In other words, they would work like hybrid trolleybuses.

Of course, this would require a serious government program. As for now, the electric car efforts are half scam, half technology development program.

Yes, that’s a big deal. Jerry Pournelle kept saying we really need better batteries. He also kept saying a battery is not a power source, but batteries are still important.

As taxpayers we’re all helping to pay for stuff we personally might never use. Google “corporate welfare” to see the extent of the problem of government subsidies; Tesla’s share of US government largesse is minuscule.

If I had a choice, though, I’d vote to get rid of all subsidies, too. Let individuals decide how to spend their own money.

PS: Same as all subsidies. Get rid of all of them. No deductions or subsidies for anything or anybody.

Electric vehicle subsidies (federal and state) for automakers are hard to estimate, certainly they amount to billions of dollars per year for as long as they are in force, with no equivalent for ICE vehicles.

The International Monetary Fund estimates the total global incentives to the oil and gas industry amount to $5.3 trillion per year, compared to about $120 billion for renewables.

Anyway, I think there’s a good case for seeing if there’s a way to do electric vehicles. I’d also say that if you drove a Tesla for a day, you’d never go back to those noisy, slow ICE cars.

Converting coal, gas and oil into electricity (the logistics and trucking businesses cannot afford to wait for natural supply sources to be there when they need them) and then piping it with the attendant loss through transfer to plug-in points to recharge batteries doesn’t seem like a good idea.

I know lots of people get excited about electric vehicles (I have a relative who almost swoons at the very thought of electric cars everywhere) but they will have to go some to beat gasoline and even diesel.

Agreed, for now. I want a motorcycle with big batteries for an electric scooter option. For going five miles or so inside a city, or for the first six blocks in a residential neighborhood before you open the pipes up. Or, killer app here, to get the damn thing moving when it’s too cold to start but the streets are still dry and safe. Bikers tend to like to fiddle, and the smart ones brag to the rest of us. Something good might well happen.

Who cares about energy density when you realize that the Tesla Semi’s standard size cab without a trailer – just the truck part – can go from 0 to 60 in five seconds? Pulling the maximum load legal on US highways, 80,000 pounds, it does 0-60 in 20 seconds. Density, schmensity.

The battery capacity is more than big enough for long-haul trucking. My Tesla has “only” about 250 miles of range, but there are Superchargers every 150 miles (or less) everywhere I need to go, and I can pick up 150 miles of charge in 30-40 minutes. Tesla says they can provide their usual 80% charge to a truck in thirty minutes, which is barely enough time for a decent stop.

Just like a network of Superchargers is Tesla’s unbeatable ace in the hole in the car market, its Megachargers makes trucker “range anxiety” disappear.