Ron Wagner + 642 June 6, 2022 (edited) https://www.caranddriver.com/features/g39175084/10-cheapest-new-cars-in-2022/ Edited June 6, 2022 by Ron Wagner 1 Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Ron Wagner + 642 June 6, 2022 https://www.edmunds.com/electric-car/articles/cheapest-electric-cars/ Cheapest Electric Cars Compare Starting price: $27,400 EV Range: 149 miles 2022 Nissan Leaf An EV with decent range that costs less than the rest? That's the Leaf's formula, and it's a hard one to resist. With 149 miles of range in its affordable base trim (an optional larger battery-pack version, the Leaf Plus, can travel up to 226 miles), the… Read more Pricing & reviewsSee all for sale Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Eyes Wide Open + 3,537 June 6, 2022 (edited) 13 hours ago, Jay McKinsey said: By many countries you mean two countries, India and China , and it is still not certain that they will reach their all time high. Or that it won't be offset globally by decreases elsewhere. Red-Hot Coal Prices Threaten Even Higher Power Bills Resurgent power demand and Russia’s war in Ukraine are putting pressure on supplies as inventories remain low Futures for coal delivered to northwestern Europe have risen 137% so far this year, to $323.50 a metric ton as of Wednesday. The benchmark price in the Pacific region, set at an Australian export facility, is up more than 140% this year. Cash prices in central Appalachia have climbed 40% in 2022—and more than doubled over... https://www.wsj.com/articles/red-hot-coal-prices-threaten-more-increases-in-power-bills-11654167025 Edited June 6, 2022 by Eyes Wide Open 1 1 Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Jay McKinsey + 1,489 June 6, 2022 31 minutes ago, Eyes Wide Open said: Red-Hot Coal Prices Threaten Even Higher Power Bills Resurgent power demand and Russia’s war in Ukraine are putting pressure on supplies as inventories remain low Futures for coal delivered to northwestern Europe have risen 137% so far this year, to $323.50 a metric ton as of Wednesday. The benchmark price in the Pacific region, set at an Australian export facility, is up more than 140% this year. Cash prices in central Appalachia have climbed 40% in 2022—and more than doubled over... https://www.wsj.com/articles/red-hot-coal-prices-threaten-more-increases-in-power-bills-11654167025 High coal prices certainly drive demand for low cost renewables. 2 1 Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Ron Wagner + 642 June 6, 2022 https://www.theepochtimes.com/an-alarmed-solar-industry-says-a-us-trade-probe-of-china-will-totally-fry-it-then-why-is-the-business-sunny-side-up_4498474.html The Biden Administration is supporting China and its enslaved Uighur workers so that our solar industry can function. That is supporting evil and our prime opponent. RCW An Alarmed Solar Industry Says a US Trade Probe of China Will Totally Fry It; Then Why Is the Business Sunny Side Up? By RealClearInvestigations June 4, 2022 Updated: June 5, 2022 biggersmaller Print 0:009:58 1 Publicly, big solar developers and many climate change activists are sounding the alarm about an ongoing probe of trade abuses by Chinese manufacturers. Abigail Ross Hopper, CEO of the Solar Energy Industries Association, last month described the U.S. Department of Commerce investigation as “the most serious crisis we have faced in our collective history.” Heather Zichal, a former White House energy adviser under President Barack Obama, said the examination of China’s trade practices “drives a stake through the heart of planned solar projects.” The New York Times reported last month that the “solar industry is ‘frozen’ as Biden administration investigates China” over allegations solar producers there are offshoring work to avoid tariffs. But CEOs of some of the biggest solar players in the U.S. tell a different story to investors and followers, according to a RealClearInvestigations review of earnings call transcripts and solar project plans. Amazon last month announced 37 new solar projects around the world, including in the U.S., while power plant developer Seaboard Solar announced it is working on multiple projects in New York state. A $75 million project is moving ahead in Minnesota, while two plants by Dominion Energy are starting construction in Virginia this year. Ring founder and chief inventor Jamie Siminoff introduces the Blink Floodlight Camera and Solar Power Mount + Camera during Amazon Devices and Services Announcement, on Sept. 28, 2021. (Jamie McCarthy/Getty Images) Kirk Crews, CFO of NextEra Energy, which trumpets itself as the world’s largest producer of wind and solar energy, told Bloomberg that if the investigation found that China circumvented tariffs by offshoring, “it would be unwinding a decade of trade practice.” But Crews told analysts in an April investor call that despite the federal investigation, “we remain comfortable with our current development expectations for wind, solar and storage.” Several other major solar producers also have announced they are moving ahead on projects this year, including Duke Energy and SOLV Energy. “Even with trade cases, solar demand has continued to grow—Solar jobs are still expanding,” said Tim Brightbill, a Washington, D.C.-based lawyer for domestic solar producers whose complaint last year also alleged China was avoiding tariffs. The disconnect between public and private words and deeds illustrates a solar industry that presents itself as on a progressive mission to save the planet actually behaving more like a traditional big business. It is managing expectations in the political and business arenas through messaging geared to those separate audiences. Behind the words is a highly competitive business focused on keeping costs low—even if that means sourcing cheaper materials from Chinese companies, some of which are accused of relying on highly polluting coal power, using slave labor, or violating trade agreements. The Commerce Department launched its probe in response to a petition filed in February by a U.S. competitor to Chinese producers, Auxin Solar, a small California-based solar parts maker, which alleged that China was avoiding tariffs by routing its production through four Southeast Asian countries. Auxin alleges that manufacturers in those four countries—Thailand, Vietnam, Malaysia, and Cambodia—are Chinese enterprises that use the factories for panel assembly, the last step before shipment and installation. Plants in those countries “use affiliated Chinese input suppliers and a fully integrated Chinese supply chain to circumvent the existing [tariffs],” according to Auxin’s complaint. The complaint maps the alleged movement of solar parts to the four countries from China, as direct imports of Chinese solar parts to the U.S. have dipped over the last three years while increasing from the four Southeast Asian countries. It cites one Vietnamese company, Boviet Solar, a subsidiary of Chinese company Boway, which noted on its website in 2017 that its attractiveness to solar producers is that “Vietnam is not a U.S. listed anti-dumping and countervailing region. No tariffs influence Boviet’s U.S. business, and those cost-savings ultimately trickle down to the buyer.” U.S. companies produced a record number of panels in 2020, up 24 percent over 2019, according to a report from the National Renewable Energy Laboratory. Roughly 80 percent of the components and equipment for those panels come from Chinese-linked operations. “The discourse of cheapness dominates everything now in solar,” said Dustin Mulvaney, a professor in the Environmental Studies Department at San José State University, who studies solar power commodity supply chains. Mulvaney said there is no way to police the supply chain, as components needed to build panels are integrated into the system. The origin of the components, he said, is hard to trace. The major area of concern is the Chinese region of Xinjiang, one of the world’s leading production and mining hubs for solar, where the gross domestic product has doubled since 2012, despite being accused by several countries of using forced labor. The Chinese government has denied the accusation. A 2021 report by Horizon Advisory, a geopolitical consultancy, names Chinese solar firms Daqo New Energy, East Hope Group, GCL-Poly, and Jinko Solar among the companies in the Xinjiang region using forced labor, which the companies deny. An estimated 45 percent of polysilicon, a key component of solar panels, is produced in Xinjiang. Products made with forced labor are banned in the U.S., and some U.S. solar companies have further signed a non-binding pledge to avoid factories known to use forced labor. But sidestepping human rights concerns, the Solar Energy Industries Association, the national nonprofit trade association of the solar energy industry in the United States, asked its members in April to sign a petition against Auxin’s complaint, warning “there is not sufficient capacity to meet U.S. demand anywhere else in the world except China.” The association claims that investigating the complaint “will also make it impossible to meet President Biden’s climate goals,” which include making 40 percent of the U.S. power supply solar powered by 2035. The Biden administration is caught between the statutory duty of the Commerce Department to investigate possible tariff circumvention and its stated imperative of growing the solar industry, an urgency heightened by renewable energy mandates in 38 states, including 12 that require 100 percent clean energy by 2050. President Joe Biden delivers the commencement address during the graduation and commissioning ceremony at the U.S. Naval Academy Memorial Stadium in Annapolis, Md., on May 27, 2022. (Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images) If the industry has its way, China will play a large role in achieving such goals—however environmentally unfriendly the process may be. Last year, China announced plans to construct 43 new coal plants, in part to meet the demand for more panels. “The amount of fossil fuel energy it takes to get materials from China is already high,” said Tom Beline, an attorney who is representing Auxin in its complaint. “These parts are produced using coal plants, using international freight that also uses fossil fuels. By the time the parts arrive here in the U.S., the carbon footprint is enormous.” Solar tariffs on China were first imposed in 2012 after the Commerce Department determined the country was “dumping” government-subsidized parts on the U.S. market. In 2018, President Trump imposed heavier tariffs on specific types of solar products. Auxin’s complaint of Chinese meddling has been met with an avalanche of online comments and phone calls, many of them threatening a boycott of the small producer and almost all of them besmirching the company. “Shame on you for endangering the jobs of hundreds of thousands of Americans, and for attempting to cripple the future of green energy infrastructure,” one Google review post reads. The petition from Auxin threatens one of the few sectors that has thrived in the past two years, said John Miggins, who founded Harvest Solar Energy in Tulsa, Oklahoma, in 2002, doing mostly home installations. “The big picture is that we need solar,” Miggins said. He said his prices have increased, although record inflation has played the largest part in that. He echoed the solar industry’s response to the Auxin complaint, saying it will make things tougher to accomplish the build-in-a-hurry goal of the Biden administration. “The end result is that it’s going to slow down people getting their own power system,” Miggins said. Solar advocates in the past have advocated completely abolishing tariffs on solar parts from China, claiming “tariffs are ineffective at growing solar manufacturing capacity.” Sen. Jacky Rosen, a Nevada Democrat, in February introduced a bill to repeal the Trump-era tariffs. The bill has not moved since its introduction. The U.S. solar industry can move forward without China, Tracy Stone-Manning, director of the Bureau of Land Management, told NBC News in April. “I have incredible faith in American ingenuity,” said Stone-Manning, whose agency manages thousands of Southwest desert acres being developed for solar power plants. “If we have to, we’ll start building the solar panels here.” This article was written by Steve Miller for RealClearInvestigations. RealClearInvestigations Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Polyphia + 67 LT June 7, 2022 https://www.cnn.com/2022/06/06/politics/biden-executive-action-solar-clean-energy-development/index.html 1 Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Jay McKinsey + 1,489 June 7, 2022 49 minutes ago, Ron Wagner said: https://www.theepochtimes.com/an-alarmed-solar-industry-says-a-us-trade-probe-of-china-will-totally-fry-it-then-why-is-the-business-sunny-side-up_4498474.html The Biden Administration is supporting China and its enslaved Uighur workers so that our solar industry can function. That is supporting evil and our prime opponent. RCW An Alarmed Solar Industry Says a US Trade Probe of China Will Totally Fry It; Then Why Is the Business Sunny Side Up? By RealClearInvestigations June 4, 2022 Updated: June 5, 2022 biggersmaller Print 0:009:58 1 Publicly, big solar developers and many climate change activists are sounding the alarm about an ongoing probe of trade abuses by Chinese manufacturers. Abigail Ross Hopper, CEO of the Solar Energy Industries Association, last month described the U.S. Department of Commerce investigation as “the most serious crisis we have faced in our collective history.” Heather Zichal, a former White House energy adviser under President Barack Obama, said the examination of China’s trade practices “drives a stake through the heart of planned solar projects.” The New York Times reported last month that the “solar industry is ‘frozen’ as Biden administration investigates China” over allegations solar producers there are offshoring work to avoid tariffs. But CEOs of some of the biggest solar players in the U.S. tell a different story to investors and followers, according to a RealClearInvestigations review of earnings call transcripts and solar project plans. Amazon last month announced 37 new solar projects around the world, including in the U.S., while power plant developer Seaboard Solar announced it is working on multiple projects in New York state. A $75 million project is moving ahead in Minnesota, while two plants by Dominion Energy are starting construction in Virginia this year. Ring founder and chief inventor Jamie Siminoff introduces the Blink Floodlight Camera and Solar Power Mount + Camera during Amazon Devices and Services Announcement, on Sept. 28, 2021. (Jamie McCarthy/Getty Images) Kirk Crews, CFO of NextEra Energy, which trumpets itself as the world’s largest producer of wind and solar energy, told Bloomberg that if the investigation found that China circumvented tariffs by offshoring, “it would be unwinding a decade of trade practice.” But Crews told analysts in an April investor call that despite the federal investigation, “we remain comfortable with our current development expectations for wind, solar and storage.” Several other major solar producers also have announced they are moving ahead on projects this year, including Duke Energy and SOLV Energy. “Even with trade cases, solar demand has continued to grow—Solar jobs are still expanding,” said Tim Brightbill, a Washington, D.C.-based lawyer for domestic solar producers whose complaint last year also alleged China was avoiding tariffs. The disconnect between public and private words and deeds illustrates a solar industry that presents itself as on a progressive mission to save the planet actually behaving more like a traditional big business. It is managing expectations in the political and business arenas through messaging geared to those separate audiences. Behind the words is a highly competitive business focused on keeping costs low—even if that means sourcing cheaper materials from Chinese companies, some of which are accused of relying on highly polluting coal power, using slave labor, or violating trade agreements. The Commerce Department launched its probe in response to a petition filed in February by a U.S. competitor to Chinese producers, Auxin Solar, a small California-based solar parts maker, which alleged that China was avoiding tariffs by routing its production through four Southeast Asian countries. Auxin alleges that manufacturers in those four countries—Thailand, Vietnam, Malaysia, and Cambodia—are Chinese enterprises that use the factories for panel assembly, the last step before shipment and installation. Plants in those countries “use affiliated Chinese input suppliers and a fully integrated Chinese supply chain to circumvent the existing [tariffs],” according to Auxin’s complaint. The complaint maps the alleged movement of solar parts to the four countries from China, as direct imports of Chinese solar parts to the U.S. have dipped over the last three years while increasing from the four Southeast Asian countries. It cites one Vietnamese company, Boviet Solar, a subsidiary of Chinese company Boway, which noted on its website in 2017 that its attractiveness to solar producers is that “Vietnam is not a U.S. listed anti-dumping and countervailing region. No tariffs influence Boviet’s U.S. business, and those cost-savings ultimately trickle down to the buyer.” U.S. companies produced a record number of panels in 2020, up 24 percent over 2019, according to a report from the National Renewable Energy Laboratory. Roughly 80 percent of the components and equipment for those panels come from Chinese-linked operations. “The discourse of cheapness dominates everything now in solar,” said Dustin Mulvaney, a professor in the Environmental Studies Department at San José State University, who studies solar power commodity supply chains. Mulvaney said there is no way to police the supply chain, as components needed to build panels are integrated into the system. The origin of the components, he said, is hard to trace. The major area of concern is the Chinese region of Xinjiang, one of the world’s leading production and mining hubs for solar, where the gross domestic product has doubled since 2012, despite being accused by several countries of using forced labor. The Chinese government has denied the accusation. A 2021 report by Horizon Advisory, a geopolitical consultancy, names Chinese solar firms Daqo New Energy, East Hope Group, GCL-Poly, and Jinko Solar among the companies in the Xinjiang region using forced labor, which the companies deny. An estimated 45 percent of polysilicon, a key component of solar panels, is produced in Xinjiang. Products made with forced labor are banned in the U.S., and some U.S. solar companies have further signed a non-binding pledge to avoid factories known to use forced labor. But sidestepping human rights concerns, the Solar Energy Industries Association, the national nonprofit trade association of the solar energy industry in the United States, asked its members in April to sign a petition against Auxin’s complaint, warning “there is not sufficient capacity to meet U.S. demand anywhere else in the world except China.” The association claims that investigating the complaint “will also make it impossible to meet President Biden’s climate goals,” which include making 40 percent of the U.S. power supply solar powered by 2035. The Biden administration is caught between the statutory duty of the Commerce Department to investigate possible tariff circumvention and its stated imperative of growing the solar industry, an urgency heightened by renewable energy mandates in 38 states, including 12 that require 100 percent clean energy by 2050. President Joe Biden delivers the commencement address during the graduation and commissioning ceremony at the U.S. Naval Academy Memorial Stadium in Annapolis, Md., on May 27, 2022. (Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images) If the industry has its way, China will play a large role in achieving such goals—however environmentally unfriendly the process may be. Last year, China announced plans to construct 43 new coal plants, in part to meet the demand for more panels. “The amount of fossil fuel energy it takes to get materials from China is already high,” said Tom Beline, an attorney who is representing Auxin in its complaint. “These parts are produced using coal plants, using international freight that also uses fossil fuels. By the time the parts arrive here in the U.S., the carbon footprint is enormous.” Solar tariffs on China were first imposed in 2012 after the Commerce Department determined the country was “dumping” government-subsidized parts on the U.S. market. In 2018, President Trump imposed heavier tariffs on specific types of solar products. Auxin’s complaint of Chinese meddling has been met with an avalanche of online comments and phone calls, many of them threatening a boycott of the small producer and almost all of them besmirching the company. “Shame on you for endangering the jobs of hundreds of thousands of Americans, and for attempting to cripple the future of green energy infrastructure,” one Google review post reads. The petition from Auxin threatens one of the few sectors that has thrived in the past two years, said John Miggins, who founded Harvest Solar Energy in Tulsa, Oklahoma, in 2002, doing mostly home installations. “The big picture is that we need solar,” Miggins said. He said his prices have increased, although record inflation has played the largest part in that. He echoed the solar industry’s response to the Auxin complaint, saying it will make things tougher to accomplish the build-in-a-hurry goal of the Biden administration. “The end result is that it’s going to slow down people getting their own power system,” Miggins said. Solar advocates in the past have advocated completely abolishing tariffs on solar parts from China, claiming “tariffs are ineffective at growing solar manufacturing capacity.” Sen. Jacky Rosen, a Nevada Democrat, in February introduced a bill to repeal the Trump-era tariffs. The bill has not moved since its introduction. The U.S. solar industry can move forward without China, Tracy Stone-Manning, director of the Bureau of Land Management, told NBC News in April. “I have incredible faith in American ingenuity,” said Stone-Manning, whose agency manages thousands of Southwest desert acres being developed for solar power plants. “If we have to, we’ll start building the solar panels here.” This article was written by Steve Miller for RealClearInvestigations. RealClearInvestigations Incredibly simple, the investigation was open ended but promised retroactive fines. It was a deep state investigation that you hate so much that Biden just put the kibosh on. Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Ron Wagner + 642 June 7, 2022 https://www.theepochtimes.com/large-western-corporations-abetting-chinas-human-rights-violations-sen-leo-housakos_4515801.html Basketball player and human rights defender Enes Kanter Freedom (L) takes part in news conference with Canadian Sen. Leo Housakos calling on the Canadian government to ban imports of goods made with forced labour in Xinjiang region of China, in Ottawa on June 6, 2022. (Fred Chartrand/The Canadian Press) CANADA Large Western Corporations Abetting China’s Human Rights Violations: Sen. Leo Housakos By Andrew Chen June 6, 2022 Updated: June 6, 2022 biggersmaller Print 0:003:30 1 Large western corporations that are making money in China are contributing to democratic governments’ neglect of the communist regime’s continued human rights violations, Sen. Leo Housakos said on June 6. Housakos called on the Liberal government to ban imports of goods made with forced labour by Uyghur Muslims in China’s northwestern province of Xinjiang. He was joined at a press conference by Conservative MP Garnett Genuis, U.S. professional basketball star and human rights defender Enes Kanter Freedom, and Sarah Teich, senior fellow at the Macdonald-Laurier Institute. Housakos was asked why the world acted quickly to punish Russia for its invasion of Ukraine, yet allows communist China to infringe on the rights of ethnic and religious minorities, trample on Hong Kong’s democratic system, threaten the self-ruled island of Taiwan, and violate international laws. “I think the bottom line is we have some large, powerful corporations in the western democratic world that are making a lot of money in China, and those corporations have an extraordinary amount of influence on our governments, right across the G-7,” Housakos said, noting that these corporations continue to “aid and abet China’s genocidal regime.” “It’s a sad reality, but that’s what it is. And that’s the discrepancy between why [Western governments] take certain actions, because obviously Russia doesn’t have [foreign investments].” “When countries like China have unfettered access to our large, middle-class, powerful market, they have to align themselves in human rights and democracy where we are, and rule of law. And if they don’t, they shouldn’t have access.” He pointed to a U.S. law that is set to enter into effect later this month that will protect its markets from the inflows of products from Xinjiang possibly tainted with forced labour and human rights abuses, as an example of what Canada can do. He said Canada also needs legislation like his Bill S-204, which he said is unequivocal in banning products from Xinjinag. “The onus shouldn’t be on CBSA [Canada Border Services Agency] to figure out is there one container out of 50 that is legitimate,” Housakos said. “The message should be unequivocal there: interact together, align yourself with what is important for us or you don’t have access to [our markets].” Responding to the same question, Genuis said world leaders view the two cases differently in that China violates its own laws as well as international obligations, whereas Russia transgressed an international boundary. Nevertheless, the leaders of both countries should be held accountable for the violations of human rights and international laws, he said. “Obviously, China is a larger player economically and in terms of its integration within the global system, but I think it’s a clear principle of international human rights that we not let anybody get away with the kind of behaviours that we’re seeing,” he said. Genuis pointed to Senate Bill S-211, which aims to create a reporting mechanism that allows the public to hold companies accountable if they are complicit in the use of forced labour in the manufacture of goods. The bill passed second reading in the House of Commons on June 1. He also noted that another bill that is on the way to being passed addresses the issue of China’s organ harvesting, which the Uyghurs and other minority groups, like the adherents of the spiritual practice Falun Gong, are being subjected to. NBA star Enes Kanter Freedom has in the past several years called out some of his NBA colleagues and major international corporations on the issue of China. “There are so many human rights violations that are happening over there in China, and many countries call it, and I agree to [call it], genocide,” Freedom said. “So we have to call it like it is and we have to do whatever we can to help those innocent people over there.” Andrew Chen Following Andrew Chen is an Epoch Times reporter based in Toronto. Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Ron Wagner + 642 June 7, 2022 https://www.theepochtimes.com/sec-climate-proposal-violates-first-amendment-to-constitution-law-professor_4515589.html Signage is seen at the headquarters of the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) in Washington on May 12, 2021. REUTERS/Andrew Kelly CONSTITUTIONAL RIGHTS SEC Climate Proposal Violates First Amendment to Constitution: Law Professor By Nathan Worcester June 6, 2022 Updated: June 6, 2022 biggersmaller Print 0:007:01 1 The Securities and Exchange Commission’s (SEC) proposed rules to mandate climate-related disclosures from companies abridge freedom of speech and would “create controversy by imposing a political viewpoint,” a law professor wrote in a June 1 letter to the agency. “It’s almost as though the three commissioners who pushed this rule forward don’t take seriously their oath to uphold and defend the Constitution,” Sean Griffith, a professor at Fordham University School of Law and author of the letter, said in a June 3 interview with The Epoch Times. Griffith had previously joined many other law and finance professors in an April 25 letter to SEC objecting to the agency’s March 25 climate disclosure proposal. The comment period for that proposal ends on June 17. “The Proposal seems to be heavily influenced by a small but powerful cohort of environmental activists and institutional investors, mostly index funds and asset managers, promoting climate consciousness as part of their business models,” the professors wrote in the letter. Griffith wanted to go beyond the letter and explain why he thinks the SEC’s climate disclosure approach conflicts with the First Amendment. He made his case in the June 1 letter and a 73-page draft article, “What’s ‘Controversial’ About ESG? A Theory of Compelled Commercial Speech Under the First Amendment.” “The proposed climate rules create controversy by imposing a political viewpoint, by advancing an interest group agenda at the expense of investors generally, and by redefining concepts at the core of securities regulation,” Griffith wrote in the June 1 letter. “On the one hand, I object to these climate-related disclosures. But on the other hand, it’s kind of a wonderful thing that the SEC is trying to do this, because they’re actually pressing the limit in such a way that might actually trigger an answer to the question of, ‘Where is that limit beyond which the SEC can’t require stuff?’” he told The Epoch Times. Commercial speech is less protected under the First Amendment than other forms of speech. In Zauderer v. Office of Disciplinary Counsel of the Supreme Court of Ohio, the U.S. Supreme Court established a fairly low standard of scrutiny for rules compelling commercial speech, as long as the information disclosed is “purely factual and uncontroversial.” Griffith thinks the SEC’s proposal shouldn’t be subject to this standard because it creates controversy by deviating from the agency’s core mission of protecting investors. “The reason why the climate rules are so problematic is that either they’re politically driven—which is very plausible—or they are driven by this desire to appease the institutional asset manager community, which has its own profit interest because they generate revenue from the assets under management of those ESG portfolios. At the end of the day, it’s not about investors,” he told The Epoch Times. According to Griffith, the potential rules also create controversy because they enforce viewpoint discrimination. They effectively force companies to endorse certain premises about human effects on the climate system. He also thinks the proposal redefines the central concepts of materiality and investor protection, engendering further controversy. Heightened financial risks that have some potential link to a warming effect from human carbon emissions—say, a rising rate of storms at some geographical location over the past few decades—are, by definition, already material. That reality raises questions about the value of broad new disclosure mandates for territory already covered under existing law. The SEC’s rule proposal should be held to a tougher standard than Zauderer—either intermediate scrutiny or strict scrutiny, according to Griffith. He also sees the proposal as part of a pattern of constitutionally dubious conduct by the politicized agency. The 5th Circuit ruled on May 18 that the SEC’s use of administrative law judges violated the Seventh Amendment right to a jury trial. “The SEC is almost nakedly overreaching,” Griffith said. While he and other legal scholars have raised serious concerns about the SEC’s climate disclosure proposal, some experts have defended its constitutionality. George S. Georgiev, a professor at the Emory University School of Law, took on First Amendment objections in a March 27 blog post for Business Law Prof Blog. He claimed that “even though opponents of the SEC’s climate disclosure initiative made it controversial well before the contours of the Proposal became known, this does not mean that the actual information required by the actual Proposal is controversial, burdensome, or unjustified.” Although Georgiev said his analysis of the SEC’s enabling statute and practice support the agency’s proposed disclosures, he noted that First Amendment challenges could prove significant “not only for climate-related disclosure rules, but for other disclosure rules as well.” Georgiev declined to comment to The Epoch Times on Griffith’s letter and article. James Cox, a law professor at Duke University, told The Epoch Times on June 3 that a D.C. Circuit decision, National Association of Manufacturers v. SEC, has defined the parameters of this debate over the First Amendment and required disclosures. The Dodd-Frank Act, passed by Congress in 2010, directed the SEC to compel companies to disclose whether minerals were ‘conflict free’—in other words, obtained from the Congo or an adjoining country without “directly or indirectly [financing] or [benefiting] armed groups” in the region. The judge threw out that requirement. “The statement was seen as potentially political or at least risking the speaker being ethically tainted,” Cox said. He believes the constitutionality of the SEC’s compulsion of speech has yet to be resolved, arguing that it will depend in large part on how the final release is worded. Griffith disagrees. “Insofar as the rules do create a [First Amendment] issue, it doesn’t matter what the SEC says in its adopting release. The rules either violate the First Amendment or they don’t,” he said. The prospective greenhouse gas disclosures, which he sees as just one of multiple controversial aspects of the proposal, bear no direct relationship to the finances of the affected companies. “It seems to me that the only way they could make this uncontroversial is by dropping the [greenhouse gas] disclosure requirement altogether,” Griffith said. The SEC declined to comment to The Epoch Times regarding Griffith’s paper. 1 Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Eyes Wide Open + 3,537 June 7, 2022 10 hours ago, Jay McKinsey said: High coal prices certainly drive demand for low cost renewables. Ahh I would not expect anything less of a reply. As always....Sincerely EWO Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Ecocharger + 1,375 DL June 7, 2022 12 hours ago, Jay McKinsey said: High coal prices certainly drive demand for low cost renewables. There is no evidence of that, actually the demand for fossil fuels is red hot right now. Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Ecocharger + 1,375 DL June 7, 2022 7 hours ago, Ron Wagner said: https://www.theepochtimes.com/an-alarmed-solar-industry-says-a-us-trade-probe-of-china-will-totally-fry-it-then-why-is-the-business-sunny-side-up_4498474.html The Biden Administration is supporting China and its enslaved Uighur workers so that our solar industry can function. That is supporting evil and our prime opponent. RCW An Alarmed Solar Industry Says a US Trade Probe of China Will Totally Fry It; Then Why Is the Business Sunny Side Up? By RealClearInvestigations June 4, 2022 Updated: June 5, 2022 biggersmaller Print 0:009:58 1 Publicly, big solar developers and many climate change activists are sounding the alarm about an ongoing probe of trade abuses by Chinese manufacturers. Abigail Ross Hopper, CEO of the Solar Energy Industries Association, last month described the U.S. Department of Commerce investigation as “the most serious crisis we have faced in our collective history.” Heather Zichal, a former White House energy adviser under President Barack Obama, said the examination of China’s trade practices “drives a stake through the heart of planned solar projects.” The New York Times reported last month that the “solar industry is ‘frozen’ as Biden administration investigates China” over allegations solar producers there are offshoring work to avoid tariffs. But CEOs of some of the biggest solar players in the U.S. tell a different story to investors and followers, according to a RealClearInvestigations review of earnings call transcripts and solar project plans. Amazon last month announced 37 new solar projects around the world, including in the U.S., while power plant developer Seaboard Solar announced it is working on multiple projects in New York state. A $75 million project is moving ahead in Minnesota, while two plants by Dominion Energy are starting construction in Virginia this year. Ring founder and chief inventor Jamie Siminoff introduces the Blink Floodlight Camera and Solar Power Mount + Camera during Amazon Devices and Services Announcement, on Sept. 28, 2021. (Jamie McCarthy/Getty Images) Kirk Crews, CFO of NextEra Energy, which trumpets itself as the world’s largest producer of wind and solar energy, told Bloomberg that if the investigation found that China circumvented tariffs by offshoring, “it would be unwinding a decade of trade practice.” But Crews told analysts in an April investor call that despite the federal investigation, “we remain comfortable with our current development expectations for wind, solar and storage.” Several other major solar producers also have announced they are moving ahead on projects this year, including Duke Energy and SOLV Energy. “Even with trade cases, solar demand has continued to grow—Solar jobs are still expanding,” said Tim Brightbill, a Washington, D.C.-based lawyer for domestic solar producers whose complaint last year also alleged China was avoiding tariffs. The disconnect between public and private words and deeds illustrates a solar industry that presents itself as on a progressive mission to save the planet actually behaving more like a traditional big business. It is managing expectations in the political and business arenas through messaging geared to those separate audiences. Behind the words is a highly competitive business focused on keeping costs low—even if that means sourcing cheaper materials from Chinese companies, some of which are accused of relying on highly polluting coal power, using slave labor, or violating trade agreements. The Commerce Department launched its probe in response to a petition filed in February by a U.S. competitor to Chinese producers, Auxin Solar, a small California-based solar parts maker, which alleged that China was avoiding tariffs by routing its production through four Southeast Asian countries. Auxin alleges that manufacturers in those four countries—Thailand, Vietnam, Malaysia, and Cambodia—are Chinese enterprises that use the factories for panel assembly, the last step before shipment and installation. Plants in those countries “use affiliated Chinese input suppliers and a fully integrated Chinese supply chain to circumvent the existing [tariffs],” according to Auxin’s complaint. The complaint maps the alleged movement of solar parts to the four countries from China, as direct imports of Chinese solar parts to the U.S. have dipped over the last three years while increasing from the four Southeast Asian countries. It cites one Vietnamese company, Boviet Solar, a subsidiary of Chinese company Boway, which noted on its website in 2017 that its attractiveness to solar producers is that “Vietnam is not a U.S. listed anti-dumping and countervailing region. No tariffs influence Boviet’s U.S. business, and those cost-savings ultimately trickle down to the buyer.” U.S. companies produced a record number of panels in 2020, up 24 percent over 2019, according to a report from the National Renewable Energy Laboratory. Roughly 80 percent of the components and equipment for those panels come from Chinese-linked operations. “The discourse of cheapness dominates everything now in solar,” said Dustin Mulvaney, a professor in the Environmental Studies Department at San José State University, who studies solar power commodity supply chains. Mulvaney said there is no way to police the supply chain, as components needed to build panels are integrated into the system. The origin of the components, he said, is hard to trace. The major area of concern is the Chinese region of Xinjiang, one of the world’s leading production and mining hubs for solar, where the gross domestic product has doubled since 2012, despite being accused by several countries of using forced labor. The Chinese government has denied the accusation. A 2021 report by Horizon Advisory, a geopolitical consultancy, names Chinese solar firms Daqo New Energy, East Hope Group, GCL-Poly, and Jinko Solar among the companies in the Xinjiang region using forced labor, which the companies deny. An estimated 45 percent of polysilicon, a key component of solar panels, is produced in Xinjiang. Products made with forced labor are banned in the U.S., and some U.S. solar companies have further signed a non-binding pledge to avoid factories known to use forced labor. But sidestepping human rights concerns, the Solar Energy Industries Association, the national nonprofit trade association of the solar energy industry in the United States, asked its members in April to sign a petition against Auxin’s complaint, warning “there is not sufficient capacity to meet U.S. demand anywhere else in the world except China.” The association claims that investigating the complaint “will also make it impossible to meet President Biden’s climate goals,” which include making 40 percent of the U.S. power supply solar powered by 2035. The Biden administration is caught between the statutory duty of the Commerce Department to investigate possible tariff circumvention and its stated imperative of growing the solar industry, an urgency heightened by renewable energy mandates in 38 states, including 12 that require 100 percent clean energy by 2050. President Joe Biden delivers the commencement address during the graduation and commissioning ceremony at the U.S. Naval Academy Memorial Stadium in Annapolis, Md., on May 27, 2022. (Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images) If the industry has its way, China will play a large role in achieving such goals—however environmentally unfriendly the process may be. Last year, China announced plans to construct 43 new coal plants, in part to meet the demand for more panels. “The amount of fossil fuel energy it takes to get materials from China is already high,” said Tom Beline, an attorney who is representing Auxin in its complaint. “These parts are produced using coal plants, using international freight that also uses fossil fuels. By the time the parts arrive here in the U.S., the carbon footprint is enormous.” Solar tariffs on China were first imposed in 2012 after the Commerce Department determined the country was “dumping” government-subsidized parts on the U.S. market. In 2018, President Trump imposed heavier tariffs on specific types of solar products. Auxin’s complaint of Chinese meddling has been met with an avalanche of online comments and phone calls, many of them threatening a boycott of the small producer and almost all of them besmirching the company. “Shame on you for endangering the jobs of hundreds of thousands of Americans, and for attempting to cripple the future of green energy infrastructure,” one Google review post reads. The petition from Auxin threatens one of the few sectors that has thrived in the past two years, said John Miggins, who founded Harvest Solar Energy in Tulsa, Oklahoma, in 2002, doing mostly home installations. “The big picture is that we need solar,” Miggins said. He said his prices have increased, although record inflation has played the largest part in that. He echoed the solar industry’s response to the Auxin complaint, saying it will make things tougher to accomplish the build-in-a-hurry goal of the Biden administration. “The end result is that it’s going to slow down people getting their own power system,” Miggins said. Solar advocates in the past have advocated completely abolishing tariffs on solar parts from China, claiming “tariffs are ineffective at growing solar manufacturing capacity.” Sen. Jacky Rosen, a Nevada Democrat, in February introduced a bill to repeal the Trump-era tariffs. The bill has not moved since its introduction. The U.S. solar industry can move forward without China, Tracy Stone-Manning, director of the Bureau of Land Management, told NBC News in April. “I have incredible faith in American ingenuity,” said Stone-Manning, whose agency manages thousands of Southwest desert acres being developed for solar power plants. “If we have to, we’ll start building the solar panels here.” This article was written by Steve Miller for RealClearInvestigations. RealClearInvestigations The carbon footprint for those solar panels is enormous. 1 Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Rob Plant + 2,605 RP June 7, 2022 On 6/2/2022 at 2:28 AM, Jay McKinsey said: So Europe had a plan to transition using Russian natural gas but then because of the war they had to change the plan so that coal sticks around a little longer but renewables are moved forward. I like how the dumb author called out Italy and France. Both of those countries barely use coal at all. They are both at 0.2% of world coal usage. A real nothing burger. I think combined cycle coal fired power station electricity production globally will increase over the next 3-5 years whilst massive wind and solar infrastructure is built. When those renewable projects come on line then the world will see a rapid decline in coal electricity generation. I for one will be happy when that reduction happens not because of climate change but because they are without doubt horrendous polluters. Pollution is the unseen killer. The UK in 2012 had 15.63GW of electricity produced from coal which was roughly half the demand, 7 years later that fell to 0.68GW. In those 7 years no power outages resulted from a lack of supply, the only outages were from storms. I can see the trend starting in other major countries with far higher energy demands than the UK which will impact coal long term. 1 Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
notsonice + 1,063 DM June 7, 2022 (edited) India plans to cut power output from at least 81 coal-fired plants over 4 yrs sxcoal.com Policy, Thermal Coal, Thermal Power 2022-05-31 10:41:50 India is mulling over a reduction of expensive thermal power generation from at least 81 coal-fired power plants in the next four years and a higher supply of cheaper and cleaner energy, Reuters reported, citing a statement from the federal power ministry. The plan is expected to reduce power generation by 81 TWh and help reduce 34.70 million tonnes of coal consumption and 60.20 million tonnes of carbon emissions. India has a total of 173 coal-fired power plants in operation, according to Reuters. India is the second-largest coal producer, consumer, and importer in the world, with its coal-fired power accounting for 75% of the country's total power generation, but is also the world's third-largest CO2 emitter and is 37% shy of its clean energy target for the end of 2022, Reuters reported. The country had suffered a severe power crisis in April, forcing it to abandon plans to zero thermal coal imports as rapidly growing electricity demand strained coal use. However, Japan will not shut down old and expensive power plants but aims to maximum green energy potential and save costs. Phasing out coal would be a huge challenge to India as its nuclear and hydropower growth is slow, and solar power doesn't work during nighttime peaks. India's Ministry of Power plans to reduce coal-fired power generation when renewable energy is available, which will also help ease the pressure on transportation. It is understood that the low railway capacity is also the reason for the shortage of coal supply to power plants in India. Edited June 7, 2022 by notsonice 1 Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Rob Plant + 2,605 RP June 7, 2022 On 6/2/2022 at 9:53 PM, Ecocharger said: That still leaves EVs below the 1% share of market value, Jay. Still just a marginal toy for the well-off people who can afford a third car to park in their driveway as a symbol of liberal political rectitude. Especially in California, which I will visit this summer. Those same wealthy EV owners are paying huge bucks for gasoline to fuel their real drivers, the fossil fuel cars. And which of these new EVs is parked in your driveway, Jay? None of the above? Ecocharger this is crazy Why would anyone spend so much on an EV and then leave it standing on their driveway? Most EV owners own a second car (normally their spouse) which is ICE but that is normally used infrequently and the EV used as much as possible because of fuel costs and maintenance costs (or lack of them). the ICE vehicle is used for longer journeys, ie going on vacation but rarely on a day to day basis. 1 Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Rob Plant + 2,605 RP June 7, 2022 On 6/3/2022 at 6:19 AM, Eyes Wide Open said: Why do you expose the childish mentality of the EU? Renewable energy has proven itself to be a abject failure. I couldnt disagree more. The EU is in a mess because of its reliance on Russian gas (Germany, Italy etc), those countries like Norway, France, UK, Finland, Sweden etc have a huge proportion of renewables/nuclear power generation and they are all doing fine thanks. If the US removed all its renewable powergen it would not be able to cope with demand. 1 Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Rob Plant + 2,605 RP June 7, 2022 On 6/3/2022 at 6:40 AM, Eyes Wide Open said: As ive said you are a person that needs subjective reasoning and help. Germany brought this energy crisis upon themselves. For the love of humanity who destroys coal and nuclear plants on a whim...30 plus plants! I totally agree with this in bold, but the reason they did has nothing to do with renewable energy and everything to do with Russian gas! 1 1 Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Ecocharger + 1,375 DL June 7, 2022 5 hours ago, notsonice said: India plans to cut power output from at least 81 coal-fired plants over 4 yrs sxcoal.com Policy, Thermal Coal, Thermal Power 2022-05-31 10:41:50 India is mulling over a reduction of expensive thermal power generation from at least 81 coal-fired power plants in the next four years and a higher supply of cheaper and cleaner energy, Reuters reported, citing a statement from the federal power ministry. The plan is expected to reduce power generation by 81 TWh and help reduce 34.70 million tonnes of coal consumption and 60.20 million tonnes of carbon emissions. India has a total of 173 coal-fired power plants in operation, according to Reuters. India is the second-largest coal producer, consumer, and importer in the world, with its coal-fired power accounting for 75% of the country's total power generation, but is also the world's third-largest CO2 emitter and is 37% shy of its clean energy target for the end of 2022, Reuters reported. The country had suffered a severe power crisis in April, forcing it to abandon plans to zero thermal coal imports as rapidly growing electricity demand strained coal use. However, Japan will not shut down old and expensive power plants but aims to maximum green energy potential and save costs. Phasing out coal would be a huge challenge to India as its nuclear and hydropower growth is slow, and solar power doesn't work during nighttime peaks. India's Ministry of Power plans to reduce coal-fired power generation when renewable energy is available, which will also help ease the pressure on transportation. It is understood that the low railway capacity is also the reason for the shortage of coal supply to power plants in India. Source? Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Ecocharger + 1,375 DL June 7, 2022 5 hours ago, Rob Plant said: Ecocharger this is crazy Why would anyone spend so much on an EV and then leave it standing on their driveway? Most EV owners own a second car (normally their spouse) which is ICE but that is normally used infrequently and the EV used as much as possible because of fuel costs and maintenance costs (or lack of them). the ICE vehicle is used for longer journeys, ie going on vacation but rarely on a day to day basis. "Longer journeys" means anything over a few miles, I presume. The new affordable EVs are little better than golf carts. Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Ecocharger + 1,375 DL June 7, 2022 (edited) Demand for oil and gasoline is so hot that prices are rapidly escalating and will continue to soar into the stratosphere. https://oilprice.com/Energy/Energy-General/Goldman-Now-Sees-Oil-Hitting-140-This-Summer.html "Goldman Sachs raised its short-term target for Brent crude from $125 to $140. Recovery in Chinese demand and a potential drop in Russian production may further lift prices. Goldman: the global oil market remains in a structural deficit and would need much higher prices to regain its balance." Edited June 7, 2022 by Ecocharger 1 Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Rob Plant + 2,605 RP June 7, 2022 1 minute ago, Ecocharger said: "Longer journeys" means anything over a few miles, I presume. The new affordable EVs are little better than golf carts. Most EV's have a range of 200-250 miles or more so I guess a "long journey" would be more than that. My question is in the US how many times a month does the average American travel more than that, genuinely I have no idea, if its regularly then they arent much use and will only catch on in urban areas. Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Jay McKinsey + 1,489 June 7, 2022 (edited) 7 hours ago, Ecocharger said: There is no evidence of that, actually the demand for fossil fuels is red hot right now. Here is evidence: India aims to cut power output from at least 81 coal-fired plants over 4 years NEW DELHI, May 30 (Reuters) - India plans to reduce power generation from least 81 coal-fired utilities over the next four years, the federal power ministry said in a letter, in an effort to replace expensive thermal generation with cheaper green energy sources. The plan aims to maximize green energy potential and save costs, the letter sent to top energy department officials of state and federal government said, but will not involve shutting down old and expensive power plants. India has 173 coal-fired plants. "The thermal power plants in future shall operate up to the technical minimum to accommodate cheaper renewable energy when it is available," the ministry said in the letter dated May 26. https://www.reuters.com/business/sustainable-business/india-plans-phase-down-least-81-coal-fired-utilities-4-years-document-2022-05-30/ Edited June 7, 2022 by Jay McKinsey Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Boat + 1,315 RG June 7, 2022 12 hours ago, Ron Wagner said: https://www.theepochtimes.com/large-western-corporations-abetting-chinas-human-rights-violations-sen-leo-housakos_4515801.html Basketball player and human rights defender Enes Kanter Freedom (L) takes part in news conference with Canadian Sen. Leo Housakos calling on the Canadian government to ban imports of goods made with forced labour in Xinjiang region of China, in Ottawa on June 6, 2022. (Fred Chartrand/The Canadian Press) CANADA Large Western Corporations Abetting China’s Human Rights Violations: Sen. Leo Housakos By Andrew Chen June 6, 2022 Updated: June 6, 2022 biggersmaller Print 0:003:30 1 Large western corporations that are making money in China are contributing to democratic governments’ neglect of the communist regime’s continued human rights violations, Sen. Leo Housakos said on June 6. Housakos called on the Liberal government to ban imports of goods made with forced labour by Uyghur Muslims in China’s northwestern province of Xinjiang. He was joined at a press conference by Conservative MP Garnett Genuis, U.S. professional basketball star and human rights defender Enes Kanter Freedom, and Sarah Teich, senior fellow at the Macdonald-Laurier Institute. Housakos was asked why the world acted quickly to punish Russia for its invasion of Ukraine, yet allows communist China to infringe on the rights of ethnic and religious minorities, trample on Hong Kong’s democratic system, threaten the self-ruled island of Taiwan, and violate international laws. “I think the bottom line is we have some large, powerful corporations in the western democratic world that are making a lot of money in China, and those corporations have an extraordinary amount of influence on our governments, right across the G-7,” Housakos said, noting that these corporations continue to “aid and abet China’s genocidal regime.” “It’s a sad reality, but that’s what it is. And that’s the discrepancy between why [Western governments] take certain actions, because obviously Russia doesn’t have [foreign investments].” “When countries like China have unfettered access to our large, middle-class, powerful market, they have to align themselves in human rights and democracy where we are, and rule of law. And if they don’t, they shouldn’t have access.” He pointed to a U.S. law that is set to enter into effect later this month that will protect its markets from the inflows of products from Xinjiang possibly tainted with forced labour and human rights abuses, as an example of what Canada can do. He said Canada also needs legislation like his Bill S-204, which he said is unequivocal in banning products from Xinjinag. “The onus shouldn’t be on CBSA [Canada Border Services Agency] to figure out is there one container out of 50 that is legitimate,” Housakos said. “The message should be unequivocal there: interact together, align yourself with what is important for us or you don’t have access to [our markets].” Responding to the same question, Genuis said world leaders view the two cases differently in that China violates its own laws as well as international obligations, whereas Russia transgressed an international boundary. Nevertheless, the leaders of both countries should be held accountable for the violations of human rights and international laws, he said. “Obviously, China is a larger player economically and in terms of its integration within the global system, but I think it’s a clear principle of international human rights that we not let anybody get away with the kind of behaviours that we’re seeing,” he said. Genuis pointed to Senate Bill S-211, which aims to create a reporting mechanism that allows the public to hold companies accountable if they are complicit in the use of forced labour in the manufacture of goods. The bill passed second reading in the House of Commons on June 1. He also noted that another bill that is on the way to being passed addresses the issue of China’s organ harvesting, which the Uyghurs and other minority groups, like the adherents of the spiritual practice Falun Gong, are being subjected to. NBA star Enes Kanter Freedom has in the past several years called out some of his NBA colleagues and major international corporations on the issue of China. “There are so many human rights violations that are happening over there in China, and many countries call it, and I agree to [call it], genocide,” Freedom said. “So we have to call it like it is and we have to do whatever we can to help those innocent people over there.” Andrew Chen Following Andrew Chen is an Epoch Times reporter based in Toronto. These guys act suprised. For decades now we encouraged trade from Chine despite a huge array of broken international norms. Trump and his troops claimed a spine but did nothing to stop any of Chinas transgressions or trade imbalance. Biden won’t do anything either. The Chinese are better than the rest of world at large scale solar. They do it cheaper. I think Biden is more interested in renewable chops than save the Muslims. Blame Iran and troublemakers in the Middle East. give Taiwan thousands of missiles in response for not playing nice. All these boats dragging the South Sea is silly. Give the Ukraine missiles by the thousands capable of taking out Moscow. But I want better solar and bigger tvs in exchange. 1 Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
footeab@yahoo.com + 2,129 June 7, 2022 1 hour ago, Rob Plant said: Most EV's have a range of 200-250 miles or more so I guess a "long journey" would be more than that. My question is in the US how many times a month does the average American travel more than that, genuinely I have no idea, if its regularly then they arent much use and will only catch on in urban areas. 200-->250 miles = in reality = 150-->200 miles brand new due to no one driving to the end of the battery. One no one wants to be stuck. And 2 it is really bad for the battery life. Here in reality, winter happens, dropping the range another 30%(Teslas's etc own numbers, though latest seems to have battery warming so is 15%, but is not present on cheap EV's) 150-->200 = 100-->130 miles The batteries in question on majority of EV's are currently Lithium Manganese, not NMC or LiFePo4, so range over time drops roughly speaking 6X-->8X faster. How to quantify this is not straight forward, so I will ignore this, but will become an ever increasing problem with age of vehicles. Now, my suburban area female family members easily and routinely puts on WAY more mileage a day than 150 miles when shopping especially before holiday's, birthdays, family gatherings, or any other party etc. No, they do not do this every day, only rare delivery services approach that. But once a week? Or once every two weeks? Yes. And we live in a city, not even in true rural. Yea yea, we live in a weird pocket of rural backed by state forest land and county parks so we are rural still, but we are not truly rural. My family living east of the Cascades, routinely put 2X the mileage on their cars as my family does west of the Cascades. When I lived in Ohio... no my families mileage was actually much lower due to small towns/ cities everywhere. Now here out west, road trips are VERY common occurrence and this easily runs into the 400+ mile a day category. My brother's family just drove to Boise 500 miles to see family 2 months ago and also traveled 300miles to Spokane area to see friends 2 weeks ago. Is this typical? No, but nearly everyone I know takes summer road trips(plural not singular) to go glamping, camping, backpacking, kayaking, beach combing, biking, etc. But, that is out here in Western USA. When I lived in Eastern USA, this was not true except for college age on weekends or holidays and majority USA population lives in Eastern USA so people whining about range for the most part are lying... Range 100% is a massive problem for Thanksgiving/Christmas holiday's due to fact families move so often in USA. 1 Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Rob Plant + 2,605 RP June 7, 2022 Ok thanks for the heads up and I agree on the battery issues. For any European who hasnt driven in North America before it is an eye opener when it comes to scale when they finally do. I once did a 7 hour road trip one way and never left Florida, you'd really struggle to do that in most European countries without crossing a border. 1 Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
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