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I checked out the Taycans, Etron GT RS and Lucid Grand Touring.
Taycan was way over my budget and the trunk and back seat were very small but they looked great. The dealership part really turned me off, it was like I was invisible to the salespeople with me asking to sit in the car in the showroom. It was like they couldn’t be bothered. This was in Tyson’s Corner, VA and just an awful experience.
Next was the Etron GT RS which had a great interior with a great sound system but just like the Taycan, it had a small backseat but a little bigger trunk. The pano roof was cool because you could hit a button and it wound be clear or not or even patterned. Didn’t love the front end but the rest looked really good.
Last was the Lucid with 800hp and 500 miles of range. I shockingly loved this cars features. Nice leather massaging seats, blind spot/turn signal cameras on the front cluster, great sound system, launch control that you can use right away (and I did launch it), lots of room in the back seat and a decent sized trunk. Best part is is leases really well, over $200 cheaper than a Plaid even though it was $20k more in price. Only problem is I don’t love the looks of the car and neither does my wife. She feels it looks too much like an old persons car. If I wanted more of a luxury sedan like an S class I would get this.
I’m going to check out a Lunar Silver Model S tomorrow so see what that color looks like in person before I make a decision but I’m still leaning toward another Plaid. For the roominess of the hatch/trunk, power, price and looks it’s hard to beat. I sat in the new Plaid seats and they are much firmer than the old ones but were nice and supportive.
I'm not a fan of the Lucid's looks either. And performance-wise, the 800hp Lucid is more a competitor with the base Model S. The Plaid is a lot faster. Model 3 performance is probably quicker than the 800hp Lucid.
And the utility of the Model S hatch area is one of its more underrated features. Almost station wagon level cargo capacity.
BTW, nuclear is also a part of clean energy if done properly with no cut corners
Not going to happen sadly. Nuclear is stuck at about 10% total electricity generation (worldwide) since the 90's, meanwhile solar and other renewable forms crossed 30% last year.
Thanks, we looked at the Etron GT again and while we loved the looks it just wouldn’t work for our needs. It is like daily driving a sports car every day. Low to the ground and a little tighter inside but great materials used. Also looked at a black/black RS6 Avante, what an awesome wagon. I would love to have that but I want at least one EV for now.
I ended up ordering another white ext./black int. Plaid. Brought my wife to the Tesla store today so we could see the different colors and the silver didn’t win her over. To be fair they didn’t attempt to clean it up at all but it just didn’t wow her. The red one they had in the showroom did with the white interior but she didn’t love it enough to want to buy one since she felt it needed white interior and we just wouldn’t be able to keep it clean.
So ended up with the same color combo we had with the yoke again. Kind of boring but we like the way it looks in white with the new updates.
Oh and since we ordered today we are locked in for the $7500 lease credit and I got $1000 loyalty since I didn’t delete my old car in the app yet.
Thanks, we looked at the Etron GT again and while we loved the looks it just wouldn’t work for our needs. It is like daily driving a sports car every day. Low to the ground and a little tighter inside but great materials used. Also looked at a black/black RS6 Avante, what an awesome wagon. I would love to have that but I want at least one EV for now.
I ended up ordering another white ext./black int. Plaid. Brought my wife to the Tesla store today so we could see the different colors and the silver didn’t win her over. To be fair they didn’t attempt to clean it up at all but it just didn’t wow her. The red one they had in the showroom did with the white interior but she didn’t love it enough to want to buy one since she felt it needed white interior and we just wouldn’t be able to keep it clean.
So ended up with the same color combo we had with the yoke again. Kind of boring but we like the way it looks in white with the new updates.
Oh and since we ordered today we are locked in for the $7500 lease credit and I got $1000 loyalty since I didn’t delete my old car in the app yet.
Congrats 👍. I was going to actually tell you to generate a referral link for yourself to get additional discounts. Looks like you are way ahead of me.
Again, after driving and spending at least 30 minutes looking over the new Model S, I couldn't find any issues with quality except a turn signal not working properly, which is easily fixable without having to go into a service center. My coworker is a stickler for perfection (being a Porsche owner), and he was excited about the quality.
Hopefully this time around brings you happiness and luck
Not going to happen sadly. Nuclear is stuck at about 10% total electricity generation (worldwide) since the 90's, meanwhile solar and other renewable forms crossed 30% last year.
Solar is great, but only in the summer (in places where the sun shines bright). Here in the Bay area we use a combination of Solar, wind and natural gas. I think the problem with nuclear is the stigma, people don't want to live near them. They have to be near large bodies of water, there are three possible locations in California, but the populations there would probably object
Perception is reality. Coal has killed far far more people than any nuclear accident. From Grok (which is incredible BTW)
In the United States, a comprehensive study published in Science in 2023 analyzed Medicare records and emissions data from 480 coal-fired power plants between 1999 and 2020. It found that approximately 460,000 deaths among people over 65 were attributable to coal-related PM2.5 during this period. This figure is notably higher than earlier estimates because it revealed that coal PM2.5 is more than twice as deadly as PM2.5 from other sources, causing an average of over 43,000 deaths per year from 1999 to 2007, before dropping to about 1,600 annually by 2020 due to plant closures and pollution controls like scrubbers.
Summing up, no single definitive global figure exists, but credible estimates suggest coal-burning power plants have contributed to millions of deaths over decades through health issues tied to their byproducts. In the U.S. alone, the 460,000 deaths over 20 years provide a concrete benchmark, while globally, the number likely reaches into the millions when factoring in chronic exposure over time and across heavily coal-reliant regions. These estimates reflect deaths from gradual health deterioration—like asthma, cardiovascular disease, and cancer—rather than immediate accidents, aligning with your focus on byproducts’ long-term impact.
I asked a follow up, compare the above to mining materials for batteries.
The "far worse" claim also overlooks scale and context. The International Energy Agency projects that by 2040, lithium demand might rise 40-fold for EVs, but even then, total mining emissions for clean energy metals are a fraction of fossil fuels’ annual 34 billion tons of CO2-equivalent. Coal’s health toll—think black lung, asthma, or cancer from pollutants like mercury—far exceeds the localized harms of battery metal mines, however grim those can be. And while cobalt’s ethical issues are indefensible, innovations like cobalt-free LFP batteries (used in some Teslas and Fords) are already cutting that dependency.
So, the response? Mining for EV batteries isn’t pristine—it’s messy, resource-heavy, and demands better oversight and tech to mitigate harm. But stacked against coal power’s death toll and relentless emissions, or the gas-guzzling lifecycle of ICE vehicles, it’s not "far worse"—it’s a smaller, more fixable problem in a system that’s demonstrably cleaner over time. The data backs this: EVs slash emissions and mortality compared to fossil fuel reliance, even accounting for their dirty birth. The real challenge is cleaning up mining itself, not scrapping EVs for coal or gas.
What I get out of that is it's impossible to make any fossil fuels clean, it is possible (and hopefully this is achieved) to make battery production clean to the point where the pollution is insignificant.
I’ve never understood why people are politically against “clean energy”.
Pretty simple. Oil companies have extremely strong lobbies and pour a ton of money into coffers. Can't say any more than that without getting into politics and arguments
genesis doesn't offer anything right now i'd be interested in.
