Very interesting to hear what #Toyota NA CEO Ted Ogawa has to say about #BEV investment in the US.
Essentially, Toyota is ignoring EPA guidelines about BEV mix and focusing entirely on customer demand, and they will not make BEVs in numbers higher than expected demand lest they waste their resources.
Toyota’s now-well-known reticence in jumping into the BEV bandwagon, preferring to sell #PHEVs instead, may prove to be the better bet. The EPA is likely to reduce their mandate for 50% BEV new car sales by 2030. If they do, then Toyota’s strategy would have been proven right.
@drahardja I hate that Subaru partnered with Toyota to make their first EV, but I understand it. It meant Subaru could get into the market sooner. I bought a Subaru EV (Solterra) in February 2023. It's basically a Toyota EV battery, & body (shell) but the wheels, motors for the wheels, & interior are mostly Subaru. I had to wait longer for mine because the Toyota EV version had so many problems (wheels fell off during driving). Subaru wouldn't release anything until they were sure it was safe.
@flowerpot Subaru + Toyota has a long history of collaboration including the famous Toyota 86/Subaru BRZ, so I an EV collaboration totally makes sense!
@drahardja That's what the dealership salesman told me when I called to check on the status in August 2022 (the ETA for my car). He said it didn't happen on the Solterra, but the Toyota bZ4X EVs got recalled, apparently. And he said there was more than one recall for them just that year. He said Subaru stopped production to make sure whatever the F was wrong, didn't make it out of their production. I picked up my car late February 2023 only days after it reached the dealer.
@drahardja Maybe he was pulling my leg, but that doesn't seem like something someone would tell you if they wanted to sell you an expensive vehicle. He rushed to say that none of those problems happened with the Solterra, but that Subaru didn't want to risk it.
@drahardja There is the question of whether, in real-world use, plug-in hybrids have lower environmental impact than battery-only, apparently due to the former’s smaller battery & lighter weight, despite some gas usage https://www.aceee.org/greener-cars
@Simplicator Yes. That was Toyota’s argument some years back as well. They claimed that PHEVs saved more total carbon emissions, because most people’s commutes fall within the Prius Prime’s 30-something-mile all-electric range. The smaller batteries mean that each car could be lighter and cheaper and consume less lithium than a comparable BEV, which means that more people can own and operate them everyday, which means less carbon emitted in total, despite the gasoline engine firing up once in a while.
It’s a very compelling argument to me. I think the drive to have everyone drive a BEV is suboptimal. Not everyone has the access to infrastructure to do that.
@drahardja Wonder whether there would be a market for a car with just say 50 mi. battery range, no gas motor, but you can rent a 300 mi. battery to drop into it for long trips?
@tizan I don’t see the parallel. I actually see the opposite: US BEV sales are hitting a plateau, and companies (and the EPA) who bet on steadily increasing mass adoption of BEVs now have to revise their projections downward.
@Rjdlandscapes Who will they sell the EV to? Customer demand must exist to sell cars. Toyota’s internal projections show that demand does not meet EPA’s projections, and they are following their internal numbers. How is that disgusting?
@Rjdlandscapes Sorry, but what are you basing your claims of demand on? BEV sales are slowing. Surely it’s not Toyota’s nefarious lobbying that did that.
@Rjdlandscapes Just because it grew that much last year doesn’t mean it isn’t slowing. Remember, EPA’s projection is 50% mix of BEVs by 2030. I don’t see how we can get there.
“EV sales in the fourth quarter set a record for both volume and share: 317,168 and 8.1%, respectively. And while records were set, THE OFT-REPORTED SLOWDOWN IS REAL. Q4 EV sales increased year over year by 40% – a strong result by any measure, except when compared to the growth the industry saw in previous quarters. The market posted a 49% gain in Q3, and EV sales were up 52% year over year in Q4 2022. By volume, EV sales in Q4 were higher than in Q3 by roughly 5,000 units. The EV market in the U.S. is still growing, but not growing as fast. ”
Add comment