Chevy Volt's Pricing Could Provide Sticker Shock

[aa2]

Even if we have to build more power plants we can build nuclear plants. Of which America is a world leader in nuclear plant technology. Through Westinghouse which is now a subsidiary of Toshiba, but with many US employees. And through general electric. Companies are already wanting to build factories to produce the parts for the nuclear reactors in America. Those will be very high paying jobs, not your local retail jobs.

The main cost of nuclear power is interest on the capital you borrow to build the plants. And interest rates are falling rapidly for big development projects like that. It costs around 2,000$ per kilowatt hour of capacity for new nuclear plants. America's has 120 gigawatts of nuclear power capacity now. 1 gigawatt = about 2 billion in cost.

So even if we had to double the number of nuclear plants we have, so add another 120 gigawatts, the cost would be 240 billion$ spread over quite a few years. Well our oil imports for one year, are 12 million barrels a day * 365 days a year * 100 dollars a barrel = 438 billion dollars for just one year!

[a_v_s]

Originally Posted by aa2

Of which America is a world leader in nuclear plant technology.

Since when is the US a world leader on nuclear plant technology? Germany and Canada are the world leaders. (My coworker's dad is a Nuclear Physicist, and from what he said, this is traditionally what most in the industry believe).

I believe countries like Canada and France are something like 60-90% nuclear or something like that. The US gets most of it's electricity from burning coal. I vaguely remember someone saying that no new nuclear plants have been built in the US since the 70's or something, but not sure. I think only 20% of the US's power is nuclear derived.

Right now the most advanced Nuclear Plant is a Pebble-Bed-Reactor, of which it was first designed in Germany. There are zero pebble bed reactors in the US.

[aa2]

Originally Posted by a_v_s

Since when is the US a world leader on nuclear plant technology? Germany and Canada are the world leaders. (My coworker's dad is a Nuclear Physicist, and from what he said, this is traditionally what most in the industry believe).

Right now there are really only 4 companies competing on the big nuclear deals. Areva which is a French company, Toshiba which owns Westinghouse, General Electric and AECL which is the Canadian company. Of course they have joint ventures and deals with other companies too to make the parts.

I believe countries like Canada and France are something like 60-90% nuclear or something like that. The US gets most of it's electricity from burning coal. I vaguely remember someone saying that no new nuclear plants have been built in the US since the 70's or something, but not sure. I think only 20% of the US's power is nuclear derived.

You are right, France is just under 80% nuclear. And the US produces 20% of its electricity from nuclear. 54% of US electrical production is coal. France proves a developed country can go completely nuclear.

[Saturn69]

Originally Posted by bigtime

The volt is like everything else in America. They have found a way to get you, dumbie, to pay more for something. Like cable TV. Or satellite radio. Or cell phones. Subscription fees - onstar. In this case your going to pay more to drive. Something that should be cheap to do, and with simple, reliable technology. But NO! You see global warming is going to destroy us all (even though ONE volcanic eruption has a million times greater effect on the planet). That and oil is scarce and the chinese and indians need more and more (that and the oil companies have decided to NOT add refining capacity. OPEC has decided NOT to increase production. Oil inventories are at an all time HIGH).

Yep. What you need is a car with fancy, expensive batteries. Sure GM could build a simple corolla size car with a diesel engine that got 60mpg, but why? WHEN, they can build a corolla sized car that gets 60mpg+ and costs 3 times what it should, is expensive to maintain and allows them to pay for all those high dollar UAW employees. Plus, you get to buy electricity too! Yes!!! I imagine that will be like a cell phone plan. How many minutes of charging would you like while at the mall, or work, etc.???

Paying more to do what used to cost nothing. The American way.

Congrats GM, you have starbucks-ized the car!!! Starbucks took a 60 cent cup of coffee and managed to convince you, stupid, that you should pay $5 bucks! Woohoo! GM has taken the $15,000 car and managed to convince you that you need to spend $30,000 or more for the same basic thing.

America. You have been screwed again. Congrats.

You know, I can't help but re-read this post. I wonder how many people who rode horses felt the same way when the internal combustion engine began it's slow march across history and overtook horse-drawn carriages and (EGADS!) walking as the primary means of transportation. "It'll never work..", "Oil is dirty and expensive...", "Why spend the money on something that costs 5 times what a horse does and has thousands of moving parts..." We've been here before. It's fear, it's denial, it's natural, it's inevitable.

If you buy into the 'logic' posted by "bigtime", there's really no sense in living. Hear me out...why do anything other than the basic necessities to stay alive? Why enjoy this live we're living? Why pay $30K for a car that is really, in essence no better than any other car on the road? Okay. I'll give him that. But, why pay $50K for a car that can get to 60mph in 5 seconds? You can't use that in your daily commute so therefore it is an unnecessary ability, right? Because that is what you like. It's no different with an electric car. If you like it, you buy it. If you suits your needs and desires, you buy it. It's no different than a single person owning a Tahoe, even though he doesn't tow a boat, take kids to soccer practice or do a lot of home improvements - he likes it, it suits him, he buys it. Who are we to judge?

Those who speak out against the electric car - whether it be based in fear or ignorance - are no different then the people railing against the SUV: If it doesn't fit my definition of suitable transportation, it is useless and therefore un-needed in the world and should disappear. I don't think so, guys.

Oh, and as for 'simple, reliable technology', what's more simple than an electric motor? One moving part compared to the hundreds in a 4 cylinder DOHC engine. Yes. Must be incredibly unreliable. What.Ever.

[PhishPhood]

Originally Posted by Saturn69

Not everyone thinks they hybrids/electrics are the magic bullet. I think they are a great idea, but not a viable option for everyone. To be honest, the coal-fired plants are spewing stuff into the air regardless of whether or not we use the electricity, why not use it? And truth be told, oil refineries are much nastier places than a coal-fired electric plant. How many coal-fire electrical plants explode? Yes, we need to go into this with our eyes open and with no blinders, but to mention the negatives of electric vehicles while ignoring the negatives of oil-based transportation is kind of one-sided. Another thing is that it's far easier to regulate the emissions coming out of one smokestack owned by a corporation than it is to monitor and regulate the emissions from 100K tailpipes in privately owned vehicles where there are options to re-chip, remove emissions equipment for performance gain or allow the car to be poorly maintained thereby negating the emissions control devices.

This is the key point I see as the advantage of PHEVs and E-REVs. Right now today we have multiple sources of pollution, among them are
..coal-fired power plants,
..petroleum-fired power plants,
..nuclear-driven power plants
..hydro-powered plants...... all that run day and night, plus...
..petroleum refineries that run day and night mainly producing fuel for vehicles
and
..then petro-fueled vehicles themselves.

Vehicles running off the grid would primarily use the first four sources of power for most of our driving which would result in a reduction in the usage of/pollution from oil refineries and significantly reduce the pollution output from the vehicles running off petro-fuel.

As you say these plants run day and night anyway so why not use them to power our commutes, thus cutting out two huge sources of pollution? ( over-taxed refineries and peto-fueled vehicles ).

Oh... most of the money going to fuel/power the electric plants stays here in the US and recirculates rather than going to make snowski slopes in some desert.

[CJ Thunder]

Originally Posted by PontiacBixler

I wasn't jumping on you man. When I was saying "you" in my write up describing the potential aftermath, I was generalizing, not accusing.

OK, I guess meanings were crossed on both ends. I apologize.

Originally Posted by Saturn69

Not true. There's new low-voltage stereos and lighting to design, new HVAC that uses electricity instead of engine power, new ECU programming to facilitate proper operation of engine/battery, regenerative braking, non-vaccuum assist brakes that utilize an electrical booster. There's quite a bit more here that's new besides throwing a battery into the next-gen Cobalt body. They're inventing stuff as they go, quite a few patents have been filed, much like they did when they designed the EV1. How people think this car is going to be inexpensive is beyond me, the EV1 would have cost aroud $80K to buy in 1996, why should the Volt cost less? It's more complex than just an electric car. It'll hit $40K easy, and it will appeal to the tech-savvy and well-to-do. The cost of the technology will come down, but it's not going to be a $25K Prius.

Most everything you stated is not new, GM may have received patents for things but that doesn't mean that its new. Most of those things are out there, they just jammed it into a car. I was talking about the vast size of a li-on battery.

Of course there is this:
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/connected...cnalaska03.xml

I know its a mass produced car, because I know of an electric car that had a Honda generator plugged into the charge ports. I read about it in 97 I think, it was either a Jeep or Ranger conversion.

[TRWRacing]

Originally Posted by LoneWolf

The problem is, the cost won't be offset. You'd have to do some SERIOUS driving and keep the vehicle for many years to offset the kind of cost we're talking about here.

In a culture where some people replace their vehicles every two to three years, the selling point of vehicles like the Prius and Volt are as fashion 'message' statements far more than home-budget-savers.

I keep my cars a bare min. 10 years. 1996 Beretta replaced in July 2006 that had 87,000 miles for my 2006 Monte Carlo which currently has 9800 and I plan on keeping my 1917 Ford Model T forever