The idea that electric cars are lowering demand is ridiculous.

[MASTERMIND + 7]

The idea that electric cars are lowering demand is ridiculous.  Electric cars haven’t made a dent, just a small scratch in oil demand. Electric cars are only 0.2% of light-duty vehicles, and cost so much only the upper 5% can afford them, even with subsidies.

 I suspect the peak oil demand idea is one more attempt by the wealthy and powerful to hide peak oil, because peak oil studies have shown that if peak oil were acknowledged, stock markets all over the world would crash since the economy would be shrinking from then on and debts couldn’t be repaid. Credit would freeze and dry up. Panic and social disorder would follow.

https://un-denial.com/2018/07/04/by-alice-friedemann-on-fake-peak-oil-demand/

 

Edited August 24, 2018 by MASTERMIND

[TomTom + 183]

... but but but... Elon Musk was gonna build EVs for the masses!

[NickW + 2,714]

3 hours ago, MASTERMIND said:

The idea that electric cars are lowering demand is ridiculous.  Electric cars haven’t made a dent, just a small scratch in oil demand. Electric cars are only 0.2% of light-duty vehicles, and cost so much only the upper 5% can afford them, even with subsidies.

 I suspect the peak oil demand idea is one more attempt by the wealthy and powerful to hide peak oil, because peak oil studies have shown that if peak oil were acknowledged, stock markets all over the world would crash since the economy would be shrinking from then on and debts couldn’t be repaid. Credit would freeze and dry up. Panic and social disorder would follow.

https://un-denial.com/2018/07/04/by-alice-friedemann-on-fake-peak-oil-demand/

 

I am not certain anyone is making that point. 

You are overlooking Hybrids which are a much bigger share of the market and offer considerable improvement over conventional ICE's in terms of fuel economy. I did a 110 mile trip to Heathrow today in my Auris Estate (similar to Prius) - round trip fuel economy 64 mpg (imperial). 

[Jan van Eck + 7,558]

1 minute ago, NickW said:

I am not certain anyone is making that point. 

You are overlooking Hybrids which are a much bigger share of the market and offer considerable improvement over conventional ICE's in terms of fuel economy. I did a 110 mile trip to Heathrow today in my Auris Estate (similar to Prius) - round trip fuel economy 64 mpg (imperial). 

MY 1969 Fiat 124 Spyder convertible two-seater with a dual overhead cam and a five-speed developed 54 mpg, and it was plenty fast! 

Then one fine day I needed to do a rebuild on the carburetor, and the fuel mileage dropped way down, to 36.  I called up the Fiat dealer to make inquiries.  Turns out that Fiat had swapped the original jets for larger-aperture jets for the North American market, because the feed-back they got was that the car was considered "too slow" on acceleration(!).  What did those complainers want, a Corvette with turbo boost?  I mean, come on!  That little fiat weighed only 2,300 lbs and that little motor developed 110 hp, plenty fast.  And all that was a half-century ago. 

[NickW + 2,714]

Just now, Jan van Eck said:

MY 1969 Fiat 124 Spyder convertible two-seater with a dual overhead cam and a five-speed developed 54 mpg, and it was plenty fast! 

Then one fine day I needed to do a rebuild on the carburetor, and the fuel mileage dropped way down, to 36.  I called up the Fiat dealer to make inquiries.  Turns out that Fiat had swapped the original jets for larger-aperture jets for the North American market, because the feed-back they got was that the car was considered "too slow" on acceleration(!).  What did those complainers want, a Corvette with turbo boost?  I mean, come on!  That little fiat weighed only 2,300 lbs and that little motor developed 110 hp, plenty fast.  And all that was a half-century ago. 

Yes but my car weighs about a 3rd more and can carry in this instance 4 people plus the tonne of luggage my wife and MIL brought back from OZ. 

Also I'd fancy my chances somewhat more in a collision than in your Fiat. 

[Jan van Eck + 7,558]

4 hours ago, NickW said:

Also I'd fancy my chances somewhat more in a collision than in your Fiat. 

Your chances in a collision in that little sports car would be precisely zero. Which is why I drive a 4,400-lb BMW with a big heavy V-8 up front!

[Jan van Eck + 7,558]

Electricity is not merely for propulsion.   I have been doing a rebuild on the braking system on  my big tank BMW, where the rotors get all rusty in Vermont's salty winters, and the replacement costs each are a hundred dollars.  So I have developed a system using a chemical bath soaking (to loosen up and eat the outer layers of rust) and then a neutralization bath in baking soda, and then immediate immersion into an electrolysis tank to remove the rest of the rust.  When the part ends up coming out of the tank, it is remarkably clean.  Then a drying in an oven, polishing with a wire bit in a drill, a light coat of primer paint to  keep it from immediately re-rusting, and - bravo! - I have a restored rotor.  For all four wheel positions I have just saved myself $400.  Do the same with the calipers and I have saved another $400.  

So this sets me to thinking:  the cost of the electricity for the electrolysis is peanuts, I am using 12 volts out of a garage battery charger, and coupled with a rotor lathe for $6,000 new and I have this new business ready to go.  Put some old retired machinist on there on a share basis, park it in the shop, and watch the dollars roll in.  Chemistry and physics:  not just for drilling for oil!

[ronwagn + 6,290]

Hybrids make sense just as do diesel-electric locomotives though I would prefer to see natural gas as the fuel for most transportation. 

[NickW + 2,714]

13 hours ago, ronwagn said:

Hybrids make sense just as do diesel-electric locomotives though I would prefer to see natural gas as the fuel for most transportation. 

CNG would be an excellent substitute for heavy goods and public transport vehicles. 

No reason why you can't combine the benefits of CNG and hybrid/PHEV  tech for super efficient & clean transport

[Bhimsen Pachawry + 72]

22 hours ago, NickW said:

I am not certain anyone is making that point. 

You are overlooking Hybrids which are a much bigger share of the market and offer considerable improvement over conventional ICE's in terms of fuel economy. I did a 110 mile trip to Heathrow today in my Auris Estate (similar to Prius) - round trip fuel economy 64 mpg (imperial). 

You get same mileages with ordinary diesel cars which give 28 km per litre and upto 22 when using AC. Imperial gallon is 4.5 litres. So, the mileage obtained would be close to 100km for it. This is same as 64MPG.

Check some of the high mileage cars here:

https://www.carblogindia.com/best-mileage-cars-in-india/

 

The Hybrids are definitely better in fuel economy but it will be marginal and not to be mistaken as a substitute. Hybrid vehicle is like King cobra venom while normal ICE ones are like cyanide. Limited difference and nothing to glorify.

[Tim Turley + 27]

I think hydrogen is the fuel of the future... 5 minute fillups and no dead weight (battery)... Toyota and BMW are on this, and the Koreans just jumped in.  EV's will be big paperweights in about 10 years when landfills are full of lithium cells leaking out into the groundwater.

https://driving.ca/auto-news/news/the-future-still-belongs-to-hydrogen-cars-not-electrics-say-auto-execs

[Baronyemi + 3]

Crude oil will experience a bullish throughout the coming eerl

[DanilKa + 443]

In Beijing there is a lottery system for those who wants to get a car. Chance of winning is like 1 in 1000. For electric cars - it is just a que, albeit a long one. 

https://www.economist.com/china/2018/04/19/why-a-licence-plate-costs-more-than-a-car-in-shanghai

Doubt they will play this game for long as most (practically all) people live in apartments and charging require additional cabling - won’t be long before it overloads the grid. So dynamics in overcrowded places is different and government incentives/subsidies/restrictions may skew the market and drive EV share somewhat. 

Breakthrough in battery technology is another possibility but that’s wishful thinking atm. 

Agree that peak demand is a bogus construct. I’ve heard BP chief economist peddling it. Not sure on motives, maybe genuine or maybe realisation they are not winning resource game hence trying to coerce NOC info sharing theirs “before it become worthless”. 

Humankind always expanded to the available resources and I don’t see this changing. Once energy become less cheap and abundant - will be another story. 

Edited August 26, 2018 by DanilKa

[Eric Dexter + 2]

It's realy a long list of things lowering oil demand.  Batteries, ethanol, bio diesel, renewable diesel.  Gasoline demand doesn't have to drop for oil demand to go down.  You can even produce carbon fuels like methanol or ethanol from carbon dioxide, water and electricity.  You also have some pure hydrogen.  The latter may operate somewhat like Bitcoin mining where they go to the lower cost electricity sites.

[DanilKa + 443]

On 8/25/2018 at 8:59 AM, Jan van Eck said:

So this sets me to thinking:  the cost of the electricity for the electrolysis is peanuts, I am using 12 volts out of a garage battery charger, and coupled with a rotor lathe for $6,000 new and I have this new business ready to go.  Put some old retired machinist on there on a share basis, park it in the shop, and watch the dollars roll in.  Chemistry and physics:  not just for drilling for oil!

Any car mechanic does just that, except they are using lathe remove worn ledge and you can only do that with enough residual thickness. Restoring metal won’t be practical/cost efficient. 

This market is already taken:) good thinking, though. 

[DanilKa + 443]

30 minutes ago, Eric Dexter said:

It's realy a long list of things lowering oil demand.  Batteries, ethanol, bio diesel, renewable diesel.  Gasoline demand doesn't have to drop for oil demand to go down.  You can even produce carbon fuels like methanol or ethanol from carbon dioxide, water and electricity.  You also have some pure hydrogen.  The latter may operate somewhat like Bitcoin mining where they go to the lower cost electricity sites.

Transportation accounts for 60% of oil use, if I remember right. 

Things you’ve listed doesn’t begin to scratch surface yet and will meet with materials availability constrains. It all have merit and ultimately may add up to something visible, just shear number of cars to be replaced and whole new infrastructure to fuel it is often overlooked by the “wizards”. 

https://itunes.apple.com/au/podcast/freakonomics-radio/id354668519?mt=2&i=1000418341871

[NickW + 2,714]

14 hours ago, Bhimsen Pachawry said:

You get same mileages with ordinary diesel cars which give 28 km per litre and upto 22 when using AC. Imperial gallon is 4.5 litres. So, the mileage obtained would be close to 100km for it. This is same as 64MPG.

Check some of the high mileage cars here:

https://www.carblogindia.com/best-mileage-cars-in-india/

 

The Hybrids are definitely better in fuel economy but it will be marginal and not to be mistaken as a substitute. Hybrid vehicle is like King cobra venom while normal ICE ones are like cyanide. Limited difference and nothing to glorify.

I never made a claim that Hybrids could achieve significant fuel savings over diesels but I would be surprised to see a diesel of similar size and load (in this case) achieve 64mpg. My brother has a Nissan Qashqai diesel and that is lucky to achieves 55mpg on similar runs.

In regard to the Indian cars you quote, even were they legal on western roads (in most cases probably not - the kerb weights are far too light for cars of that size) the claimed fuel economy is a a rolling road test and these bare little relationship to what you get on the road. 

If you want to combine diesel with hybrid tech this is easy and the best way is to build a series disel (rather than parallel) where the engine acts as a generator and the electric motors drive the wheels. 

Then of course you have to factor in the particulate and NOX pollution which is a magnitude higher with diesel engines compared to petrol. 

[NickW + 2,714]

12 hours ago, Tim Turley said:

I think hydrogen is the fuel of the future... 5 minute fillups and no dead weight (battery)... Toyota and BMW are on this, and the Koreans just jumped in.  EV's will be big paperweights in about 10 years when landfills are full of lithium cells leaking out into the groundwater.

https://driving.ca/auto-news/news/the-future-still-belongs-to-hydrogen-cars-not-electrics-say-auto-execs

The fuel cell and highly reinforced Hydrogen tank isn't equivalent deadweight? 

Unless things have changed you have to use approx 40% of the equivalent energy in the hydrogen fuel to compress it into a space similar to that of a conventional fuel tank. 

Where is the Hydrogen likely to come from - Natural Gas. 

There maybe a bit more convenience on running a fuel cell but the energy losses in each system have to be a lot higher for fuel cell compared to EV. 

[Billyjack + 58]

EV's will never significantly reduce the use of gasoline/diesel, until there is a charging while driving mechanism. In the USA mechanical transportation were all preceded  by the construction of roads and rails before autos and trains became commonplace. The main reason this has not been done is there was no way to charge you for the usage until now.

[Bharath + 12]

On 8/24/2018 at 10:18 PM, MASTERMIND said:

The idea that electric cars are lowering demand is ridiculous.  Electric cars haven’t made a dent, just a small scratch in oil demand. Electric cars are only 0.2% of light-duty vehicles, and cost so much only the upper 5% can afford them, even with subsidies.

 I suspect the peak oil demand idea is one more attempt by the wealthy and powerful to hide peak oil, because peak oil studies have shown that if peak oil were acknowledged, stock markets all over the world would crash since the economy would be shrinking from then on and debts couldn’t be repaid. Credit would freeze and dry up. Panic and social disorder would follow.

https://un-denial.com/2018/07/04/by-alice-friedemann-on-fake-peak-oil-demand/

 

Your arguments will die under the tyres of electric trucks and buses. I though agree that electric cars cant make a dent on oil demand. a million bus and million trucks will dent 2 million barrels of oil every day.. 

[John Foote + 1,135]

I drive a 2018 4 door sedan, silly amounts of power, in the sport mode I have to be careful not to smoke the tires, and it gets 30MPG at 80mph. The 71 Ford I had in the early 70s, huge V-8, same sort of driving, I'd be happy with 12 mpg, and driven hard did much worse. A 65 Beetle by modern standards is a gas guzzler, and OMG was it underpowered. Efficiencies, and modified behavior, effect demand a lot over time. Don't look to all-electric as the only thing effecting consumption. An HVAC today is better, and uses a fraction of the power of an old system. What really drives increases in demand is the economic expansion in China, India, and hopefully one day, Africa. 

[ronwagn + 6,290]

Meanwhile, back in the realities of the near future. Not much will change until gasoline and diesel prices go way up and natural gas will be charging most of the electric vehicles. The smart money is on natural gas for large vehicles but that will wait until gasoline and diesel prices go up. 

[entertenter + 24]

hydogen, high pressure tanks, fuel cells, electrolysis apparatus has been around for ages. Long before Lithium batteries were invented. If I am correct, from 1960'es. If there was any reason, or profit to build hydrogen cars, they were already here. in mass. Instead Battery Electric Vehicles (BEV) appeared.
There are fundamental problems that do not allow for hydrogen economy to emerge

- energy efficiency - of 100% electricity at input, only 10-15% reach wheels. 50% is wasted at hydrolysis, following 50% is wasted at fuel cell add gas compression to 700bar. plus other hydrogen infrastructure energy consumption. Thats why there is no electrolysis plants. It is a waste of noble energy form - electricity.
- hydrogen is made of natural gas, which is fossil fuel. To avoid losses at hydrolysis.

In the end, it is more economical to burn natural gas directly in ICE car than build fancy hydrogen infrastructure and have a car with steam locomotive efficiency.

[entertenter + 24]

I remember, during 1980's there were significant efforts to increase ICE efficiency via increasing engine temperature. As the higher the temperature difference between gas expansion start and end, the better the heat engine efficiency. I remember, some examples of these high temperature engines, they were made of ceramics, and were red hot while running. But unfortunately these engines did not last long, and they were prohibitively expensive to produce.
Recent increases in ICE efficiencies are mainly due to usage of better materials and oils, to minimize internal losses and fuel waste minimization using correct fuel amounts and burning it most efficient ways possible. All this, without the need to increase Carnot' cycle efficiency by rising engine temperature.

[JunoTen + 118]

It's ridiculous now, but when it happens it will be much less ridiculous...

It's not just electric cars, it's autonomous electric cars. They will be used in services that will be cheaper than buying or owning a car, which will make oil demand plummet.

By the end of this year Waymo will launch a commercial service with no security drivers in Arizona. It will steadily scale up with other actors in play such as GM. The move is supported by China, a country that simply does not want to keep buying oil.

Oil demand will peak in 2020 and fall by 30% by 2030, without considering electric planes.

More in this video https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ox5LtxqQNHw