I just want a car that doesn't spy on me
this post was submitted on 05 May 2025
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How does the apocalypse make evs future proof?
This comic seems to imply that the outcome of climate change will be dependent on individuals' choice of personal vehicle, and not on the cars themselves or the systems that keep people reliant on them. EVs will not save us from climate change. They are an attempt to prolong the life of the auto industry as we move into a future that must move past motornormativity.
I think the bigger issue is that this comic seems to imply climate change will summon meteors.
I don't see how this comic talks about climate change at all. It's basically a long winded way to say "haha some people won't be ready to adopt new tech until the literal apocalypse"
While I absolutely support the death of the car by replacing it with mass transit and walkable cities, there's no way in hell that's going to happen on a large scale within my lifetime if ever. EV's may be an attempt to prolong the life of the auto industry, but it is a very successful attempt.
I did a quick googling to get some numbers, and it looks like in 2022, 28% of US emissions were from transportation. Another 25% was from electricity generation. Fix those two things alone and you've more than cut your emissions in half.
Getting people to switch to electric cars will go a long way towards slowing down/stopping climate change, and is actually doable. In North America, getting everyone to change their lifestyles, redesigning city layouts, and actually building the public transportation to support it is a process that will take generations to complete. We don't have that kind of time. Better to get people into electric cars now, while we work towards the long term goal of not needing them.
An EV still produces about 30% of the lifetime CO2 emissions of an equivalent ICE, assuming a 100% clean grid [1]. So unless we change the systems that are putting more and more cars on the road, and increasing vehicle miles traveled each year, emissions will continue to rise.
Cars only really became available to the public in the 20s or 30s. I bet your city was overrun by cars by the 50s. Cities drastically changed over just a few decades. Why should it take significantly longer to go in the reverse direction? Other than a lack of political will.
edit: I'm not against EVs overall. I know there will always be a need for cars/trucks to some extent, and I think they should all be EVs. But don't let that be a distraction from actual meaningful climate action.
So that source specifically states that the production emissions are a best estimate, and not thoroughly examined in the scope of that study. In the not-so-theoretical case where the grid is carbon free (there are locations in North America where this is very close to true) that completely changes the math on the production emissions. That study chose not to look at that, and instead choose a flat rate that reflected the current average.
Also, I'm not saying that electric cars are the proper solution; I'm saying they are the fastest solution. They are a stop-gap because the proper solutions are going to take too long to implement.
I think a bigger part of the production emissions come from further up the supply chain than the factory. Such as extraction, refinement and shipping of the lithium and cobalt required for batteries. That is also what makes it hard to estimate.
My point was that switching to EVs will not make transportation emissions disappear.
Cities should be carless (only renting cars should be allowed), rural areas should be EVs only, and only if you have photovoltaics on your roof.
Bro are you saying meteors are part of climate change?
I interpreted the meteors/city on fire as short hand for general armageddon because it is probably pretty hard to draw; in a single comic panel: droughts, crop failure, wild fires, floods, severe storms, wars over fresh water, etc. You know, the actual things that will kill people from climate change.
But if you interpret the meteors as literal, then what is the point of the comic? A swarm of meteors is not influenced at all by someones choice to drive an EV or not. So this comic is no longer a critique of that choice.
The point is that some people won't even take the smaller steps towards a sustainable future with flimsy excuses, and then might do it when everything is going to shit.
In this case it's someone opposed to those positive changes.
The point of the comic to is to show how futile and silly these excuses are, using hyperbole at the end, to show how foolish and stubborn these people are.
I'm sorry that you're not the type of person to get jokes, and hopefully you can learn to recognize the mechanics of humor at some point so you understand why and how jokes work for other people.
I think the actual joke is that there isn't any more future so it's finally future proof cause it's not getting any better and only worse.
Yeah that too probably
I don't think I could ever go back to a gas-powered vehicle now, simply because it's too convenient to just plug my car in at home. For trips, yes, it's slightly less convenient to charge it than it is to fill up a gas vehicle, but it's not like it can't make the trips in a similar amount of time, regardless.
It's towing that is the achilles heel of electric vehicles, you can cut your range to less than half with a combination of a trailer and stuff on the roof.
Very few people actually ever tow anything (and I say that as someone who regularly does tow things). But even then, I can keep our ice pickup and replace our car that we drive every day with an ev.
We won't, though, because the current situation in the US means us taking on new debt would be dumb.
Well, statistically, you don't actually...
I'm not owning two vehicles just so I can have an EV.
I take transit wherever possible, and we're down to being a one car house, but that car will always be an ev now. It's so much more convenient, and no gas stations ever. I don't know why people are so loyal to a fuel
My favorite places that I've lived all had transit that was so convenient that I didn't even own a car. Unfortunately, today I live in a place where there is zero mass transit near my house.
You're acting like I can afford a gas car and I'm not planning on ending it all once my rust bucket won't start anymore
I have a long commute, and there is no charging infrastructure around. I'm still getting an average of 48 mpg (20 km/l) on my 2018 sedan. It makes no sense for me to change now, but I've got a feeling my next car will be fully EV.
Obviously drive your current car as long as you can, but modern (last 4 years or so) have gotten to 300+ mile range, a 150mi commute would be wild
Oh yeah, the commute excludes hybrids, not full EVs. Back when I got this car, EVs ere prohibitively expensive, so i considered a hybrid, buy that was a non starter because I'd end up using the same amount of fuel.
You should always drive an ICE car as long as you can. Or at least sell it to someone who doesn't just dismantle it for parts.
I mean.... it depends on your requirements. The charge time is most of the time the dealbreaker, because humans are lazy, with an EV you can not just go "oh i forgot to fuel up, lets go to the next gas station and fill it up in seconds" rather "Oh i forgot to plug in my EV after a long drive, guess i will have to wait some hours".
But still EVs can take you far and it gotten pretty far in the technology, but i guess the battery still holds personally me off buying one.
For me, the problem is that I live in a condo, and don't have the ability to even slow charge at home. If sitting at a charging station was something I only ever had to do when going on a road trip, I'd likely already have an electric car.
<<“Oh i forgot to plug in my EV after a long drive, guess i will have to wait some hours”.
On a lot of models its like 20 minutes to charge up to 80% and typically by businesses where I can grab groceries/food/coffee. Charging tech got good a few years ago.
The only thing I'm still leery of is long trips to national parks since something like Yellowstone has limited charging nearby. It exists, but probably more EVs looking to charge than available spots.
You brought up another point: For longer trips charging stations is not easy to find ( definitly not in my region ).
I haven't bought an EV yet myself because I'm not buying a new car until my current one kicks the bucket, but don't they have that "quick charge" feature similar to phones where if the battery is low it can get to "good enough to get you to work and back" in like 5 minutes?
I just can't wait to not have to worry about oil changes or "odd engine sounds" anymore lol
But you will have to worry about your battery. It will depend on usage, "fast" charging etc... but it will not last as a "normal" car does. So you will have to replace it or dump the car. ( most people just dump it as its cheaper to buy new )
Depends on the charger. Technology Connections has a good video about it. The 15 minute figure is for a best case scenario going from 20 to 75%, if I'm not mistaken. More likely you'll wait something closer to 40-90 minutes, depending on many cars are charging at the same time, etc etc.
That would rely on having the right charger, and I suspect they will be rare, because that's a massive amount of power to deliver, and getting that much power to the site would be difficult.
Instead of oil changes you'll have coolant changes. I have.
Taking a quick look it looks like these coolant changes are between 50k and 100k or every 5-10 years, that's still LOADS better than every 6-10k miles or every couple of months lol
Mine's every 30.000 km, or every two years. Which is the same as oil changes in my previous car.
If you have a garage at home, this is a moot point. 98% of driving is not long trips, and the vast majority of homes are 2 car households. It makes sense that one of them should be an EV
I don't drive my own vehicle to work, it's only used on weekends and holidays, so closer to 50% of the driving I do is long trips.
Installing the charging equipment is also a cost consideration.
Why I said two car households are great for it. One of them can be gas. The other one can be EV. That's what I do, we have the EV for the 98% of driving we do in the city, groceries, errands, commuting, whatever. Never buy any gas for that, charge it when we get home. Have the gas car for long trips. We have yet to come across a time of when that wouldn't have worked in our family
Looking at the Scout vehicles... which, technically speaking, don't quite exist yet. :(
There are 2 prototypes, truck and SUV, but the factory to make more is still being built. Hope is 2027/2028?
With a gas powered generator, it will in theory have a 500 mile range.
Actually, Scout vehicles do exist. I have one. It was made in 1967.
Yeah, the OG Scouts, the new ones will be electric.
Yup, and wasn't the brand bought by VW? Mine was made by International Harvester. So not really that closely related, except maybe for body shape.
Yup, they bought IH and Scout came with it.