Nov 17, 2017 at 8:29 AM | Mark Hodgson

Battery cars doing under a 100 miles a week, of town mileage may make sense, until the batteries need to be replaced.

Big trucks will be doing 50,000 - 100,000 miles a year? So will need to change batteries at least once a year at $100,000 a time. In the UK, it could work (just) The best trial would be Supermarket delivery trucks, with regular routes and guaranteed charging during deliveries.

Gwen. Your 6.49am reminded me of my time in Wales as an undergraduate where and when I learned of the cross border traffic every Sunday when the deprived Welsh made migrations to the fleshpots of the wicked English who could drink alcohol. I was told that traffic accidents peaked during this alcoholic transhumance. Even more interesting was that the people I stayed with stored their beer bottles until their English relatives visited. The bottles were then taken home upon departure thus concealing the fact that the Welsh drank. Appearances needed to be kept up in front of other "chapel".

Nov 17, 2017 at 8:24 AM | Mark Hodgson

It is good that Scotland acknowledges that their alcohol problems are worse.

Prohibition in the USA did not stop consumption, and increased the involvement of criminal activity, by increasing the rewards on offer.

There is then the problem of making illegal drugs more attractive:

“You can go get a fiver, buy half a gram and it’ll knock you out for a few hours,” says John, who has been homeless since 2014. “It’s better than buying a bottle of White Ace [cider].”

From:
https://www.theguardian.com/society/2017/apr/15/its-worse-than-heroin-how-spice-is-ravaging-homeless-communities

I do not pretend to know what the solution is, but price fixing does not benefit the law-abiding citizens.

Gwen

As for Tesla, the BBC have a story up this morning on the front page of their news website:

"Tesla unveils first electric truck"

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-42021713

Because it is written by a North America correspondent, rather than by McGath and co (all too busy in Bonn and Switzerland, presumably) it is actually a reasonably balanced piece. As well as talking about the new truck, it also discusses his new sports car It includes gems like this:

"The Model 3 is behind schedule due to factory delays, a situation Mr Musk described recently as “production hell”.
The 46-year-old had been camping at Tesla’s Gigafactory in Reno, Nevada, to oversee battery production for the new cars. However, while the company had predicted it would make 1,500 Model 3 cars in the third quarter of 2017, in reality it only managed 260."

"Depending on your opinion of Mr Musk, launching a new truck at this time is either a bold statement of belief in his technology, and business as usual, or a foolish distraction from Tesla’s main goal of making its Model 3 a mainstream, affordable car."

"With Tesla Semi, Mr Musk enters a competitive, demanding market. There are an estimated 3.5 million truck drivers in the US, the vast majority of whom drive diesel-powered engines. Tesla will not be able to compete on diesel’s range, and battery specialists doubt Tesla can produce a powerful enough battery at a reasonable price.
“A 300-mile-capable battery pack costs about $200,000,” a Carnegie Mellon study concluded.

“Which is much higher than a diesel-powered semi-truck, which costs about $120,000, on average, for the entire vehicle.”
Mr Musk said the Tesla Semi would be able to travel 643km (400 miles) after 30 minutes of charge at one of Tesla's new mega-chargers.

As for cost, the company said that per mile the Tesla Semi would work out cheaper than a diesel equivalent when fuel and other maintenance is taken into consideration - but did not share the cost of an individual truck.
The Diesel Technology Forum, a non-profit trade group that promotes the use of diesel, said Tesla’s announcement needed to be "evaluated in the context of reality”.
"Diesel is the most energy efficient internal combustion engine,” Allen Schaeffer, the forum's executive director.
"It has achieved dominance as the technology of choice in the trucking industry over many decades and challenges from many other fuel types.
"Still, today, diesel offers a unique combination of unmatched features: proven fuel efficiency, economical operation, power, reliability, durability, availability, easy access to fuelling and service facilities, and now near-zero emissions performance."
As well as coming up against diesel incumbents, Tesla also faces other electric rivals. Concept electric big rigs have been unveiled by Daimler, Volkswagen and Cummins - though all fall short on range, and none are currently on the roads."

Pcar and Gwen

I understand why the SNP have gone down the route of minimum pricing for alcohol, but as usual, suspect politicians of not thinking through the implications, and of being blissfully unaware of the law of unintended consequences.

Poor people with an alcohol problem don't cease to be poor or to have an alcohol problem just because the SNP government makes alcohol more expensive. On the contrary, they will become even poorer, because they are unlikely to kick their alcohol habit, certainly not without expensive support from the state. If they become sufficiently poor, the more desperate among them may even resort to crime to fund their habit, as some drugs users do. One thing I think I can just about guarantee is that alcohol sales won't go down. In the meantime, everyone has to pay more for alcohol, whether they have an alcohol problem or not.

I suspect it will end badly, and the news about it will be buried in due course.

With great publicity, Elon Musk launches his electric truck "following the success of his electric cars".

Has Tesla sold a vehicle at a profit?

Nov 17, 2017 at 12:25 AM | Pcar

The Law of Unintended Consequences may kick in. Off Licences, small shops and supermarkets just South of the Scottish Border, may see an increase in trade, to the detriment of those on the Scottish side. Cross border smuggling will increase.

Politicians from Scotland should set a good example, but I don't know whether Westminster bar staff regard it as a a purely Scottish problem.