[ROCKMAN]

Just saw this: The U.S. auto industry sold more cars and trucks in 2015 than ever before, with Detroit automakers reporting their best sales since the mid-2000s and several foreign manufacturers posting all-time records.

http://www.detroitnews.com/story/busine ... /78295542/

[AdamB]

Like Saudi Arabia having no farms?

I keep saying, collectively we are really pretty stupid.

Alternatively, Saudi Arabia has something it can trade for food, and therefore doesn't need any farms. Gee...I wonder what that might be...?

[Shaved Monkey]

It is just very strange to me that a country that built its own defense aircraft in WW II is willing to just let its entire manufacturing capacity go away without doing anything to change the trajectory. No manufacturing will make Australia totally dependent on other countries for manufactured goods, how hard is that to understand?

Its just ideological madness,allowing the free market to dictate as though the free market knows whats best.
The theory is we sell iron ore and coal to China and they make stuff for us cheaply.

[JV153]

Its just ideological madness,allowing the free market to dictate as though the free market knows whats best.
The theory is we sell iron ore and coal to China and they make stuff for us cheaply.

Sneaky. .. and, yes the US auto industry has recovered.

[ennui2]

It is just very strange to me that a country that built its own defense aircraft in WW II is willing to just let its entire manufacturing capacity go away without doing anything to change the trajectory. No manufacturing will make Australia totally dependent on other countries for manufactured goods, how hard is that to understand?

Its just ideological madness,allowing the free market to dictate as though the free market knows whats best.
The theory is we sell iron ore and coal to China and they make stuff for us cheaply.

What's more madness is that Australia is ground zero for climate change and it is still embracing its coal industry and I don't think you can even get a Tesla over there.

[dolanbaker]

It is just very strange to me that a country that built its own defense aircraft in WW II is willing to just let its entire manufacturing capacity go away without doing anything to change the trajectory. No manufacturing will make Australia totally dependent on other countries for manufactured goods, how hard is that to understand?

That trend is not unique to Australia, there are many other countries that have done the same.
There used to be a Ford factory in Cork which closed down about 20 years ago, the Irish steel industry went 10 years ago and more recently a number of PC module manufacturers went. At least Australia has huge mineral reserves and the ability to grow huge quantities of food that it can trade, most EU countries don't have that luxury.
I expect that we'll soon see Chinese made cars being imported in vast numbers here, if this does happen, they will undercut all the budget car manufacturers in Europe.

[toolpush]

I don't think you can even get a Tesla over there.

I saw my first Tesla about two weeks ago, so they must be available, but not many on the road. Yet to see a Leaf, or any other electric cars. Sydney taxis are changing over to Camry Hybrids, so the are plenty of them.

[ROCKMAN]

pusher - Did you see my comment about the enthusiasm over the $2 billion in future Tesla orders? In 2015 Ford alone sold $24 billion of F-150's. Yes indeed: Mr. T has saved our asses. LOL.

[toolpush]

Rockman,


I flew through LA and SF last year, and was surprised doing a little road side survey, while the wife polluted the air, to see so many CNG, hybrid and electric cars. The Californians certainly are making the incentives to move away Gas and diesel worthwhile. I fee the big incentive that gets the Tesla type cars selling over there is the access to the HOV lanes. People with money have always had there right to privilege.
On the other hand Europe, where most incentives were all to do with fuel price, and Europe has some really high fuels prices, electrics and hybrids had a real hard time gaining traction. Now the evils of diesel is the latest fashion, and governments getting into a heavy EV push, We will see how they go. But electricity is not cheap in Europe and fewer people live in detached houses, so even there it will not be so simple.
So Rockman, are you hanging off buying your F-Truck, until they coming out in the EV version? lol

[Outcast_Searcher]

So Rockman, are you hanging off buying your F-Truck, until they coming out in the EV version? lol

By coincidence, I read an article on Bloomberg today about the F-150, talking about how they already are not meeting US 2016 pollution standards on some F-150's, despite the $1 billion plus they just spent upgrading them.

The article mentioned that they will likely have a LOT of problem by 2025 when the US mandated efficiency standards are much higher.

The problem, though, is that some versions of the new F-150 still don’t meet the government’s 2016 emission and fuel-economy mandates. What’s more, the hurdles get higher from here: By 2025, the targets will be much more stringent.

Two things caught my eye as likely future F-150 options:

By 2020, Ford will have a hybrid pickup with batteries powerful enough for daily driving, CEO Mark Fields has said.
Ford also is testing a diesel-powered F-150, according to a video posted on Autoblog.com, and may add a 4-cylinder engine for the first time in the U.S., a person familiar with the plans said. That may be a hard sell on the farms and construction sites where Ford has championed big, powerful V-8s for decades.

IMO, a better way to handle this would be meaningful gasoline (i.e. carbon) taxes, to dissuade most people who don't actually need a work truck from driving one every day. Naturally the oil lobby and the auto lobby and, sadly, most US consumers would be strongly against such a common-sense move. How are Ford and GM to make big profits if they can't sell hulking gas hogs that people rarely actually need?

[toolpush]

Searcher,

I agree totally with you on the point that most people don't need the capabilities of the F-Truck and its brothers. Most sales are driven by fashion and keeping up with the Jones. The Japanese, used to provide smaller versions of the pickup trucks for people that wanted the utility of the design, but didn't need the size and mass of the F-Trucks. Unfortunately, the Jap trucks are nearly up to the size of their America compatriots.

I can see a Hydrid Pick up making it to the market. Fully EV, I think will be a much bigger sell!

PS. The funny thing about a meaningful carbon tax to push changing habits, is when they introduced one in Australia, it distinctly left out transport fuels. And this was introduced by a left/green coalition. It was considered to be too politically sensitive to even mention transport fuels. Our carbon tax, could have just as easily called a coal tax, as that was all the effect it had. I agree on higher fuel taxes, but that ain't going to happen in the US, and unlikely here soon. Politicians are too busy counting votes!

[ROCKMAN]

pusher - They can by all the Teslas they want in CA and it won't change a thing nationally: the per capita gasoline consumption there is already the lowest in the nation. In fact it is only 10% of the national weighted average.

http://www.statemaster.com/graph/ene_ga ... per-capita

Notice how a number of New England states are 10X or more higher then CA. Even the NY consumption is 7X greater. And it of course Texas is more then 11X higher.

By the way just last week I bought my 16 yo daughter a used 4 door Silverado. A country girl that's been pulling horse and cattle trailers for a while. This summer if I can't get her hooked up as an intern with a civil engineer (as I so despately hope) she'll be working cattle for some neighbors. If I had thought about dealing with a teenager getting her driver's licence I might not have been as enthusiastic about adopting her 16 years ago. LOL.

[Outcast_Searcher]

pusher - They can by all the Teslas they want in CA and it won't change a thing nationally: the per capita gasoline consumption there is already the lowest in the nation. In fact it is only 10% of the national weighted average.

http://www.statemaster.com/graph/ene_ga ... per-capita

Notice how a number of New England states are 10X or more higher then CA. Even the NY consumption is 7X greater. And it of course Texas is more then 11X higher.

Well, I tried to post a detailed comment about this, but the site seems to have lost it via the Captcha check thing, so I'm not doing all that work again.

The gist is:

The figures for the bottom five states make NO sense to me. The gasoline consumption suddenly falls off a cliff relative to the other 46 listed states (DC listed as a state). Yet, the basic make-up of the states like CA and OH, with lots of cars, drivers, roads, cities, rural areas, traffic jams, etc. isn't REMOTELY different enough to make anything like a 10Xish difference vs. the average states.

So I'm calling "bogus data reporting" here, unless someone can enlighten me.

And I checked things like BEV sales in CA, and the numbers are well over an order of magnitude too small to cause that effect vs. the average state. And notice for the 46 state group, the range of figures isn't much over 2X.

If someone can explain what I'm missing here, I'm all ears.

[Shaved Monkey]

I don't think you can even get a Tesla over there.

I saw my first Tesla about two weeks ago, so they must be available, but not many on the road. Yet to see a Leaf, or any other electric cars. Sydney taxis are changing over to Camry Hybrids, so the are plenty of them.

Even Taxis in the bush(bush town) up here there are a few hybrids.
Hybrids need stop start so not that great unless your in a city/big town perfect for taxis

[Tanada]

pusher - They can by all the Teslas they want in CA and it won't change a thing nationally: the per capita gasoline consumption there is already the lowest in the nation. In fact it is only 10% of the national weighted average.

http://www.statemaster.com/graph/ene_ga ... per-capita

Notice how a number of New England states are 10X or more higher then CA. Even the NY consumption is 7X greater. And it of course Texas is more then 11X higher.

Well, I tried to post a detailed comment about this, but the site seems to have lost it via the Captcha check thing, so I'm not doing all that work again.

The gist is:

The figures for the bottom five states make NO sense to me. The gasoline consumption suddenly falls off a cliff relative to the other 46 listed states (DC listed as a state). Yet, the basic make-up of the states like CA and OH, with lots of cars, drivers, roads, cities, rural areas, traffic jams, etc. isn't REMOTELY different enough to make anything like a 10Xish difference vs. the average states.

So I'm calling "bogus data reporting" here, unless someone can enlighten me.

And I checked things like BEV sales in CA, and the numbers are well over an order of magnitude too small to cause that effect vs. the average state. And notice for the 46 state group, the range of figures isn't much over 2X.

If someone can explain what I'm missing here, I'm all ears.

A lot of it is the whole per capita trick where you divide the consumption by the population, which makes an over populated state like California look much better. Try this graph from the same page but set to total gasoline consumption by state instead of per capita,
http://www.statemaster.com/graph/ene_ga ... onsumption
On that graph California ranks # 28 and there is no huge drop in a group of states compared to the average.

[ROCKMAN]

T - Per capita is not a "trick" per se. Texas consumes mor the 7X times as much gasoline as CA. But if CA is "overpopulated" at 38 million wouldn't you say the same for Texas at 28 million? I also found the CA stat shocking. But I've yet to see anyone post contradictory data. So my statement stands until they do: no matter how many alt vehicles are bought in CA it won't produce a significant decrease in the average consumption because that number is already so very low. OTOH if there were a huge substitution of alt vehicles for ICE's in Texas there would be a significant impact on fuel consumption.

Don't hold you breath for that to happen. LOL. Texans bought more of those $24 BILLION worth of F-150's in 2015 then folks in any other state.

[vtsnowedin]

If someone can explain what I'm missing here, I'm all ears.

I can confirm that the Vermont numbers are total BS.
They list gasoline consumption as only 802,000 gallons which isn't enough for 1000 cars driven normal amounts.
The real figure from State of Vermont government reports for 2010 was 332,000,000 gallons of gas.

[ROCKMAN]

A minor correction: 1 barrel = 42 gallons.

And for bonus points: why is it "bbl" and not "bl"?

[vtsnowedin]

A minor correction: 1 barrel = 42 gallons.

And for bonus points: why is it "bbl" and not "bl"?

Well even if it is in 42 gallon barrels it should read 7.904 million barrels. No idea what the extra b is for in bbl.