matter - will be verboten henceforth.

They died a natural death - a free market death.

Internal combustion proved superior. Economically and functionally better than horse (and electric) power. People gave up their buggies and their equines freely, without being "nudged."

They didn't have to be.

Now, they do.

This ought to raise questions and probably does among the Thinking - but such questions are rarely given voice and answered even less often.

If electric cars are so functionally fabulous, so superior to the Judas Goated internal combustion-powered car, then how come the bans? Why not let the electric car succeed on the merits, organically?

The answer, of course, is that it can't.

Not yet - maybe not ever.

© Associated Press
It's obvious to anyone who does the math - the EV buy-in cost vs. the cost of gas for an otherwise similar IC-engined car. It doesn't add up, not favorably, anyhow. There is a reason why arch crony capitalist and rent-seeking kingpin Elon Musk builds electric cars that are quick and sexy and laden with gadgets. It is to shove the economic inferiority of the things under the rug. And if they aren't economically superior to cars powered by gas and diesel engines well - why bother?

Isn't it like paying people to build - and buy Porsches?

Startling that this doesn't grate more than it ought to among the taxpaying masses - who are paying for the subsidized rich to drive around in subsidized rich people's cars.

Meanwhile, the cars they drive - the ones they can afford to drive - are being regulated and legislated out of existence.

No one talks about the Recharge Issue, either - and it's a huge issue. Unless you believe that having to wait a minimum of 30-45 minutes every 100 miles or so to feed a partial (80 percent) charge back into the batteries is acceptable or logistically feasible. Imagine hundreds of thousands of EVs queuing up to charge up at the same time.

Imagine what this will do to the grid.

© Eric Peters Auto
Imagine what would happen in the event you - and hundreds of thousands of other people with battery-powered cars - had to suddenly and unexpectedly get going and get far. As in the case of a hurricane barreling down on the state. No time to wait 30-45 minutes and you need to be able to move hundreds of miles down the road, without having to stop and queue up for 30-45 minutes with hundreds of thousands of other people.

It's crazier than the combined contents of St. Elizabeth's Hospital in DC - the nuthouse where they kept lovesick John Hinckley, among others less famous. Which explains why electric cars are not selling, in spite of the subsidies - and despite the quickness and sexiness of some of them.

It is because they are economically and functionally inferior.

Thus, the necessity of banning their functionally and economically superior competition. It has come to this because - all the Breakthrough Talk notwithstanding - the necessary breakthroughs haven't happened and never may.

What's happening is a kind of putsch by the technocrats. And - unless these technocrats are exceptionally stupid - they know perfectly well that absent the endlessly promised Breakthroughs that have yet to materialize and never may - electric cars can never be more than the subsidized toys of the affluent and a recipe for national gridlock.

© Eric Peters Auto
Now think about what that implies.

Yes, exactly.

The object of this exercise - the banning, on the one hand, of economically and functionally viable internal combustion and, on the other, the mandating of extremely pricey and heavily subsidized electric cars - is to reduce mobility. To limit the average person's ability travel by private car.

It's not just Britain - or France or Germany and China and India. The push is worldwide and coming to America, too. EV Production quotas and sales mandates are already in effect in states like California. IC No Go Zones and outright bans are surely next.

It sounds hard-to-believe, but the concatenation of facts is hard to ignore.

More than a century ago, technology liberated the average person, expanded his horizons. 100 years down the road, technocracy is bound and determined to reverse that.

Eh, I probably won't be around till then... and my 94 jeep has 271,089 miles on it, doubt it will be here either lol

Not had a chance to read it all yet but the dates are a bit confusing, the uk is going to ban the "sale" of new petrol and diesel cars by that date, you'll still be able to drive them but you can bet they sting us on tax. at the moment they are just introducing another for older vans /cars in London, extra charge as well the congestion charge so basically, you can pollute as long as you pay lol
Oh, I have repeated it.
I'm sure big industry, mainly oil, are not happy about it. It also amuses me when you have the mid to lower classes buying into the whole eco scene, electric cars, switching lights off, recycling etc, then you get the wealthy not worrying about it so much driving the big Chelsea tractors (range rover, all big 4×4s ) because they can afford not to care about it!

the worst of that mikey is the refusal to accept point of use pollutes less than centralized electric generation.

they would truly get the best bang by developing true hybids not these dual fuel drives they are currently calling hybrid

Yes, also, even in the time scale we are talking about I'm sure we couldn't produce enough power for all the cars to be charged! They've only just agreed and started to build a nuclear power plant! It's been discussed for probably 10 years and will take the same to build at least!
Good in theory but it's going to be a struggle!

yep so clean,by outsourcing the Pollution!

Think about it, they took all of the mercury filled thermometers that were "too polluting"away from us and then turned around and put it in light bulbs that they forced us to buy. The reason your appliances only last 10yrs now is they want you to update to the latest most efficient newer models, as they try to lighten loads on the electric grid leaving open power to charge our cars. But what they don't understand is it will need a major overhaul to handle these loads. Batteries are becoming more efficient with technology,but over heating and fires are a big issue. Hydrogen (electric and water) is a better option, but it all has to do with who wants what. The Hindenberg blimp that burnt made everyone afraid of hydrogen,but it seems that the dopeing compound was the real issue,hydrogen can be safe and reliable. The US had planned to get 40mpg to 50mpg from all cars by now, and if it were left to the right people that could happen, however they keep the 15mpg SUVs that people love so much. Europe is way ahead of the US on efficient cars and appliances,but it has a lot to do with what corporations, and people what and do with things. I'd buy an electric car if it were affordable,self driving, and looked good. All of those things are possible,but we are not going to be hovering around like the jet sons anytime soon.

As a lifelong petrolhead, I am really going to miss the sound of a big ole American V8 screaming down the interstate. But hey, technology advances. The day of hydrocarbon fueled IC propulsion is going the way of the dinosaurs I'm afraid.

And I suppose you folks who buy into that "centralized electrical generation will pollute more than roads clogged with cars belching out ozone killing fumes" have never heard of solar or wind generation.

actually support those mowtown but just how much is generated that way? and even now the growth of those forms is pitiful.



and dust we actually reached those marks for efficency in the states. the the fuel got reformulated and they evaporated

All liberal leaders, except China and India... I just don't see how a government can make these kinds of laws without public votes...

Quite a bit actually. Just got back from a trip through the plains states and the number of windmills is surprising. And solar panels are becoming cheaper. Slow growth yes. But alternative energy is growing.

No doubt we will be dependent on fossil fuels for generations to come, but things are changing.

I'm all for alternative fuels except for motor vehicles

Lithium is the problem, it isn't clean or safe, from mining to transport to recycling... the clean energy agenda dropped the ball on this one IMO

so are the wars we keep starting, with 100 burning oil fields polluting the air...

Hmmm a picture of Kuwait burning oil fields from 1991?

No need to look so far out of town, or so far back in time.

Just look in your massive oil pollution Texan backyard right now

Now THAT'S gas powered

You bet!

I wish we could tap into all the hot air coming from these threads lol

that just might give fossil fuel a run for it's money

lol...we don't burn oil fields here.. but yes, that is Kuwait, but the message is still the same... it all went into the atmosphere, and the leaders trying to blame cars for it won't work.. and you trying to spin doesn't change the fact that there are still some being blown up as we type.... and guess where all that CO2 is going? the atmosphere...