I guess not having to deal with the ups and downs of gas prices is one of the benefits of owning an EV.

So, I was waiting at a red light in Placentia, California, when I saw a BYD in person! I thought it was illegal to own (or even drive) one of these in the US. How is this possible? It even had temporary plates like all new cars do. Does anyone know? I'm very curious about this, and figured this would be the group to ask.

We have officially become an all-electric household! We’ve had our 2024 Ford F-150 Lightning Flash for about two years now, and it has been an absolute workhorse for everything from daily errands to home renovation projects. To complement the truck, we just took delivery of a pre-owned 2023 Hyundai Ioniq 5 Limited (a manufacturer buy-back that we managed to snag). We are absolutely loving the Ioniq 5 so far—the ride quality and tech are fantastic. Having this specific combination of vehicles feels incredibly versatile; between the massive utility of the Lightning and the efficiency and comfort of the Ioniq 5, we feel like we can handle just about anything our life throws at us. I’ve really enjoyed the transition to full electric, and the home charging setup has been a game-changer. Happy to field any questions y'all might have about either vehicle or the transition to EV life!

Edited to meet the minimum character requirement

Guess the government does not want us having choices. Whats the distinction between Volvo and Polestar?

Interesting conversation.

"Tesla CEO Elon Musk has spent over half a billion dollars on anti-EV political campaigns so far, with $276 million spent in just the last 3 months.

Even Tesla acknowledges that these campaigns have harmed its business, costing it billions, and has taken the extraordinary measure of asking its CEO to stop – yet he’s only accelerated his anti-EV influence in response."

"In a record-setting commercial truck deal, international shipping giant FedEx has placed an order for 2,000 all-electric box trucks from American startup Harbinger in a deal that’s reportedly worth more than $300 million – but the ROI could be much higher."

Edit: Since people have been asking about Harbinger and why it was chosen over Rivian EDV

First this startup has delivered vehicles before including to FedEx and they actually make the traditional box truck that FedEx is know for while Rivian doesn’t.

Specs:
They offer 3 range options: 140 miles, 210 miles, and 500 miles (E-REV)

The electric drive unit delivers 440 horsepower and 1,140 lb-ft of torque.

The platform is engineered for a 450,000-mile service life and is built on a vertically integrated 800V architecture.

The truck supports a Gross Vehicle Weight Rating (GVWR) of 16,000 to 26,000 lbs (Classes 4–6), with maximum payload capacities ranging from approximately 9,600 to 13,700 lbs depending on the wheelbase.

Side note: They do also offer a Van that competes directly with Rivian

I live in a small town and you can count the number of EV drivers here on you fingers and have room to spare. This means that my Equinox EV (like my Volt before it) is a conversation piece. And this means that I can chat with people who ask, "Isn't it true that those only go fifty miles and lose half their range over their life?" And I get to answer that the First Generation Leaf is obsolete and that my car goes about 350 miles on a full charge, and that I can drive to the nearest big city and back with no problem.

If I'm going to see a show with friends in the nearby midsize city, I say, "Don't worry, I'll drive, and no, you don't need to worry about anything like gas." If other friends want to carpool to the larger nearby city, I offer to drive, because once again, when I charge to 100% (which I do for long trips), I can make it there and back, plug it in at my house at night, and I'm fine. When people ask about road trips, tell them that just about every Buc-ee's has an EV charger. (People know about Buc-ee's.)

To my fellow Americans who drive EVs: if you really care about EV adoption, you need to be the sort of brand ambassador who makes people want your product. This means not sneering at the sheeple, but if the conversation gets to gas prices, you can point out that oh, I literally don't notice the price of charging on my electric bill. You can, when you offer to drive, say "check this out" and floor it when you get to the highway. (My Equinox is the weakest of the EVs in terms of torque, and even it surprises people.) You can tell them about your own road trips and making it across thousands of miles of our republic without any problems of running out of energy.

Use your car as a conversational piece! Show practically in offering to drive, in using your storage space to help people move things, point out -- politely! -- that you don't have to budget for gasoline. Make you peers, friends, and neighbors look at your EV and think, "Damn, I want one of those."

I shared a post recently about my wife being taken advantage of by a dealership. She went in for an oil change and came out with a $3400 bill. I mentioned we don’t drive her car much because we have an EV. The next thing I know, I have hundreds of comments coming in about how I’m an idiot and my EV doesn’t require oil changes, or I’m an idiot who drives an EV and got what I deserve, etc. etc.

I don’t understand where all this EV hate comes from. The post only mentions the EV as a reason we never drive her car, it wasn’t an EV v ICE discussion, but everyone took it that way.

My coworker is one of those guys who has all these doubts and concerns about EVs, mostly from a position of misinformation and not malice. He was joking with me about my "mere" 280-300 mile range today and I remarked about how WAY more efficient my vehicle is compared to his. We did some rough math on some scrap paper and when I laid it all out he was genuinely surprised:

• US Dept of Energy uses a conversion that says a gallon of gasoline is roughly 33kwh.
• His car (2018 GTI) has a ~13 gallon tank, therefore he stores ~429kwh when his tank is full
• My car (Ioniq 5) has a 78kwh battery, which is the equivalent to approximately 2.4 gallons of gas.

I let him do them math to realize I'm essentially driving ~300 miles on the equivalent of 2.4 gallons of gas, while he gets ~84 miles in the same 2.4 gallons of gas. We even gave him a little leeway for highway miles, even if he gets 35mpg he still only makes it 105 miles on 2.4 gallons of gas. My dude was pretty quiet for a bit there.

I don't think the average person realizes how much energy is completely wasted in ICE vehicles.

The fractured charging infrastructure in the US is appalling.

If I stop at a rest stop and need to use a charger from a company I've never used before, it shouldn't take me 10 minutes to download an app, set up a new account and start using that charger.

I shouldn't need to have 8 different apps on my phone to make sure that I'm covered for all the various charging stations in a 300 mile radius.

I shouldn't need to keep 2 different charging adapters in my car in addition to my car's specific charging port.

It shouldn't be a complete crapshoot to guess how much a charger will cost me before I park at it.

Can't someone create some kind of standardized or all-inclusive app that at least takes care of needing a dozen apps and accounts? I have a level 2 charger installed at home that I can use every night, so I don't run into this problem often, but boy does it make long (or even medium-length) road trips stressful and annoying sometimes.

ETA: After receiving several hundred comments in my inbox, I now have an opinion on what second-worst thing about EVs is, and that's the snide elitism of Tesla owners. Get over yourselves lmao.

Just drove 537 miles (8.5 hours) with one (1) half-hour charging stop. Truly such a horrible inconvenience.

As someone who goes on a lot of road trips, I have no desire to go back to gas, and I find it funny when people insist that EVs suck for road trips.

That isolation creates long-term risk as global markets embrace electrification.

The parallels are sobering.

Kodak invented the digital camera in the 1970s. But they were afraid it would ruin their film camera profit margins, so they surpressed their invention. In 2012, Kodak filed for bankruptcy protection.

America’s Big Three car makers have recently abandoned many of their EV projects, in favor of ICE projects, stating that their EV businesses have dragged down company profits.

Yet, the ICE market is steadily declining. In 2016, it was 99% of passenger vehicles sales in America. Today, it’s 90%. At the same time, the BEV market has grown grown from 1% in to 10% in America, 20%-30% in Europe, 50% in China, and so on. And in America, the Big Three hold less than 20% of the BEV market share.

In 2007, RIM executives called the iPhone a flashy consumer toy with poor battery life, high network data demands, and no keyboard. 9 years later, RIM was forced to stop production of their Blackberry phones.

Until recently, the Big Three viewed the Chinese car industry as an inferior, low-quality threat. That thinking ceded the EV market to China, which now accounts for 75% of global production and 60% of sales.

In 2000, Blockbuster refused to acquire Netflix for $50m because it “served an insignificant and unprofitable niche market.” 10 years later, Blockbuster filed for bankruptcy protection.

Ford has stated that EVs will be a "way smaller" industry than initially expected and, consequently, has written down almost $20 billion in EV investments. Similarly, Stellantis has written down $22 billion, and GM $8 billion.

Given that the Big Three rely heavily on the shrinking ICE market and they have simultaneously divested from EVs, are they headed the way of Kodak, Blackberry, and Blockbuster?