What puddle? wrote:

Prospector:
I missed this last week:
"Biden Seeking Pledge for 40% of Car Sales to Be EV by 2030"

Won't they simply bring in 'emergency powers' to push through legislation - re: building permits for power generators?

Things in the US are going to have to shift, surely? Car manufacturers are pushing on towards EVs without actually waiting for governments to tell them to do so. It seems like every month that another car manufacturer announces no more internal combustion engines. They aren't going to make two different cars. May we see US imports of global cars fall, then?

E

What puddle? wrote:

Prospector:
I missed this last week:
"Biden Seeking Pledge for 40% of Car Sales to Be EV by 2030"

Won't they simply bring in 'emergency powers' to push through legislation - re: building permits for power generators?

Things in the US are going to have to shift, surely? Car manufacturers are pushing on towards EVs without actually waiting for governments to tell them to do so. It seems like every month that another car manufacturer announces no more internal combustion engines. They aren't going to make two different cars. May we see US imports of global cars fall, then? E

What type of power generators, when Coal Fired and Nuclear are excluded from the discussion. Environmentalists lobby congress to block these traditional power generators (even desiring to shutdown one's operating). Hydro is basically maxed out. Maybe some room for new Natural Gas Generators, but natural gas is an important fuel for winter heating, and during extreme cold weather snaps the gas distribution system has experienced disruptions in the past. Solar and Wind simply will not make up the increased demand required by EV's.


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I hope you can see the image attached. The electricity needed to fill the gap as vehicles switch from petroleum to electricity is enormous.

Biden's statement is to appease the 'perfect world' environmentalists. One cannot simply go this fast toward electrification of the transportation sector without adequate electric generation. Mark my words that the automobile manufacturers will only produce EV's as long as the consumer can get their batteries charged.

What puddle? wrote:

Thanks for your considered and educational post. Obviously we don't know the political future of the US or Canada, how far it's going to swing toward EVs even though, as you say, there aren't the charging points. The thing is, though, are there enough potential buyers for the Grenadier (in your section 1)? That's the key question. Sure, there's bound to be some, even quite a few, in a population of a few hundred million people, but enough to make the Grenadier profitable? They say they have to shift 30,000 a year for that. Can you tell me why other vehicles don't fulfill that segment (for you); why not the Defender? Why not the Land Cruiser? Admittedly both more expensive than the Grenadier.

You say that the Rivian won't be considered for those in section 1, but for how long do you think the Grenadier will have internal combustion engines? As I said, by the time it launches in North America, it will be just six years away from being banned here. And as I said, we don't know what pressures governments are going to come under from the green lobby. Also, within just a few years, battery EVs will have very long ranges - it is coming.

Although I bow to your superior knowledge of the North American market, things are changing VERY fast. Go back ten years and predict how quickly EVs have progressed and sold. The change will be much quicker than the past 10 years.

There is one glimmer of hope for western governments (on the subject of the green lobby). We are very possibly about to enter a cooling phase which may last for two or three decades. It's called the Atlantic Multidecadal Oscillation. The warming (since around 1980) may well be on a downward shift.



This may well curtail the push towards eco-everything for quite some time, and push back the drive toward total EVs. In which case, the political moves towards greening in the US may stall. Added to that (given that US politics swings pendulum like) we may see the Republicans in for two terms if things follow their current path

Again, thanks for your post.

Thanks for the kind words, what puddle -- I don't know about "superior knowledge of the market" though on my part, that's just a layman's observation of who is buying 4x4s but I may have misread my neighbours! Still I do appreciate the kind words and compliments in your reply. And frankly I totally agree with you on what question matters -- can they sell 30k of them?

I think there are probably 30,000 category 1 professionals in North America, absolutely, who would be well served by the grenadier. Whether they think that enough, or believe it enough to give up their traditional pickups, I am far less certain. I actually think that by marketing to the "pros", Ineos will sway a lot of the category 2 people and that group will actually form the basis of sales (just as it does with pickups and other 4x4s -- it's the category 2 people that have really made the Wrangler, which was originally very much a category 1 truck, to persist into the present day. The heritage of a pickup truck is that "It's what pros use", but in the modern West, the pickup truck is basically just the family sedan and forms the majority of the sales of every one of the big 3 manufacturers here, so there is precedent for this "pro-gone-soft" sales strategy.

But, this is where I think the Grenadier has a niche. The "Lifestyle" 4x4s are too light-duty for serious professional use, in my opinion, and there are none that truly fit my needs as they all seem to want to fit into a 6,000 lbs GVM rating. This means payload figures are scant -- by the time you add a bumper, winch, skid plates, and even basic camping equipment, it's easy to blow their payload capacity out of the water as the most I have seen is 1500 lbs or so, which is in the mid-size trucks (which is what I currently use). And, there's all sorts of other problems with the Lifestyle 4x4s that mean I can't really make an informed decision on what they are actually capable of. Toyota says the wading depth of the Tacoma is at the wheel hubs. The mid-size trucks from GM and Ford don't bother publishing wading depths at all. I have no idea how much weight I can put on the roof of my vehicle, nor do I know what happens to my tow ratings if I go off road. There are real world consequences to this for travellers like me -- my Jeep Rubicon only had 850 lbs payload, so between my wife, myself and our dogs we had very little room for things like recovery gear, a tent, etc. We traded up to the midsize truck, but there are reports of airbags detonating off road in bumps, and apparently if they go through water the wrong way, the electronic steering box will get flooded and they can go into limp home mode. None of this suggests a robust, rugged 4x4.

As an aside, I really can't see Ineos not chasing the fleet market. For NGOs who work in remote parts of the world, they don't have any other option on the market right now. With fleet sales, I can for sure see them selling 30,000 units a year. Well, 29,999 units in year one -- pretty sure they've already got one sale in the bag, to me!

Anyway in terms of options for my needs, I could go for the HD-line of trucks, but they are huge and not very maneuverable. I regularly go down cut lines and side roads (Usually ATV trails) where an HD truck just wouldn't fit. So that leaves me to choose from a plethora of "Mid-size" options, all of which have the same challenges and weaknesses I've described above.

I can't get them in Canada, but the modern Land Cruisers are suffering from this same sort of fate; the US spec Land Cruiser was only rated at 1300 lbs payload if I remember correctly. And, they have gone significantly in the direction of "Luxury Bloat" and appear to be continuing that with the 300 series, making them less suitable as a utility vehicle. But with no plans to come to North America, it's a bit of a moot point; the ideal vehicle for me right now would be a 70 series Land Cruiser, but again, can't get them here in North America new, and I don't want an old truck that someone has rode hard and put away wet for 25 years (which is the importation age for vehicles).

That really only leaves me with one vehicle that I can buy that meets all my needs, and that's a Land Rover Defender. It has a 2,000 lbs payload, a published roof load and wading depth, it's a global platform as there are JLR dealers in every country, and it seems genuinely engineered to be a tough touring vehicle. In fact, the Defender checks all my boxes and I think it's a fantastic platform. However, I'm quite hesitant to go that route because of complexity. It does not seem to me to be a very bush-proof vehicle; all my vehicles will break, guaranteed. The Grenadier appears to have a "fix it with bailing wire" ethos, like the old Defenders or 70 series LCs, whereas the New Defender does not give me that impression yet.

So enter the Grenadier -- the best way I can describe it is that it's a modern version of the 70 series Land Cruisers. It's got the payload and off-road specs that make it very appealing. But even there, I'm a little shy on their promises that this will be a global vehicle -- if I can get it fixed a the local agricultural shop as they've promised, I'm thrilled. If I have to rely on a BMW dealership, I'm very much not thrilled. So as that gets sorted, my opinion might change on whether the Gren is good enough for me but so far Ineos has been pretty good on delivering what they say they'll do (at least as far as the truck goes...I'll leave that "it will be built in Britain" promise alone )

In terms of how long Ineos will be ICE -- I'm expecting it to be not that long, as they only have an engine supply guaranteed to 2035 (and as you've said, change happens fast!). That might change if the science/cultural movement around sustainability shifts, as you've said. I am actually really excited about Ineo's partnership with Hyundai on hydrogen fuel tech. That gives a bit more "liquid fuel"-level of portability over electric, but also solves the pollution issue. I suspect that much like the world I grew up in, where urban areas were dominated by gasoline and industrial areas are dominated by diesel, we will see a shift where industrial areas run on hydrogen and more urban areas run on electric (Caterpillar for example appear to be investing in hydrogen it looks like, and have been for a long time; they are the dominant marque on job sites out this way and so if there is an infrastructure for hydrogen loaders, graders, etc. then it's natural for the Ineos to go Hydrogen to meet that market).

What puddle? wrote:

Prospector:
Well, in the title of Marilyn Monroe's last film (that was prophetic), something's got to give! How does the system work, given that you have 'independent' states? Sorry for my ignorance, do you have a type of federal generation system? There's some chat of the US breaking up into maybe three countries within a decade (yes, I know it's unthinkable, but it is possible). Will power generation be another reason to break apart?

lohr500 wrote:

Muddybigdog wrote:

Do folks think, will the R1T and the R1S be able pass the UK and EU road safety regulations for passenger protection, as the front look quite slab fronted. As this was meant to be the reason what helped kill the original defender?

In my humble opinion the only thing that killed old style Defender was the bunch of clowns at JLR who thought it would be better to replace it with a Discovery type SUV. (Oh, wait a minute, they have one of those in the range already ) .

 1982 88" 2.25 diesel
1992 110 200tdi csw -Zikali
2008 110 2.4 tdci csw-Zulu
2011 110 2.4 tdci csw-Masai

Hufflepuff wrote:

I don't think its a sure thing that EVs are here to stay in the medium term. Other technology is available which is getting research investment at the moment, including hydrogen combustion or other synthetic fuels. Liquid fuel still offer significant benefits over battery technology for 'working' vehicles, ones which can't be off the road for 8+ hours at a time (eg. trucks).

The Germans are offering €1.54B of funding for 2021-2024 for renewable fuels in general

Germany has issued a call for the development of test sites to produce Power-to-Liquid (PtL) clean combustion fuel at the scale of up to 10,000 tonnes per year


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It is meant to be the stepping stone to large-scale commercial production and supply of this renewable liquid fuel, adding that aviation and shipping would be the initial big users. However, as a combustion engine liquid, it does not iintroduce technical barriers for it to fuel smaller heavy duty vehicles, such as truck, cargo handling equipment or locomotives on non-electrified tracks.

BVMI is offering €1.54B of funding for 2021-2024 for renewable fuels in general, which can be tapped for the PtL production prototype.

Simply put, PtL fuels are synthetically produced liquid hydrocarbon fuels generated from renewable electricity sources and conversted to refined fuels. The concept was conceived by German chemists Franz Fischer and Hans Tropsch has long ago as 1923, following the invention of synthetic fuel in 1913.

The "PtL development platform" sought by BVMIO is expected to encompass research, semi-industrial production and demonstration. In the next phase, Berlin would invest in commercial production at converted or newbuild plants for electricity-based fuels and next level biofuels. The guidelines for this phase are due later this year.

https://www.worldcargonews.com/news/news/b...fuel-67087