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Tag Archives: Tesla

Are Battery Powered Vehicles the Future?

Posted on September 1, 2017 by Donn Dears

…Are Battery Powered Vehicles the Future?… The Economist Magazine made several over-the-top statements about electric vehicles in its August 21 issue, not the least of which was that the cost of ownership between an internal combustion engine powered vehicle and Continue reading Are Battery Powered Vehicles the Future?→

Posted in CO2, Energy, Freedom, Government, Politics | Tagged BEV, CO2, HEV, Tesla

Electric Vehicle Sales Report

Posted on July 18, 2017 by Donn Dears

…Electric Vehicle Sales Report… The following table shows vehicle sales for Hybrids, PHEVs and BEVs for the first half of 2017. Quick takeaways: Sales of all three categories increased in the second quarter: PHEVs by the largest percentage, i.e., 21%, Continue reading Electric Vehicle Sales Report→

Posted in CO2, Energy, Freedom, Government, Politics | Tagged Bolt, CO2, GM, Tesla

Electric Vehicle Industry Issues

Posted on April 21, 2017 by Donn Dears

First quarter sales of PHEVs and BEVs were robust. Given that PHEV and BEV sales continue to be tiny in comparison with all light vehicle sales, the questions remains: Will PHEVs and BEVs become mainstream over the next few years? Continue reading Electric Vehicle Industry Issues→

Posted in CO2, Energy, Freedom | Tagged CO2, energy, Freedom, Tesla

Latest on Electric Vehicle Sales

Posted on January 19, 2017 by Donn Dears

Plug-In (PHEVs) and battery electric vehicles (BEVs) had a good year in 2016, while sales of hybrids, like the original Prius, continued to fall until the last quarter. US Sales of Electric Vehicles, Including HEVs 2016 Month Hybrid (HEVs) PHEVs&Extended Continue reading Latest on Electric Vehicle Sales→

Posted in Energy, Freedom, Government, Politics | Tagged CO2, electricity, energy, EV, Tesla

Pushing the Green Car Agenda

Posted on December 13, 2016 by Donn Dears

While expensive battery-powered vehicles (BEVs), such as Tesla, are uneconomic and impractical, most people could relax and ignore the hubbub about BEVs because they could always rely on using their family car powered by gasoline. This sanguine view could be Continue reading Pushing the Green Car Agenda→

Posted in Energy, Freedom, Government, Politics | Tagged CO2, energy, EPA, Obama, Tesla

Tesla, GM, & Toyota Battle for Customers

Posted on October 11, 2016 by Donn Dears

The electric vehicle battleground at the end of September saw a major increase in the number of PHEVs and BEVs being sold during the 3rd quarter, and a continuing shift away from Hybrids, such as the original Prius.   US Continue reading Tesla, GM, & Toyota Battle for Customers→

Posted in Energy, Freedom, Government, Politics | Tagged Bolt, CO2, EPA, EV, global warming, PHEV, Tesla

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Table of Contents

Introduction

When we flip the switch, the lights come on without anyone thinking about it. This has only been true for the last hundred years in metropolitan areas, and for only approximately eighty years in rural areas with the enactment of the Rural Electrification Act of 1936.

In 1935, only 25 percent of rural homes in the United States had electricity, and there are people alive today who grew up without electricity. Today, few people are even aware of the monolithic system that generates, distributes, and controls the electricity that flows with seeming effortlessness across the United States. This system is referred to as the grid, which is actually three grids covering the entire lower forty-eight states.

Over the past one hundred years, there have been only two area-wide blackouts affecting over 30 million people caused by a failure of the transmission system. There have been other blackouts—mostly caused by storms—affecting smaller groups, perhaps as many as several million people. Overall, the grid has worked remarkably well. Reliability can still be improved upon, but this is primarily a question of placing transmission and distribution lines underground to minimize weather-induced outages.

Suddenly, we are faced with a threat to the grid we haven’t seen before. It is a threat that can dramatically increase blackouts and the suffering that accompanies them. Some in leadership positions have viewed climate change as an existential threat to mankind and have implemented actions to eliminate fossil fuels from the generation of electricity. Some have claimed that wind and solar and other renew- ables can replace all the coal-fired, natural gas, and nuclear power plants in the United States. It can be argued that the actions these people are taking are making electricity more costly and less reliable, and placing Americans at risk for little or no reason. They are willing to gamble the safety and lives of Americans, as well as the American economy, on an ideology.

Our nation has suffered through a medical war fighting COVID-19 in which thousands died. As my neighbor said,

“The inability of our country to anticipate the corona- virus pandemic and put in place adequate reserves of all of the things we needed—PPE, ventilators, masks, tests, hospital beds, etc.—speaks loudly and directly to the need for reliable on-demand electricity and the need to plan for it right now.”

Imagine if Americans had to suffer through rolling blackouts while quarantined at home during a future pandemic. How would newly erected emergency hospitals operate without electricity, let alone our existing hospitals without diesel fuel or natural gas to power emergency generators?

This was brought home by an oped in the Washington Post. Quoting from the op-ed:

Residential use is up as workers and school children stay home.

[Demand is down] in locked up restaurants, offices and factories.

Hospitals are a different story: They consume twice as much per square foot as hotels . . . lead schools and office buildings by an even greater margin. And their work couldn’t be more vital as they confront the novel coronavirus.

A grid operator, sequestered in his dispatch center in East Greenbush, New York, said it all, “Keeping the lights on. . . . It’s so critical.”3

There is little doubt there will be another pandemic. The only question is when. We must do what is needed to guarantee adequate and reliable supplies of electricity in preparation for the next pandemic.

President Trump recognized the vital importance of the grid when he issued an executive order on May 1, 2020, to protect the grid from foreign adversaries. He said the grid, “provides the electricity that sup- ports our national defense, vital emergency services, critical infrastruc- ture, economy, and way of life.”

There is also an ideology that threatens the grid. This book will examine how federal regulators, state governments, utility companies, and the operators of the grid themselves are imposing their beliefs about climate change on all Americans and placing the grid in great jeopardy. Unelected bureaucrats and self-imposed intelligentsia are making decisions that place all Americans in danger.

Looming Energy Crisis will show you why we must continue to use fossil fuels and why we must protect the grid from the actions of those who are imposing their personal beliefs on the rest of us. Our objective should be low-cost reliable electricity available for everyone.

Reliability is a national security issue.