Featured Shareholders Concerned About Toyota Anti-Electric Car Lobbying

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Even a vague claim like that cannot hide the true nature of concern. Don't deny there are not safety issues with both the liquid electrolyte being flammable and super high-speed charging which requires cord cooling.

 

Stopped raining here can go back out in the garden and the real world

I am a retired Toyota Employee who worked for Toyota and retired after 30 years spent in Maintenance Projects and Engineering. Blessed to have been able to visit many Toyota Plants and spend considerable time in Japan for Training and working at different Japan Toyota Plants and US site Toyota Plants. Also had the wonderful experience of helping out at the Subaru Indiana Plant as well as some Domestic Automaker Plants

Worked with some of the best people in their Fields while at Toyota and enjoyed every minute of it. It would be hard to find a better company to work for.

Nice to be able to pass on a few of Toyota accomplishments while it was raining outside. I could go on all day doing that but can get back outside since the rain stopped

 

Hyundai had issues with battery supply when the Ioniq first arrived to the US, and it may have been a factor in why the Outlander PHEV took so long to arrive here. Though reports for the latter were simply saying production constraints.

Are the safety issues worse than those of hydrogen? Gasoline?

The potential safety issue with high-speed, high-voltage charging doesn't go away with their solid state batteries.

Li-ion requires the potential dangers to be addressed in the design. Was there evidence of that lacking in the cars using Li-ion traction packs on the road when Toyota made the statement, including their own models? There have been fires, and issues requiring addressing by the manufacturer, but that goes for gasoline and diesel cars too.

The point isn't about there being safety issues to address, it is about Toyota using those issues as an excuse for not having a BEV when customers asked for one. Yet those issues didn't keep Toyota from sticking those Li-ion packs into their hybrids when they have the best NiMH supply in the business, or going with LiPh that doesn't have the fire risk. If Li-ion truly was unsafe, pack size wouldn't matter as there is plenty of plastics and other fuel in a car to keep a fire going once it starts.

 

toyota has done a great job with hybrids, fair with phevs and poor with bevs. hopefully we will see changes soon

 

Toyota is smart enough to not allow shortcomings of the past to be carried forward. Notice how the "good enough" attitude is being used to spin their stance as an "excuse" rather than an effort to give the next generation something better? Most people don't. Fortunately, some recognize history's pattern. There is good reason for taking it slow to do it right. We see token efforts, vague promotions, and pledges with no accountability or consequence. We're being played and some are more than happy to defend those actions... using Toyota has a distraction & scapegoat.

 

who is playing us, the companies actually selling bev's?

 

Care to name names and provide examples?

 

Obviously he's talking about all the empty promises around Hydrogen and the speed at which it will be adopted

 

• 'means testing' - California, the UK and I suspect other government bodies had put an income and/or cost limit on EV subsidies. This encourages the wealthy to own a gas/diesel instead of getting a BEV that soon enough can become an affordable (and useful) used car.
• Chinese and Japanese ultra small - in one respect, they mirror the ultra small ICE cars that are little more than commuter or 'going for groceries' run about. Source: Wuling Mini outsells Tesla Model 3, as China dominates global top 10 EV sales

Having owned four Toyotas of which three were Prius but never owning Toyota stock, technically "I don't have a dog in that fight." As an observer, I have confidence that Toyota could engineer and produce a world-class, BEV. For inscrutable business reasons, they only make a mandated, Chinese EV and nothing for the USA. I don't resent their decision as much as wish they changed direction ... even though SouthEast Region Toyota will refuse to distribute or sell a Toyota BEV.

Our seven year old, 2014 BMW i3-REx will eventually reach end-of-life. When that comes, I would like alternatives but today, it is slim pickings outside of Tesla. Too many inefficient, not auto driving, over priced, crash hazard EVs out there. The LIDAR wars continue and hopefully Toyota will avoid that 'tar baby.'

Bob Wilson

 

My current car is a second hand Prius Alpha. It replaced a Gen2 Prius I had bought in 2008 as the first new car I ever bought. In the past I have also owned Toyota Motor Corp. stock. I am anything but a Toyota hater.

No question that Toyota could engineer a top notch BEV if they committed to it. The problem is business, not engineering. Japanese businesses have a reputation of taking a long term view compared to US businesses but Toyota and Tesla are both going against the stereotype and doing the opposite of what one would expect. Toyota is going for short term wins, Tesla (and VW) for long term.

BEVs offer the chance to grab market share and build a technological lead at the expense of short term profit. Tesla doesn't really turn a profit from making cars yet, but they gained market share and mindshare.

ICEs (including hybrids and PHEVs) offer the chance to maximize short term profit from existing production sites and patents, at the expense of future market share. Think VW and other European car makers betting on diesel instead of electrifying their fleet. Toyota is the king of hybrids, so the longer we remain stuck at the hybrid stage and before, the more money they can make from what they've got. It puts them in the same boat as oil companies.

Toyota can't be too blatant about it, of course, so they like to talk about future technologies such as hydrogen fuel cells and solid state batteries, but both are really just fig leaves to pretend the company is ready for the future. SSBs are far from market ready with many technological challenges yet to be solved, followed by the need to establish mass production at the GWh per year scale. HFCs for cars have already lost the race against BEVs: The cost advantage of BEVs over HFCVs is growing by the year and DC Fast Charging is largely eliminating the range issue. Building up hydrogen refuelling infrastructure will be expensive, slow and wasteful. Green hydrogen will require three times more renewable energy than BEVs for the same distance covered. Hydrogen fuel may make sense for heavy trucks or ships, but not for cars. Eventually Toyota will have to recognize that.

 

I share your frustration with Southeast Toyota Region. Two years ago I wanted to purchase a new Toyota Prime. I had to remove it from consideration because I live in the Southeast Region and didn't want to travel to another Region to purchase the car. The Toyota Southeast Region simply said no to me when I asked to purchase the Prime.

I am a Toyota "homeboy" love their cars- get an employee discount -but unfortunately live in the Southeast Region .

For those not familiar with the Sales Region concept. Toyota Southeast Region determines what type of Toyotas are chosen for distribution and how they are distributed to the Regions Dealerships in the Southeast United States.

The advent of internet car buying and car shipping service make purchasing a vehicle out of the region less intimidating but still not ideal if you like to test drive a vehicle and see if before you buy.

 

I think Hyundai and Kia EVs are only sold in CARB states.

 

Sounds like they are available everywhere. Whether one is actually on a lot for a test drive outside a CARB state, or one with EV incentives, is another matter. By the latter criteria, the Prius Prime isn't available in all 50 states.

 

Thanks! It does appear that the Niro EV is now more widely available, including one in stock just down the road from me.

However, on the Hyundai website for the Kona EV it says “limited availability in select states” and lists CA, CO, CT, ME, MD, MA, NJ, NY, OR, RI, VT, and WA.