Sobering News for the Volt - Production Shutdown

Status
Not open for further replies.
Like other's have mentioned, where does the electricity come from to charge the volt? Coal fired power plants, those evil fossil fuels! What's the volt going to do to you're monthly electric bill? Nobody tells you that! Electric cars are a zero sum game, still have to have fossil fuels to supply the electricity.

Also, there is a company out here called Abroad Solar, that is on the verge of going bankrupt. The Obama admin gave this company a 2 billion dollar loan! Can you say "Solyndra"!
 
Last edited:
Originally Posted By: subiedriver
Like other's have mentioned, where does the electricity come from to charge the volt? Coal fired power plants, those evil fossil fuels! What's the volt going to do to you're monthly electric bill? Nobody tells you that! Electric cars are a zero sum game, still have to have fossil fuels to supply the electricity.

Also, there is a company out here called Abroad Solar, that is on the verge of going bankrupt. The Obama admin gave this company a 2 billion dollar loan! Can you say "Solyndra"!


That's why I've always maintained that we need to build more nuclear power plants to replace the coal and oil fired ones we have now. New designs from Westinghouse, Toshiba, and GE are much safer than the old ones. They finally approved a couple for construction in georgia, let's get with the program rest of the country.
 
Originally Posted By: Nick R
Originally Posted By: subiedriver
Like other's have mentioned, where does the electricity come from to charge the volt? Coal fired power plants, those evil fossil fuels! What's the volt going to do to you're monthly electric bill? Nobody tells you that! Electric cars are a zero sum game, still have to have fossil fuels to supply the electricity.

Also, there is a company out here called Abroad Solar, that is on the verge of going bankrupt. The Obama admin gave this company a 2 billion dollar loan! Can you say "Solyndra"!


That's why I've always maintained that we need to build more nuclear power plants to replace the coal and oil fired ones we have now. New designs from Westinghouse, Toshiba, and GE are much safer than the old ones. They finally approved a couple for construction in georgia, let's get with the program rest of the country.


AND this should be DONE well before we think about electric anything for vehicles.

ONCE we have the infrastructure in place then we could have an intelligent discussion.

But that will not happen that requires the "p" word
Click to reveal..
and thought instead of what we have today.

Bill
 
funny thing about the p word. When using it everyone seems to think things are to expensive, so instead they pay 10x as much reacting after the fact. I see it all the time on a micro level in my line of work.
 
Originally Posted By: Bill in Utah
Originally Posted By: Nick R
Originally Posted By: subiedriver
Like other's have mentioned, where does the electricity come from to charge the volt? Coal fired power plants, those evil fossil fuels! What's the volt going to do to you're monthly electric bill? Nobody tells you that! Electric cars are a zero sum game, still have to have fossil fuels to supply the electricity.

Also, there is a company out here called Abroad Solar, that is on the verge of going bankrupt. The Obama admin gave this company a 2 billion dollar loan! Can you say "Solyndra"!


That's why I've always maintained that we need to build more nuclear power plants to replace the coal and oil fired ones we have now. New designs from Westinghouse, Toshiba, and GE are much safer than the old ones. They finally approved a couple for construction in georgia, let's get with the program rest of the country.


AND this should be DONE well before we think about electric anything for vehicles.

ONCE we have the infrastructure in place then we could have an intelligent discussion.

But that will not happen that requires the "p" word
Click to reveal..
and thought instead of what we have today.

Bill



Infrastructure: The chicken or the egg.

Nobody is going to invest in infrastructure until there is a demand for it and there's never going to be a demand until the infrastructure concerns are settled. A vicious cycle.

Who decides what infrastructure gets the most attention? The oil companies want you to invest in more pipelines and drilling to further a petroleum future. Greenies want investment in solar and wind, to reduce the petrolium use. Nuclear has clear benefits and significant dangers, much of which hinges on who underwrites and insures such high risk projects (hint: It's our government, who is just awash in cash to dole out). Then there's the electrical grid, which hasn't received much atteniton since the entire Northeast went dark for a few days in 2003.

That leads into true future energy sources, things like hydrogen. A hydrogen future will never exist until there is wide scale production and distribution. All the folks in the above paragraph (oil companies, nuclear providers, and green energy suppliers) don't want to see this come to fruition, since it means a dent in their own plans.

All this happening in a nation that has no substantial national energy policy. Is this a surprise?
 
FLASH! G(overnment) M(otors) releases the name of the NEWEST & BEST(EST!) Hydrogen Powered Vehicle:

The NEW GM Hindenburg

Cheers!
 
Most folks can only afford one car and won't buy a botique vehicle for commuting that can't be used on weekends for longer trips. Practical hybrids like the Ford Escape that get good milage and do double duty (lots in NYC taxi fleets) sell well.

Many urban areas can barely meet peak demad loads on hot summer days as it is....now add a few hundred thousand 240 volt quick chargers....folks might get an off-peak incentive, but if they need the car, they will still plug in when arriving home from work.
 
Quote:
That leads into true future energy sources, things like hydrogen. A hydrogen future will never exist until there is wide scale production and distribution. All the folks in the above paragraph (oil companies, nuclear providers, and green energy suppliers) don't want to see this come to fruition, since it means a dent in their own plans.

All this happening in a nation that has no substantial national energy policy. Is this a surprise?

But we have one HECK! of a BIG GIGANTIC Department of Energy!

And a HUGE Department of Education, too! (with no substantial education policy, either)

Cheers!
 
Originally Posted By: MrHorspwer

Infrastructure: The chicken or the egg.

Nobody is going to invest in infrastructure until there is a demand for it and there's never going to be a demand until the infrastructure concerns are settled. A vicious cycle.

Who decides what infrastructure gets the most attention? The oil companies want you to invest in more pipelines and drilling to further a petroleum future. Greenies want investment in solar and wind, to reduce the petrolium use. Nuclear has clear benefits and significant dangers, much of which hinges on who underwrites and insures such high risk projects (hint: It's our government, who is just awash in cash to dole out). Then there's the electrical grid, which hasn't received much atteniton since the entire Northeast went dark for a few days in 2003.

That leads into true future energy sources, things like hydrogen. A hydrogen future will never exist until there is wide scale production and distribution. All the folks in the above paragraph (oil companies, nuclear providers, and green energy suppliers) don't want to see this come to fruition, since it means a dent in their own plans.

All this happening in a nation that has no substantial national energy policy. Is this a surprise?


Who? the big G of course. They invisioned this EV plan afterall. So instead of dumping money on EV vehicles, they should start building some nuklear plants. Once you have the chicken, the eggs will come soon after. But makes too much sense.
 
Originally Posted By: Norm Olt
FLASH! G(overnment) M(otors) releases the name of the NEWEST & BEST(EST!) Hydrogen Powered Vehicle:

The NEW GM Hindenburg

Cheers!

Real value added here...
33.gif
37.gif
 
Last edited:
Originally Posted By: 01rangerxl
Originally Posted By: jim302
At the end of the day, cost was the real issue. >$30,000 is a lot of money for an economical car.


Probably true. A local dealer is advertising leftover new 2011 Impalas for about $13K. The Volt would have to save a lot of gas for the premium to pay off.

Thats a heck of a deal, the Impala gets pretty decent mileage too for a big car. Unless gas prices really explode the Implala is the far better buy; low purchase price, operating costs and proven reliability.

Too bad GM lets top selling models like that languish for years without so much as a new grille to freshen things up.
 
After reading all these negative posts about GM and the Volt. And and alot miss informed info being posted "can only go 600 miles".

No wander the country is in the shape its in.
33.gif


It's so funny how people don't like change or something different. Such as Valvoline's NextGen product "I'm not putting the old used oil in my car" thoughts.

Yes, the Volt is costly to buy. But what new tech is not ? And yes it it new tech in the mass produced auto field. People may say the Prius is cheaper and ect.. But the Prius, at least not yet can go up to highway speeds, up to 50 miles without burning a drop of gas. The Volt can do that plus that go unlimited miles on gas fillups.

As for the Leaf. That's a short range commuter car, that you have to have a second car to go on longer trips.

I'm not pro Volt or GM or a greeny. Shoot I drive a gas hog. But it suits my needs and it's paid for. But I do support any new tech that helps us less fuel and oil. Which the Volt does in the right markets. But so say it's a waste, and should have never been built or money spent on this type of tech are just closed minded people.

Rant off.
 
Problem with planning is that, par4ticularly on this board, it's associated with one of the C words, as opposed to the other C word which is supposed to provide all things necessary as and when they become necessary.

In electricity, it's most "economical" to run ageing inefficient plant, because the $2B required for a new one has already been paid off decades ago, and even 'though the price of fuel is going up, $2B is a lot of dough to pay out today for savings tomorrow.

The Volt sales are proving this...how many Volt advocates on this board have anted up and bought one because they are such a good idea ?

Would the advocates have a 1 Volt per family policy imposed on the populace at large ?

That's the problem with planning...it has to be visionary, not lobbied, and to the majority, it has to be uncomfortable as it's something that you wouldn't normally do based on experience.
 
I agree that it was the price that killed this car.

I also really can't see it coming back, even with gas prices rising.

With the Cruze, the Sonic, and the Spark in the line-up, GM doesn't really NEED the Volt, it will have plenty of cars under $25k that will get 35+mpg.
 
Problem is that with electricity, it is the ultimate in supply and demand...every time you flick a light switch, the frequency drops a little, and a generator somewehere, 200+ tonnes of steel and copper spinning at 3,600 RPM responds to provide the increased demand...if the capacity isn't there, brownouts start.

When you fill up, you are using part of a pool of potentially weeks of supply, your individual impact being nill.

Everyone coming home from work, hitting the AC, and cooking their pork chops noticeably affects the grid...add plugging in the Volt after a commute home, and even more "excess" capacity is required.

Just for info...on a 500MW power station
Turbine/Generator train 200+ tonnes, 100' long.
Sitting spinning at 3,000-3,600RPM on a train of 10-15 bearings.

Fed a half tonne per second of steam at 2600psi, 1000F

From a boiler that's 200 feet high, 60 feet square, and swallows air at 0.6 tonnes per second, and coal at 120lb per second (in a day, consider 100 yards square, 2 feet deep), producing 100 yards square by 6" deep of ash to be gotten rid of.

Heat rejected from the cycle is released by evaporating around 6M gallons of water.

It's big...plugging a car into a power point does not make it any smaller.
 
GM should have marketed the Volt with Apple, paint it white only and call it the iCar.

would have sold a billion of 'em.

then the next year, sell it only in black, change the color of the start button, call it the iCar 2 and sell another billion.
 
Originally Posted By: mpvue
GM should have marketed the Volt with Apple, paint it white only and call it the iCar.

would have sold a billion of 'em.

then the next year, sell it only in black, change the color of the start button, call it the iCar 2 and sell another billion.

That made me laugh pretty good!
 
Status
Not open for further replies.

Similar threads

A
Usefulness of running radiator fans after shutdown?
2 3
Replies
40
Views
4K
eljefino
GON
Another article about vehicles sending data to their insurance company via Lexus Nexus
2 3 4
Replies
64
Views
2K
Invisible
S
DOJ and EPA Targeting eBay for Selling Defeat Devices
2 3
Replies
42
Views
2K
oil pan 4
D
Oil changes for warranty
3 4 5
Replies
88
Views
5K
nicholas
N
Bizarre Electrical Issue/No Start On 2013 LaCrosse
2
Replies
33
Views
3K
Lacrosse13
Back
Top