Why shouldn't Americans be allowed to buy this superior product?

[Ford]

Wondering aloud...if buying Chinese made products is such a bad thing, why are Trump ties and MAGA hats not facing steep tariffs as well? Where's the factory in the US that's making all the Trump-branded flags, signs, t-shirts, and gold-plated sneakers?

 

[bilby]

Btw, I looked up a random Chinese EV for sale in Europe, BYD Atto 2, which is a compact SUV. It's about 30,000€, which is certainly not super-cheap!

The BYD Atto 3 sold here goes for a list price of $40,000-$45,000 Australian, which at current exchange rates is US$26,000-$29,000. That's a similar price to the European market.

Nobody's making an SUV to OECD standards for much less.

 

[bilby]

Normally, electricity use is much lower at night. Seems like a perfect time to charge your EV at home.

Sure. But it's the time when almost all electricity in Queensland is coming from coal.

The folks who buy these EVs have solar panels on their houses, and say "I use net zero carbon power to charge my car", by which they mean they buy and use 50kWh of nighttime coal power to charge it, and then (hope to) sell 50kWh of solar power to the grid twelve hours later (if it's not cloudy). This is, of course, a total fucking nonsense. Their car was charged by burning coal. Reality doesn't do "net power use", it does "actual power use".

 

[Jimmy Higgins]

EVs are marginally environmentally better than ICEs.

I would say much more than "marginally".

I would. I'm talking start to finish.

Also, Chinese EVs won't be that cheap. Currently notably cheaper, but not single thousands cheap.

I agree. The $6k price tag is not sustainable once the cars are brought up to US crash test standards, not to mention the manufacturers establish a US dealer network. Although, I think the compulsory dealership model is obsolete and should be done away with.
Btw, I looked up a random Chinese EV for sale in Europe, BYD Atto 2, which is a compact SUV. It's about 30,000€, which is certainly not super-cheap!

Why shouldn't Chinese EVs be sold in the US? I have no good reason to stop it. Personally, I feel EV or H2 infrastructure is cart before the horse as we don't have a remotely green grid yet, and we aren't even on the path to get there.

I think H₂ is not practical for personal mobility, and BEV is the superior technology there.

If H2 could be created with green energy, it would be cleaner than ICE and EV, easily. However, I think H2 production would need to be localized to cut out distribution issues. But we aren't there.

And our grid is much greener than it was say 20 years ago.
View attachment 50642

It is cleaner, but we need near zero CO2. Burning natural gas is better than coal, but it is not what we need.

Note the precipitous decline in coal use and its replacement with both natural gas (due in large part to fracking/shale revolution) and renewables.

Renewables help is a way but it is encouraging some pretty shitty ideas like massive battery storage which is far from green!

Now, some countries have much greener grids. Take France for example.
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Note the prevalence of nuclear power.

Yes, France went nuclear, Germany went solar. There was no breakthrough with solar and the US looks is trying renewables, but it won't get us there.

All of this ignores EVs are not easily recyclable, despite claims being made. A recycler attached to Tesla and Musk is claiming full reclamation, yet is only producing batteries with 30% recycled lithium.