[ValarMorghulis]

Toyota’s chief Akio Toyoda says converting entirely to EVs could cost hundreds of billions of dollars and make cars unaffordable for average people.

Link here

[Cessna182]

Electric vehicles are important to reduce the carbon footprint, but not without addressing the electricity source. In India even now coal is the biggest generator of electricity and the same happens in most developing countries. In the next 30 years coal will get replaced by natural gas. But unless nuclear is promoted in a big way it will be tough to make sure that carbon emissions come down- it is just that the emissions shift from the exhaust of a car to the chimney of a power plant.

Also, Toyota invested huge amounts into hybrids and hydrogen vehicles hence this statement might be motivated by their ROI considerations.

[J4J]

This looks true to a certain extent.
The vehicles are true engineering marvels but still face the following problems even in the most developed countries:
1. Improper charging Infra in some countries.
2. Charging time.
3. Different brands and incompatible chargers and subscription plans.
4. Battery in cold weather conditions.
5. Waste disposal of these cars once they reach their end of life.
6. Affordability.

All of the above problems were mentioned in the first EV thread also. Still we do not have a proper solution for any of these.

Recently I saw a YouTube video of a famous Youtuber who embarked on 1000+ mile trip in his Tesla in UK to Scottish Highlands. He faced most of the above problems.

For city use, this is definitely a very good option but for long drives, we are still very far.

[gusfring]

Well, Toyota has too much vested in their hybrid tech, so won't be wise to take this at face value. But when a car has to practically become a phone (being connected, receiving software updates) I guess it will take time. But it is only a matter of time.

Only now, I hope Toyota doesn't do a Maruti and shun EVs altogether . Their "friends" here will likely have a field time explaining why they brought back diesels next year

[EightSix]

All of Toyoda’s points are valid and I see no reason why one should disagree with him. We are still a long way to completely replace our cars with electric ones. Enough info has been shared by more knowledgeable BHPians on this interesting discussion at this linky about the aspects of power sources, cost-effectivity among other points.

As Cessna182 stated, in most developing countries, Fossil Fuels are the sources of electricity. “save the planet”,

I am strictly against a blanket ban on ICEs by governments, and if anything, EVs should co-exist with EVs, like how gasoline and diesels along with EVs do today. After all, EVs are also cars, only powered by a different drivetrain.

Once the technology is advanced and infrastructure has been improved, people will shift to EVs themselves. Forcing people to buy EVs is just ridiculous.

Just think of it, 5 years ago, you only had the Mahindra electric cars and limited charging points. Sometimes, you could count the sales of those cars on your fingers (of one hand)!

With Nexon EV, ZS EV, KoNA EV, EQC and the radical increase in the number of charging points today, EVs are fetching customers in 1000s today. That kind of growth cannot be achieved by forcing people to abandon EVs.

Also, a Toyota bigwig is not the first to call EVs overhyped:
https://www.theverge.com/2019/6/28/1...tive-overhyped

[RSR]

Kodak's chief once said digital cameras are overhyped.

BlackBerry's chief once said touchscreens are overhyped.

Intel's chief once said ARM-based mobile processors are overhyped.

Toyota's chief now says electric vehicles are overhyped.

Rinse & repeat!

[Jeroen]

Originally Posted by RSR

Kodak's chief once said digital cameras are overhyped.

BlackBerry's chief once said touchscreens are overhyped.

Intel's chief once said ARM-based mobile processors are overhyped.

Toyota's chief now says electric vehicles are overhyped.
![/i][/b]

When traditional car chiefs start calling EV overhyped they have lost the plot. Make no mistake. Hybrids, if anything, are overhyped and most folks will go from an IC vehicle straight to an EV.

It’s becoming very apparent that hybrids do next to nothing for the environment.

No, it won’t happen overnight, but the pace is picking up. Many western nation have pulled the phasing out of IC vehicles forward. You won’t be able to buy a new IC car in most of Europe after 2030. In countries with that legislation looming, you can see it coming IC sales will beginning to tank in the next few years already, if they have not already.

As always the developed world, (horrible term but you get my drift) will be ahead of the rest of the world. If there is a danger it is IC powered cars becoming very expensive due to dropping volumes, no new innovation etc.

When it comes to a internet, India went from virtually no (fixed) internet and skipped a few intermediate technologies and went straight to mobile internet.

It is all down to available infrastructure at a good enough price point.

Jeroen
Diehard IC fanatic and very hateful of EVs.

[GrammarNazi]

A company that profiteers selling crazily over-priced cars with old school tech even to people in under-developed & developing countries, is talking about cars becoming too expensive for common people! Irony died a thousand deaths when he made that statement.

Toyoda invested R&D into Hybrid tech thinking it was the next logical step, but I doubt it's going to pay off. I believe the shift to electricity is a lot more of a geo-political decision to reduce interdependence, than a naïve one based on carbon emissions and the environmental impact. The situation among sovereign nations cannot concerns itself for helping some Corporation earn profits!

Toyota isn't an NGO involved in promoting public mobility, it's a profit hungry corporation that only cares for itself. No way should common people (even non-electric enthusiasts) find themselves as an ally to such corporations, instead of what is in the strategic interest of their country.

Let's see.

[Bibendum90949]

This statement reminds me of Maruti's ploy and marketing that painted diesel engines as bad when they didn't have one in their kitty. With this, we're starting to see Maruti's influence on Toyota

[saikarthik]

Toyota is making this statement because their strategy is on losing side. Done and dusted point.

But there are two things at play here which we might have to dig deeper to find proofs.

When someone says EVs, everyone imagines BEVs(battery electric vehicles). But even Hydrogen fuel cell vehicles are EVs but with less batter capacity as the fuel cell generates electricity on board the vehicle and no need for a bigger storage (small battery is sufficient). And Hydrogen has more energy density per unit volume and weight compared to current batteries (not comparing to future Li air or solid state batteries). This makes use of less Lithium and lithium lobby now is the same as oil lobby in the past.And oil companies are lobbying against both hydrogen and regular EVs.

Hydrogen generation and storage is a issue which has been sorted out by few companies even without a global push.

So clearly there is political and other interests involved here which we can't ignore while a debate.

[S15]

Originally Posted by RSR

Kodak's chief once said digital cameras are overhyped.

BlackBerry's chief once said touchscreens are overhyped.

Intel's chief once said ARM-based mobile processors are overhyped.

Toyota's chief now says electric vehicles are overhyped.

Rinse & repeat!

And all those who heavily invested in Digital cameras are now about to be extinct, with smartphones getting ever closer to digital cameras (not $ 10,000 lenses). Heck, I've seen movies shot with iPhones and Samsung Notes

Touchscreens are overhyped. No two ways about it.

Intel is still a global leader in what it does best, make desktop and laptop CPUs.

Now a few from my side:

Tablets said laptops are overhyped (surface pro/ ipad pro etc)

uber/ola/lyft said car ownership is overhyped

kindle said actual hard copy of books is overhyped


This reminds me of an old saying; "Americans spent years developing a pen that could work in zero gravity. The Russians? Well, they just used pencils"

I've followed the Nintendo story very closely, and I have seen them go from being a very successful company, to being almost bankrupt, and back to being a very successful company for no reason.

The have always made, and continue to make Handheld consoles, and have done nothing different.


The world is now trying to go after a zero gravity pen. Well, as for me, I'm glad that Electric cars wont be my only option in this lifetime, and after I die, who cares.

[Jeroen]

Originally Posted by S15

This reminds me of an old saying; "Americans spent years developing a pen that could work in zero gravity. The Russians? Well, they just used pencils"
.

This must be the most over used quote on the internet and I never understand it?

Would you prefer to live in Russia or USA? The USA is far from perfect, especially with the idiot Trump, but is still ahead on just about every topic under the sun compared to the Russians, with the possible exception of hacking.

It is like claiming Harald the horrible Viking was quite inventive for using his enemy skulls as goblets.

Yes, sometimes simple solutions are the best, but simpleton nations never are!

On the matter of pencils in space: what nobody mentions is you need to take along sharpeners. And they create dust. Not a huge thing when you spend a few days in space. But when you have your astronauts out there for months it is a real problem. Do you really think the Russian still use pencils up there?.

Better yet: Did you realise this whole Russians pencil thing was fake news to start with?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Writing_in_space

Sorry to distort your world views, but by and large the Russian are both the dumbest and cruelest nation in the world. By a good margin too!


Jeroen

[nandrive]

Originally Posted by Jeroen

It’s becoming very apparent that hybrids do next to nothing for the environment.

I am not sure why you say so. I drive an all wheel drive hybrid car and get almost double the
real world mileage of non-hybrid version of the same model. My contribution to environment is almost halved(50%) by using a hybrid. Though using hybrid was not making any economical sense for my usage pattern, I bought it just for this reason by paying a premium.

[GTO]

Definitely a case of sour grapes. Toyota invested heavily in hydrogen fuel cell cars, but eventually, the consumer spoke with his wallet and bought EVs instead. EVs are going mainstream and there are no two sides to it.

If you can't fight them, join them. Toyota should instead focus on making EVs that are as competent as the current benchmark = Teslas. Making these kind of statements will demotivate his electric car engineering team.

[srishiva]

Future in a short time will be electric. But things will not be same. There will be newer kind of batteries, charge times etc. To imagine electric cars as of today in millions will be cumbersome. Can't think of the charging times of today to help with replacing IC cars as we use cars today.