Toyota are flailing around because they spent the last ten years spreading FUD. Did you know they were once a major stakeholder in Tesla and even launched an early EV using some shared tech? But they sold their stake in Tesla and spent the last decade desperately trying to pretend battery electric vehicles don't exist.

I don't know what their endgame is either. Toyota has entered into manufacturing partnerships with some Chinese companies so maybe they'll belatedly sell EVs that are actually Chinese manufactured but under their design / logo. Maybe these will sell well. But it won't help the Japanese economy so I wonder what will happen with their domestic auto plants.

Most EV owners will charge overnight too. I've had my EV for a year now, and I've used a public charger precisely once. Obviously not everyone is lucky enough to be able to charge their car in their own driveway so joined up thinking is necessary. Norway has on chargers on the street, in carparks etc.

Yes never intended to. The issues with hydrogen are insurmountable - the cost of it, the lack of scalability, the energy required to make "green" hydrogen, the dirty secret that most hydrogen isn't green and comes from natural gas, the extreme volatility / danger of it, the lifetime of the fuel cell, and the environmental impact of hydrogen escaping into the atmosphere. All these are insurmountable issues, as has been demonstrated by the utter failure of this technology to scale up.

So now Toyota are playing the same tune with liquid hydrogen. Except liquid hydrogen must be stored in an insulated flask at -250c in the car and offgassed so it basically evaporates into the atmosphere if you don't use it in a few days. Great for methane production and nothing else. They're also hyping up ammonia which is merely an extremely toxic chemical that burns and produces nitrogen oxide, another potent greenhouse gas. It's so harebrained and desperate that I wonder who they're fooling any more. It may be some regions like the EU with EV deadlines will permit some synthetic fuel powered vehicles, but none of this garbage will be allowed.

As for why they're doing it, there is some geopolitics involved here since China has access to natural resources, but that's not all of it at all. It is primarily because Toyota's former CEO got a hate boner for electric vehicles and ever since they have been playing this charade. Toyota is also a domineering force in Japanese automotive circles and they've forced other makers down the same route. They will of course belatedly make some EVs, ironically made by Chinese OEMs, but by then it may be too late.

I'm sure QDEL is great but OLED already delivers most of what this tech screed promises and for substantially less. Building a factory that makes displays costs billions and these screens would *really* have to deliver significant energy saving, and brightness to justify the very large investment necessary to manufacture them. And also consumers would *really* want to buy them to overcome the enormous markup they'll command. Also, aside from its positives there are things which are not mentioned, such as how easy it is to manufacturer, how it deals with heat, cold, moisture, UV, how resilient it is to shock & pressure (e.g. if it were used in phones), what substrate it lives on, how easy it is to "print", what the production quality rate is, what the meantime between failure is and so forth.

That's the thing with EVs. While it would suck if the manufacturer went bust (e.g. Fisker is on the brink right now), the car itself would still function for its entire lifetime. Plug it into a home or public charger and its ready to go again.

Conversely, if you bought a car that operates on MagicFuel(tm), and the only nearby MagicFuel station is going to close down, then now you own a brick on wheels. And adding insult to injury the only reason MagicFuel existed was because a cynical automaker wanted to disrupt sales of EVs and suckered people into being pawns in their game.

Toyota has only ever used hydrogen tech as spoiler and FUD to counter the uptake of battery electric vehicles. It never stood a chance of taking off for a variety of reasons and was never intended to. Same for their other efforts of late - liquid hydrogen power (not merely compressed but liquid), ammonia power, solid state batteries (which they've been claiming could come any day for the last 10 years) etc. All intended to dampen enthusiasm for BEVs and spread the illusion of viable alternatives. And yeah solid state batteries will come at some point but it will be no thanks to Toyota.

I wouldn't be surprised if in addition to the above that some parties, e.g. automakers or oil companies are responsible amplifying disinfo about EVs. There is certainly a lot of lies going around and somebody is putting them out there.

Hello context callling. This is an article about Amazon delivering shit in the US, not about some other thing in Rwanda or whatever else you want to conjure up.

Drone delivery would only work in locations in perfect weather, with no nearby hazards, no flight paths / air restrictions, where the item is light enough, and in stock and close enough to a recipient who will pay stupid money to receive it fast. In other words, a diminishingly small set of customers.

If that were to happen, then most people could install solar & a household battery. Either charge the car at night from the battery, or during the day/weekend. I expect ultimately most EVs will be charged through solar hooked up to parking. After all most cars spend their lives stationary, parked at home or the office.

I hope Rivian does profit and can expand on this. I think it's an incredibly innovative design that would work for any company that needs to deliver stuff in an optimal fashion. To me it's a sleeper hit too. While Tesla is stealing oxygen about cybertrucks etc., here is a competitor that puts out an incredible commercial vehicle. It speaks well of Rivian and their design teams to put function over form.

Outlawing of competition? The US, Europe, Asia et al are free to compete on battery technology, auto manufacturing, renewables and all the rest. The problem is they're NOT competing. Traditional automakers (e.g. GM, Toyota etc.) are spreading plenty of FUD about EVs and nonsense about hydrogen / ammonia powered cars. But compete? Not so much. Perhaps if they did, they'd wouldn't be in such a precarious situation.

China stole a march because they went all in on EV technology while other regions dithered. That doesn't prevent other countries from catching up, and innovating in their own way. There are countless companies looking to improve battery technology, range, motor efficiency etc. so that I think batteries in 10 years from now will be nothing like the ones of today - they'll be lighter, more energy dense and probably solid or semi-solid state batteries. Many of these innovations will come from Western companies. Competition is the answer.

Protectionism is certainly not the answer. Either by slapping tariffs on Chinese products or extending shitty ICE tech because the West is so backwards it can't compete. That's "outlawing of the competition". We should not tolerate ICE vehicles a second longer than necessary, at least where EVs are viable replacements. China probably has most to lose from the West pulling its finger out of its ass and actually competing and that's what needs to happen. And any company that can't keep up even with 15-20 years warning deserves its fate.

Oh it's fuel savings too. US prices might differ but in Europe it costs about 1/2 to 1/3 to charge an electric vehicle on a night rate as to fill it with petrol / diesel at the pump. I'm sure that's true for businesses too, especially ones like Amazon who might see the upfront cost of moving to an electric fleet paying for itself over a number of years. And other forms of servicing should be cheaper too like you say.

Go and watch Doug DeMuro's video about it. It's not just a delivery van, it's fantastically well thought out electric van terms of efficiency, ergonomics, safety, visibility, route planning and driver comfort. Amazon probably do have crappy regular vans in their fleet spray (as well as contractors) painted with their livery. This is an entirely separate thing to those. And as you say other couriers have similar needs which is why I think if Rivian has rights to the design there would be a lot of companies very interested in buying their own versions.

I've watched YouTube videos about them and they have an excellent industrial design that fits their purpose. Just the way the driver sits, the visibility, the way packages are stored, the overall capacity. Everything is so well thought out. I wonder if Rivian has rights to sell the same basic vehicle to other courier firms because I could see it being a very profitable side business for them.