[readyman]

That's irrelevant. EVs are necessary to preserve land values in Socal, which is why Cali real estate funded Cali politicians to use all of their weight to win fed funding for the Tesla project in the first place.

Everybody knows (whether they admit it or not) that EVs don't help with global warming. They merely displace polution from places like the San Bernadino Valley and Los Angeles, which is all they were meant to do, for the purpose of preserving real estate values. And it's working.

[shuckles]

So your theory is that China is investing unprecedented amounts into EV production to improve air quality in coastal California thereby propping up land values? Wouldn't it be cheaper to pass permit reform so that LA and SF metro areas could just build mass transit?

[readyman]

>So your theory is that China is investing unprecedented amounts into EV production to improve air quality in coastal California thereby propping up land values?

China has the necessary political organization and willpower to meaningfully invest in nuclear energy, making EVs an environmental benefit. That does not apply to the US.

>Wouldn't it be cheaper to pass permit reform so that LA and SF metro areas could just build mass transit?

No. Better public transit could work in SF but SF isn't the problem. LA is the problem because it's surrounded by mountains on most sides that trap the pollution, and LA city planning makes public transit a nightmare no matter how you build it. You can't plan a city around interstates then bolt on public transit later.

[smcin]

> You can't plan a city [LA] around interstates then bolt on public transit later.

LA used to have a perfectly functioning public transport network, then in the 1900s-1950s it was systematically dismantled by holding companies fronting for car companies buying up rights-of-way and depots.

> China has the necessary political organization and willpower to meaningfully invest in nuclear energy, making EVs an environmental benefit. That does not apply to the US.

Better to restate your criticism of EVs not being environmental as "[claim:] EVs are only a net plus for the environment if they don't just relocate poullution to electricity generating plants, but use lower-carbon-emission generation like nuclear". There are still environmental benefits to moving smog out of/downwind of Los Angeles County (pop 9.7m) to its neighbors [0].

Building new nuclear plants (or even extending the life of the last existing one) in California is for decades already a political hot potato, it will only get approval when the grid is repeatedly straining at its limits in peak summer or winter. So that's a political question, not an engineering one.

[0]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_power_stations_in_Cali...

[seanmcdirmid]

> Everybody knows (whether they admit it or not) that EVs don't help with global warming.

That isn’t true: this is very a popular crank theory right now, but it’s not a popular opinion in mainstream science or among the public at large.

[readyman]

It's absolutely true. The detriment of manifesting the necessary new and very nasty manufacturing processes make it a done deal, especially compared to simply building trains, which is admittedly not simple in the US due to the cruel and unusual political economic situations. Nevertheless, all of this is true.

[seanmcdirmid]

I get it, it’s the most important theory of crank science today. But it makes assumptions like people buying EVs and incinerating their existing ICE cars, everyone getting electricity from small island diesel generators or the dirtiest coal plants, etc…

China is doing all of the above, BTW and it’s working well for them. You build out HSR, local transit, and EV capabilities out all at the same time. It will work out well for them.

[readyman]

>You build out HSR, local transit, and EV capabilities out all at the same time

And the critique is that the US is not and cannot do so. These are political problems and our politics are dominated by the interests of capital, not the interests of our society.

[seanmcdirmid]

The statement “EVs won’t seriously do anything about global warming” is explicitly a global one, not limited to the USA (or you could have said US warming).

[api]

Total nonsense. An EV running on coal emits less CO2 per mile than an average efficiency gas car, and that’s the worst case. Almost nobody gets all their power from coal. California can be >50% solar during the day.

Transit is better but there is zero chance of replacing all cars with transit. Car centric development is deeply entrenched nationwide not just in SoCal.