If each of those government workers backed up their own work to a 32 GB USB drive all would be well. I bet they could get a great bulk deal from Samsung or Hynix on such tiny obsolete models. (Yeah, I know there are probably security issues with this plan while there are no security issues with the current plan, the data remains very secure.)

And is still competitive in price with Pepsi. It's actually pretty amazing in that regard.

I don't disagree that fossil fuel use will decline over time, the world will necessarily decarbonize, but it is going to take generations. I also don't disagree that China knows what they are doing and are going to eat everyone else's lunch. I'm 60 so I don't really care about the former. I don't have any love for China's human rights record so I don't think the latter is good, but I have no control over it and won't be here for it so I'm just going to go on enjoying life in the present.

I doubt that will fly here, cords hidden under the snow are a trip hazard. I see lawsuits.

Condos around here typically have underground parking. I don't think bylaws would even allow you to build without some minimum number of spaces, though I don't think it is one-to-one.

I think the question was how are you going to coordinate the limited streetlamps with all your neighbors and their guests? (eg who will have to move their car at 3am to make way for someone else to charge before morning?)

No chance of that at all if you let them be the ones that make the rules. Nonetheless if I have to involuntarily give money to someone I would vastly prefer it be artists over billionaires, a billion times over. It's hardly even a real question.

I do have mod points but I don't think you intended that to be as absolutely hilarious as it is so I'll save my +1 Funny for elsewhere.

And that would probably matter if they were not selling it all to somebody else, given the fact they are a major oil producing country. The graph in your own link shows other sorts of hydrocarbon fuels increasing domestically also. Where exactly do you think all the other products of fractional distillation are going?

Oil is a global commodity used for much more than gasoline. Fossil fuel consumption is still increasing year on year. I would not even bet on that changing in 10 years.

I don't know about Norway but that article seems like a lot of wishful thinking. Here in Canada we will be happy to expand our production to make up for any loss from them, but I would not count on Norway stopping oil production in my lifetime either.

Yes that is what I meant. I personally don't think this is something that should be added to the long line of disposable items that are so popular in society nowadays, but hey if people think disposable cars will save the world, have at it. At least it makes me laugh.

Cars are cars, they come with many different powertrains, BEV, fuel cell, PHEV, gas, diesel, whatever. There is nothing revolutionary there.

Gasoline won't get more difficult to refill, at least not in my lifetime. That is a scary story like peak oil or the new hotness, stranded assets. Less demand should make gasoline cheaper, but I don't see it going back to an unwanted byproduct of refining like it originally was.

The selection on Amazon is generally better that any local bricks and mortar stores unless you want to spend a lot of time driving around window shopping. Also I give my credit card number to Amazon, and place 100 or so orders in a year. I prefer this to giving my card to 100 different online retailers, but that is just me.

As the EV fad diminishes and mandates disappear I think they will be fine.

I'm talking about the 15K Chinese EVs everyone is clamoring for. The Chinese may indeed make just as good an EV as a Tesla for cheaper. I don't expect those to be them though.

Yes I know. My concern was that someone might think well you can get a new Chinese EV for only 15K so who cares if it only lasts five years? I only keep my cars that long but the used car market is still very important to a lot of people. I'm not American but I think the average car age is around 12 years. There are all sorts of reasons to not want that number to drop.

Not if it is in the same price bracket, but not for a fraction of the price. Don't get me wrong, Chinese are very capable of building high quality stuff, but quality is not cheap no matter where you do it. They can also make the absolute cheapest flimsiest barely serviceable version of anything. Like things on Temu that may seem like a great deal, but don't expect them to last.

Well no my plan is irrelevant but someone else will hopefully be driving it for many years after me in any case. I have some concern that cheap Chinese BEVs may end up being somewhat synonymous with disposable BEVs. I know that is certainly a popular attribute for many things in the modern economy but I'm not sure it is something we want to be extending to automobiles.