California SB-286 HOV Extension Update

What matters is matching the battery capacity to your commute/driving and charging pattern.

 

Meanwhile, back on the topic ...

Both bills passed their respective houses last month and are now in the transportation committees of the other house. Vote was 49-22 in the Assembly and 37-0 in the Senate.

 

Which is incredibly high mileage for a comfortable car that seats five. 78 mpg means 13 gallons of fuel takes you over 1,000 miles.

Since this thread is about public policy, step back and consider the impact that 50+ mpg would have if applied to 1/3 or 1/2 the cars in America! The energy independence and environmental improvements would be phenomenal. We don't need to achieve zero gasoline use in America to meet our goals.

 

No policy is seeking zero in any foreseeable fortune. But zero for some has a more dramatic impact on the average. As this is about policy step back and think how many people will do either, and if only a smallnumber will do anything different how do you incentivized them to make the most impact.

From a policy point of view, HOV lanes are not going to get 1/3 of cali let alone america to switch to a prius. Even if they do get some to convert, the improvement from 25 to 50mpg is only a 50% reduction in total gas used, about the same as people switching from a truck/suv at 15mpg to a car at 30mpg. With only a 50% reduction, or every person in the HOV going gas free (or nearly) moving up from an20mpg car it will take 2 people going from a the same 25mpg car to a 50mpg car.. i.e. double the number of cars in the HOV (which is already somewhat clogged) to reach the same impact. An every person going from 50mpg to an EV is as much as someone going from 25mpg to 50mpg. Even if they move to a PHEV getting a median 175 MPG, the reduction is much larger, a reduction of 85%.

The total sales of hybrids getting 50 or better (Prius liftback +C) was about 1.3% of total sales last month. PHEV sales last month where .54% of the total sales. If one presume the prius buyers moved up from 25mpg cars (not realistic since many are already toyota owners), then the 50+ hybrids will save about 4.45Millon gallos a year. The PHEVs (using a weighted milage for Volt, PHEV and C-max) will save 75% of that amount, with less than half as many vehicles on the road.

The reason for emphasis on zero is that as only a few people will actually switch, the incentives are to get people to move as far down the gas usage as possible. Hence the white stickers getting longer life.. they really want to incentivize those.

 

Just out of curiosity... Directed to those of us that had the yellow stickers.. Honestly how many SUV cheaters did you see in the carpool lanes during your commute? I saw them daily in Southern California —especially on the 110 and 91 corridors (the poorest and most uneducated areas).

So if there is no risk of penalty for driving a low mpg vehicle in the carpool lane, why would you buy a small ugly Prius?


iPad ? HD

 

I know of two self confessed HOV lane cheaters. Both claimed they were caught very infrequently. The $250 or so fine every once in awhile was acceptable to them for the savings in time. That's why HOT lanes are gaining popularity, I suppose. Then they raised the fine to $400. Both were caught twice in the same week. I assume they stopped cheating.

And yes, one of them drives an SUV and pays up to $3, the highest I have seen to get past a 2 mile "Lexus Lane" corridor. Must feel good to have money.

 

I doubt it. Of course it depends on how you do the math.
For example, if batteries are the limiting resource, it makes much more sense to build 4 or 5 regular Prius's (converting 35 mpg cars into 50 mpg cars) than to build one PIP.

Here is the math for cars going 15K miles/yr
4 cars at 35 mpg = 1714 gallons of gas
4 cars at 50 mpg = 1200 gal
3 cars at 35 mpg, plus one at 100 mpg = 1285 + 150 = 1435 gal

Now consider the amount of batteries to build a Leaf...easily > 10x those needed to make a Prius
10 cars at 35 mpg = 4285 gal
10 cars at 50 mpg = 3000 gal
9 cars at 35 mpg, plus one EV = 3857 gal

Mike

 

The amount of batteries is not particularly relevant to the issue of HOV policies or HOV CO2 impact computation (Also note you are mixing NiMh and LiIon in discussion and they are not interchangeable . The primary cost of batteries is not the active materials (about 12% of the total cost), its the rest of the packaing/manufacturing etc.

But more relevant it that HOV lane access is an incentive to get an individual to reduce their cosumption and given how few will change its about getting those people who will to do more. If you want to argue about battery production that would be a different thread. If noone was willing to get a white or green sticker with the current rules then CARB would need to reconsider regular hybrids, but since the market seems to be willing to step and buy ZEV and PHEVs, providing HOV for single passengers in a regular hybrid just don't seem justified.

I will add that I would prefer a model of MPG (or CO2) per passenger so its not necessarily better to have 2 people in a 12mpg truck as it is 1 in a prius, but that would be too hard for them to enforce and politically unacceptable for too many.

 

As for the troll who said that the plugin prius should be stripped of its green sticker. I'm well over 1000 miles on this tank of gas and haven't quite hit 8 gallons of gas used. I will probably make it to about 1200 miles on this tank – my best mpg yet! Woo Woo!

 

How long does it usually take to become law?

 

We will have to be patient. Legislation moves at a snail's pace for good reason. If I were a betting man, I would say within the next 3 months.

 

As I understand it, the bills are moving at a customary pace for non-emergency measures, which this is. At some point, the versions from each house will be merged into one bill, and that process will take a while.

 

I think reducing CO2 is a good thing...but I think reducing congestion and smog emissions are more important. CO2 is a world-wide issue...but smog and congestion are very local. Giving out HOV stickers is a very local thing as well.

Just as a thought...it would not bother me a bit to get a huge percentage of people into EVs and PHEVs and have them all powered with coal. We could then solve the electrical generation problem much much easier than we can solve the I-want-to-drive-a-big-gas-guzzling-car problem, EV range problem, EV charging problem.
Let's just say in a moon-shot type of program we spent on the order of $50B/yr and got 50% of all drivers into EVs, PHEVs in 10-15 years...and powered them all with the current grid and even more coal.

The US imports ~10M barrels or oil per day. At ~$100/b that is $1B/day or $365B/yr. We know that it costs less (2x - 4x less) to power an EV compared to a gas car, so we know we'd end up saving money...even though the government would need to give rebates to get people to buy the cars. $7500/car isn't enough (based on current data), so maybe it needs to be doubled. $50B/yr at $15K is 3.3M cars/yr...33M in 10 years, 50M in 15 years.
If we could do this, then after 10-15 years we could spent all the billions being saved and billions not being sent overseas to make the grid as clean as we want. We'd easily be saving or spending $500B/yr on utilities rather than foreign oil. Of course, this is politically impossible to implement.

Mike

 

Unfortunately for those of us that had the yellow stickers, that wasn't exactly the case, sadly.

 

Hoping it gets out of the transportation committee ...

 

SB-286 was amended on June 11 in the Assembly. The text now appears identical to AB-266 with one little change that could only be an improvement. Seems like progress.

 

I bet this bill will be extended to promote sales, and once it does the cars will start selling like hot cakes. HOV access for 6 years is a no brainer and a good investment for CA drivers

 

I wish. But if 3 years HOV didn't get them selling like hotcakes a year and a half ago, then I don't think this bill will be a major factor.

 

Paying a huge premium (between regular and plugin) for 3 years would have deterred a lot of buyers but with 6 years of HOV access I think it will have a +ve impact on sales.

 

It was the case. The yellow stickers were also extended. But, alas, all good things come to an end.