Add an extra 40% worth of sales if they make it a sedan instead of a homely hatchback. Toyota has the better idea, even though the Prius looks like 10 day old vomit.

 

Why is the front end melting?

Interior is blah, but the exterior is a huge improvement

 

It looks better, but that isn't saying much lol. Its still an awkward looking dork mobile in my book, but it is better than the Prius.

Any idea on price????

Also that's the other thing I don't get, is why do electric cars have to look like total dork-mobiles? The current trend is to make them look like a janky *** $15,000 hatchback. Maybe sales on stuff like the Bolt, Volt, and current Prius wouldn't be in the toilet if you could sell them on how they look. Right now they're marketed on their technical aspects as the future to the technology hipster. Or its marketed to those stupid smug environmentalist types who think it runs on unicorn farts(coal powered electricty!!) and gives them a completely undeserved entitled sense of self righteousness and moral superiority(never mind the environmental cost to make your new "green" car vs keep driving your existing car that has already been built).

I guess my rambling point is they need something to sell/market electric cars on other than that "it is the new thing" and some sort of hippie bull**** nonsense of saving the earth. Style and performance are things the Model S has in spades. Or it just could be as simple as building an electric car in the right shape, ie a stylish small crossover SUV, not something that looks like a janky *** $15,000 Versa Note.

 

They said starting at $30,000, which, in California, where about half of Leaf's (Leaves? hah) are sold, it could come down to $20,000 with current federal and state incentives. $30,000 is substantially below the $37,500 that the Bolt is priced at, in recognition of the range deficiency. Pure EVs are exceedingly difficult for the American landscape, but the 150 range is generally acceptable for the ultra dense urban settings that are more normal in Asia and Europe. Japanese Leaf owners are expected to charge just once per week with that 150 range.

 

Don't forget there's an e-Plus coming in the second half of 2018 with 60kW battery with better performance and 225+ miles range. Rumor has it there will also be a Nismo version that will have better performance than the e-Plus trim.

 

Ok now i see your point about looks, but toyota has a deliberate strategy of making the prius look anything but mainstream, so buyers can feel 'special' i guess... a rolling virtue signal. i found everything about the last generation prius awful including the driving. The new one which i've not driven apparently drives a lot better, but they decided to make it 1000x uglier, i mean 'special'. The prime is the least hideous but that's not saying much. So no, i don't see any chance that toyota will make the prius look more mainstream.

 

Exterior is good enough not offensive. I really like the interior and it is a real car interior unlike the Model 3.

 

Much better than before, but could be even better again.




Would be an unanimous hit if it could have looked more like its sexy prototype.

 

What that video doesn't tell you, though, with its "End of Fossil Fuels?" message, is that fossil fuels still generate much of the electricity that recharges these cars.

 

Not this again.

When will gasoline cars transition to cleaner sources. Never. When will electric cars get charged from cleaner sources? Potentially we will one day charge our cars from 100% clean and renewable energy. Let me know the day petrol has this potential.

 

even with current power generation sources, electric cars are much cleaner than gas powered when drilling, refining, transport is all included.

from eia.gov...

 

Well, Petroleum, Natural gas, and Coal are considered fossil-fuels. According to that chart, together, they make up almost 70% of the total...which is pretty much what I said in my last post.

 

Never?

Although petroleum itself hasn't gotten any cleaner, today's cars, thanks to advances like unleaded fuel, catalytic converters, electronic engine controls, advanced combustion techniques, etc.....emit only about 1% of the tailpipe-emissions that they did when first started driving in the late 1960s. Diesel-fuel, also derived from petroleum and crude-oil, has similarly shown remarkable improvements in low-emissions (even independent from the VW/Audi scandal LOL), with today's low-sulfur diesel fuel, advanced engine controls, and urea-solution treatments.

 

Yes, electric power is largely generated by fossil fuels, just as gasoline- and diesel-powered cars run on fossil fuels, but what is not mentioned is that the aggregate (total) emissions from the thousands of small power generators in our cars and trucks generating mechanical power is much dirtier than the large electric power generating stations.

A large, electric power generating station is more efficient than a small, mechanical power generating station. Electricity generators, electric motors and electricity transmission are incredibly efficient, much more so than a small fossil fuel generator directly generating mechanical power.

Due to the efficiency of electric motors, an EV uses less thermal power than a comparably-sized fossil fuel-powered vehicle.

The emissions of a large, electric power generating station can be more efficiently and effectively scrubbed than the emissions from the many, many, small mechanical power generating stations. This means that a large, central electric power station has cleaner emissions than the thousands of small engines powering our vehicles that, in aggregate, would provide the same power.

So, if we removed the small, individual power generators powering our cars and trucks, and replaced them with EVs drawing electricity from large power generators, we would clean up our total emissions.

 

Yes, we have made great progress in cleaning up gasoline and diesel engine emissions in the past 40 years, but we may have reached our technological (and our toleration) limit. More and more automakers now see the end of diesel-powered passenger cars, no doubt helped by European cities (such as London and Paris) and countries (Germany is an example) that will be outlawing diesel-powered cars in the near future (2030 to 2040), and automakers such as VW and Mazda that have not been successful in developing reasonably-priced diesel passenger cars.

European automakers, even the small ones such as Volvo and Aston Martin are turning towards electrification of their drivetrains, turning to hybrids, plug-in hybrids and electric vehicles rather than try to improve the diesel car powertrain.