[Martinjlm]

Originally Posted by Evergreen6

Another low-quality automotive piece, with the aforementioned half-truths about EV's, and a fundamental misunderstanding about how a publicly traded company makes decisions.

Originally Posted by MSS1LE

What does he misunderstand?

Originally Posted by Evergreen6

Barra or any other CEO of a publicly traded company doesn't do anything without the confidence of the board, which represents the company's shareholders. What the customer wants is actually secondary to what the shareholders want, although the two are inevitably linked. GM continues to be one of the best-sellers of light pickups in the US, and is also aiming to be a leader in EV's as well. Note that behind the editor's sour comments about EV's, sales of EV's in the US continue to grow year over year. The problem is that automakers have over-estimated demand while infrastructure has been slower to catch up from a position of already being behind.

The article is another misogynistic look at Barra and is obviously anti-EV, and takes a negative stance with regard to GM as a whole because GM "killed" our beloved Camaro. Boring. I consider myself centrist with regards to EV's. I lease an EV for fun, as an experiment to see what it's all about and experience it in my own way, far from any media or internet perception of such. The current limitations of, and public sentiment of EV's can be discussed analytically and without such slant, either for, or against. We get it, Camaro enthusiasts (including myself) are disappointed the model has reached another end. We can do that while acknowledging the Camaro is not currently a focus for GM.

I'm not here to argue. It's all her fault, and the government is making us all buy EV's. Yep. :nods: That's a super-productive way to look at things.

Well stated!!

[Martinjlm]

Originally Posted by Spaceme1117

The electrical grid is being made less reliable by replacing reliable power (nuclear, gas, coal) with unreliable power (solar, wind). That is happening now. Texas found that out in 2021 when their grid collapsed. Just a few days ago, Texas was asking people to not charge their EV's and not use electricity because they did not have enough power as the contribution from "renewables" was nearly zero.

And very few if any new power plants are being built.

EV's have too many issues that will never be solved to be a viable car for most people

The current CEO of GM is a diversity hire, nothing more.

What is needing in the auto industry is a company with a CEO who is willing to tell the government to piss off and then makes care people actually want to buy. But no one has the courage to do that.

The root cause of the Texas grid failure was determined to be Texas’ decision to NOT winter proof the power generation, then getting hit with a rare winter storm that took down the unprotected grid.

From independent news source Reuters… During a historic cold snap that has left millions of Texans without electricity, water, and heat for days, claims that the state’s use of renewable energy sources, specifically wind energy, are to blame have circulated on television and social media. These claims are misleading, as they shift blame for the crisis away from what appears, so far, to be the root cause: record cold temperatures that affected generation and transportation across all fuel types (including, but not limited to, wind energy), combined with the inability of the state’s independent and isolated electricity grid (operated by the Electric Reliability Council of Texas, or ERCOT) to source supplies from elsewhere.

Far from being a diversity hire, GM’s CEO started with the company right out of high school as an engineering student at General Motors Institute (now Kettering University) which was then and now still is one of the country’s leading engineering schools. At one point she very famously did stand up to tell government to piss off. This happened in early 2020 when she stated that GM would not support efforts to block California’s waiver allowing them to set their own emissions and air quality standards.

[Chris Durant]

Not sure why this current disaster of a government is shoving them down our throats ?, Unless those losers are invested in it, which would explain some of it. Also the Save the planet nuts, it isn't going to save anything, it has just as many issues and harm for the planet.

Originally Posted by Mid_Life_Crisis

This pathetic CEO sold GM’s soul to the progressive left and they will pay the price for that. Additionally, shocks me how many people don’t see they are giving up their freedom of movement by going all in on EV…..what happens when government says you can’t charge at certain time due to the grid being overextended. This will happen. Guaranteed. This and a hundred other reasons why 100% EV makes no sense.

[bigd1276]

Originally Posted by Number 3

This “pathetic” CEO just keeps piling on $10 Billion annual profits……year after year after year.

Please do some research on the grid. Even just a couple of Google searches. IF 100% of vehicle sales are EV by 2030 (and this won’t be the case). The grid will do just fine. And for all cars to be EV, assuming 100% of sales are EVs by 2030, it will be 2050 by then. Do you really assume EVs can’t work because in the next 25 years no on will improve the electrical grid? Seriously?

I feel better now knowing that you have confidence in the grid. Please keep this post handy....

[Silveradoss573]

Originally Posted by Number 3

Please do some research on the grid. Even just a couple of Google searches. IF 100% of vehicle sales are EV by 2030 (and this won’t be the case). The grid will do just fine. And for all cars to be EV, assuming 100% of sales are EVs by 2030, it will be 2050 by then. Do you really assume EVs can’t work because in the next 25 years no on will improve the electrical grid? Seriously?

Just keep on drinking that kool-aid that Martin keeps serving up.😂

[GreenZLE]

I've done the math and the power grid cannot handle the total replacement of ICE vehicles with EV's. There is no where near the capacity, especially if you want to charge in 1/2 hour and go.

IMO, the best path forward is to eventually upgrade home power to 480v 3-ph. Why? Because a 2 port fast charger is 62.5KW. If running that on 240v 1ph, thats 260 amps at full capacity. 200a home power is only rated at 80% continuous, or 160a so you have to get your service upgraded to 400a which is actually 320a continuous leaving you 60 amps of overhead. However, 480v 3ph is much more efficient and would cost less on your power bil in the long run due to a couple of reasons. Upgrading to 3ph wont be cheap though!

Now, California has 14 million cars. Its simple math to figure out how much power would be needed to charge all of them at once, but thats not realistic. Is is 1/8th at any given time? Is it a 1/16th at any given time? Is it a 1/32nd? At any rate, the power capacity is monumental but its simple to come up with a number. Consider this too, the power companies will HAVE to regulate EV charging at night because thats when the demand will be highest. I smell disaster!

California is already dealing with brown outs all the time, they are decommissioning carbon based power plants, and the new CARB/SORE regulations for 2024 have already went into effect so small gas engines such as those for back up portable generators will be illegal to sell into California after 2028 so best get em while you can. The drive to eliminate carbon there is in full effect!!!!

On top of all of this, the plan is to eventually have only electric semis operating in California. I've no idea what this will add but Cummins launched Accelera in 2023 to develop electric OTR trucks and bring them to market. It would stand to reason that their main market will be California first.

As someone else pointed out, increasing the demand while lowering the supply doesnt math out right.

[Need4Camaro]

Not to mention the billions they are investing in removing coal and natural gas energy for wind and solar. I'm not against green energy, but they are not ready to replace reliable sources yet. To make them reliable we would need large scale batteries and we would also need to build enough generation plants to 'over-produce' in order to charge those batteries as you cannot charge them if you are only supplying at demand levels.

That is going to cost ALOT of money.

[Mid_Life_Crisis]

If you have to plug-in for a charge to have freedom of travel you are in the hands of government and I don’t trust them to do much of anything right. Especially when you get administrations with crazy agendas.

[SomeGeoffGuy]

Originally Posted by MSS1LE

I find the reasoning pretty funny:

“We’re experiencing global climate change causing unpredictable weather patterns!”


“Really? I have a great idea! Let’s make our electricity sources dependent on the weather! What could go wrong?”

Wow, that is funny! Yea, I remember last summer when California told people not to plug their cars in for rolling blackouts. I live in Michigan, and they are predicting the same thing here with Whitmer trying to make our grid renewable. I will have my Camaro, and I just need enough gas to get the hell out of here when it happens!

-Geoff

[bigd1276]

Originally Posted by GreenZLE

I've done the math and the power grid cannot handle the total replacement of ICE vehicles with EV's. There is no where near the capacity, especially if you want to charge in 1/2 hour and go.

IMO, the best path forward is to eventually upgrade home power to 480v 3-ph. Why? Because a 2 port fast charger is 62.5KW. If running that on 240v 1ph, thats 260 amps at full capacity. 200a home power is only rated at 80% continuous, or 160a so you have to get your service upgraded to 400a which is actually 320a continuous leaving you 60 amps of overhead. However, 480v 3ph is much more efficient and would cost less on your power bil in the long run due to a couple of reasons. Upgrading to 3ph wont be cheap though!

Now, California has 14 million cars. Its simple math to figure out how much power would be needed to charge all of them at once, but thats not realistic. Is is 1/8th at any given time? Is it a 1/16th at any given time? Is it a 1/32nd? At any rate, the power capacity is monumental but its simple to come up with a number. Consider this too, the power companies will HAVE to regulate EV charging at night because thats when the demand will be highest. I smell disaster!

California is already dealing with brown outs all the time, they are decommissioning carbon based power plants, and the new CARB/SORE regulations for 2024 have already went into effect so small gas engines such as those for back up portable generators will be illegal to sell into California after 2028 so best get em while you can. The drive to eliminate carbon there is in full effect!!!!

On top of all of this, the plan is to eventually have only electric semis operating in California. I've no idea what this will add but Cummins launched Accelera in 2023 to develop electric OTR trucks and bring them to market. It would stand to reason that their main market will be California first.

As someone else pointed out, increasing the demand while lowering the supply doesnt math out right.

But what does increased demand with lowering supply do?CHA-CHING $$$$$$$

[The Maverick]

Originally Posted by Martinjlm

Far from being a diversity hire, GM’s CEO started with the company right out of high school as an engineering student at General Motors Institute (now Kettering University) which was then and now still is one of the country’s leading engineering schools. At one point she very famously did stand up to tell government to piss off. This happened in early 2020 when she stated that GM would not support efforts to block California’s waiver allowing them to set their own emissions and air quality standards.

I think the fair inference is that he was claiming that she was a diversity hire as CEO . . . so saying that she was qualified to be hired in her original position as an engineer doesn't really rebut his claim at all.

[79 TransAm that never was]

Originally Posted by Edwardo

This is an interesting read... well written.
https://theweeklydriver.com/2024/01/...ws-gms-future/

Thanks! Good read.
EV - Extended Vacation. You'll need an extended vacation if you travel more then 50 miles from your home in an EV.
EV's aren't about "saving the planet". EV's are all about taking away our freedom of movement.

It comes as no surprise to this former gm employee that they stopped listening to their customers when gm didn't even listen to it's employees!
gm has always been top heavy, but back in the day they still managed to put out products people liked. gm became lazy, gave up without trying, and blamed everyone but themselves for their poor sales.

Rather than fighting, gm just eliminated divisions driving those divisions loyal customers to their competition. Employees could see the problems a mile away, yet upper management chugged along, became yes men for bad ideas and then blamed all of their problems on their assembly workers.

I sold all of my gm stock the moment they went on their "downsizing" craze on the factory floor, while upper management stayed intact. Every employee on the floor knew that gm was on a path to bankruptcy. Killing the Camaro is just another example of what's really wrong at gm...gm has been run by imbeciles for far too long!

[Capricio]

here's a video of the Munro evaluation of the Ultium stamped steel million-weld skateboard,

https://youtu.be/jB_vDkaO3hU

https://news.yahoo.com/gmc-hummer-ev...175600928.html

All the General's eggs appear to be in this basket and I fear for this company's future, esp since there seem to be so many issues with mass producing it so far.

[MT-SS1LE]

Bottom line is consumers DO NOT want EV's. Sure, you have yuppies buying Teslas, but that does not mean your working class American wants them. If they did, they would not be languishing on dealer lots (Ford F150 anyone). Americans want reliable and affordable transportation, and EV's ain't it. They can't tow much for long, they suck in cold weather, and you better budget $10K-$30K when the battery dies. If the government were not forcing the car manufacturers to produce these boring appliances due to global warming BS, they would only sell in California. It is absolutely laughable that the government thinks we will all be driving these boring, unreliable cars in 10 years. Never gonna happen!