I think the issue then is in terms of pure zero emission vehicles in the last few years Tesla’s have had the most value in terms of technology, range, battery longevity. This is slowly changing. Even now you can get a new MG4 at $40k after rebate which is firmly in the same price range of a new Corolla. We’re starting to see more and more lower priced EV’s coming out from the likes of BYD, Opel, GWM. The real problem is that we’re waiting for the other manufacturers to start releasing EV’s to market.
Have a look on evdb.nz and you can see that there are quite a few models now that are in the 40k range after rebate which is within a new Corolla pricing. More affordable new EV’s are coming, it’s just that the major manufacturers are playing catch up, while Tesla has been doing it from the start, which is why you’re seeing more of them.
Does lemmy not have a block user function where you won’t see their comments? I guess that doesn’t help when you want to wholesale block users from an instance.
I personally haven’t seen anything worth defederating over so far. In any case I usually just scroll past or don’t interact with comments that are inflammatory. However as you’re the admin it’s your call. My only reservation is that we don’t have many contributors as it is.
Also you should have posted your 150 word article anyway.
Tesla’s on the road - given their price point, it would seem that the EV rebate is going to people who arguably don’t need it
Can you explain what you mean by this? There are a lot of used and imported Tesla's being sold now. There are 105 used Tesla's showing on Trademe right now and most won't get the rebate. A freshly imported second hand Tesla that hasn't been registered here yet will get the same $3450 rebate as a $15k freshly imported Leaf. Tesla's styling hasn't been changed at all for some time, so unless you know what you're looking for it's difficult to tell if the Tesla you saw is a 6-7 year old model or a brand new one.
I thought the goal of the rebate is to drive low emission vehicle adoption, with EV's being the newest technology the higher end of the market is where it would be happening first. You can still get partial rebates on imported used Hybrids and EV's depending on that model's emissions.
Oops I wasn't too clear, but we got an imported second hand 2018 40kwh Leaf. We were tossing up between going for a new car (MG4) and going second hand. Decided it wasn't worth it even with full rebate right now for something we were planning to use just around town and for my partner to go to work. Our actual plan was to go second hand and get solar installed, which would have cost less than the new car. The roof maintenance issues threw a spanner into the works so we're not doing solar for now.
I've never bought a new car either and this is actually the most expensive car I've ever bought. Accounting for the rebate and selling the old ICE car, the Leaf cost us around $18.5k. When there are a more extended range second hand EV's for sale will be when we trade up the old hybrid.
We like the car a lot, but I will say if we only had one car the Leaf wouldn't be my first choice due to the lack of active battery cooling and battery degradation. As it stands the range on it for around town use will last us a long time even with degradation. It was advertised as 89% SOH and it still shows the full 12 bars. I'm just waiting on my ODBII dongle to arrive so I can check and monitor battery health.
I get the angle you're coming from, as someone who was bemoaning the lack of availability of small non-SUV EV's in another forum. However when I think about it, it does make sense from the carmakers point of view. The rise in popularity of crossovers and small SUVs didn't start with EVs but was already there from ICE cars. So making EVs to suit the most popular category that they sell is likely a smart move for actually selling EVs.
I guess we could argue about how much responsibility they have for driving that demand or changing the attitudes of their buyers. We'll eventually get there I think, but we can see already it takes a long time to change the general public's perceptions on climate change as it is, let alone getting them to consider smaller vehicles or make lifestyle changes
We just got our Leaf this week, now just waiting on the rebate to be processed. The plan is to replace our older hybrid with a longer range EV in the next five years, once more of them show up second hand.
You're right about the uncertainty, I wouldn't be putting my name down on a waitlisted EV right now if my purchase was depending on receiving the rebate. I do think some form of RUC is fair for EVs, but yeah making it less attractive to own a low emission vehicle combined with removing the rebate at the same time seems short sighted.
I agree that our cities and towns are too car centric, it seems very unlikely that we will get sweeping changes to our public transportation or redesigning of cities to be more pedestrian/bike friendly any time soon. The general public seems to be against any large changes to the current way of life and neither major party seems brave enough to do it.
While personal zero emission vehicles contribute a tiny fraction to lowering our emissions, I think incentivizing their uptake is still a good idea. I'm a fan of the Japanese Kaizen concept of incremental continuous improvement that involves everyone. Working on lowering emissions on all fronts is ideal, but as always with politics they can only do so much at a time without upsetting voters.
Watched Beau Miles’ latest video and it kind of resonated seeing as our second child is getting close to 1. It reminded me how selfishly frustrating it can feel when young children take up your time that you want to spend on other pursuits. It’s a reminder to me that it’s not permanent. Also a reminder that we haven’t taken a holiday for years…
I can recommend his vids, he’s a introspective and inspirational person who makes quite well done short videos.
I got it shortly after I heard they were discontinued, so there was still some stock floating around. I think it might have been through Dick Smith/Kogan at the time?
If you're willing to go down the Amazon route, I think Echo Dot's have an aux out? They had a device called the Echo Input as well which was like and Echo Dot without the speaker, doesn't seem available anywhere though. I would probably only try this if I could be sure I could disable the microphone and smart speaker functions.
I would love some smart speakers but I find them pricey as well.
I'm using a Chromecast audio with an old pair of speakers on a smart plug. The speakers are old enough that it only has an IR remote.
I have it setup so:
Chromecast is detected as Playing, speakers turn on.
IR blaster sends commands to set the volume and bass level I like.
Dashboard displays additional buttons for controlling volume via IR blaster.
If Chromecast stops casting, the speakers turn off and buttons on dashboard disappear.
Main reason it's setup this way is I already had the old speakers and getting a Chromecast audio and IR blaster was much cheaper than getting good smart speakers. Although you're right it would be much simpler if I just get some decent smart speakers.
I think the issue then is in terms of pure zero emission vehicles in the last few years Tesla’s have had the most value in terms of technology, range, battery longevity. This is slowly changing. Even now you can get a new MG4 at $40k after rebate which is firmly in the same price range of a new Corolla. We’re starting to see more and more lower priced EV’s coming out from the likes of BYD, Opel, GWM. The real problem is that we’re waiting for the other manufacturers to start releasing EV’s to market.
Have a look on evdb.nz and you can see that there are quite a few models now that are in the 40k range after rebate which is within a new Corolla pricing. More affordable new EV’s are coming, it’s just that the major manufacturers are playing catch up, while Tesla has been doing it from the start, which is why you’re seeing more of them.