America and Canada have spent tens of billions in taxpayer money “saving” Chrysler and GM. During this Year of Living Parasitically, Toyota hasn’t said boo to a proverbial goose. This despite the fact that a non-governmental ChryCo Old GM Chapter 11/7 would have eliminated most of the North American market’s production over-capacity, setting the stage for a more rapid recovery. Politics, doncha know. Anyway, yesterday, sitting in a Volt prototype at a Toronto GM Chevrolet dealership, Ontario Premier Dalton McGuinty made an announcement. After July 10, 2010, customers plunking for plug-in hybrid and battery electric vehicles would be eligible for a $10,000 rebate. The car most likely to be so blessed: the Chevy Volt. But that’s not what really got Toyota’s goat. As the Leader-Post reports, “Mr. McGuinty said he wants one out of every 20 vehicles in Ontario to be electrically powered by 2020.”
Ontario had to help stabilize the auto industry by providing aid to GM and Chrysler Group LLC, said Stephen Beatty, managing director of Toyota Canada Inc. But he said that was meant to be a one-time action — step in and get out.
“How long does this continue?” Mr. Beatty said. “We can’t set up a situation where the future of the industry depends on constant subsidies…. This suggests that [the government] is prepared to be interventionist beyond their aim to help the industry recover.”
Toyota, known for its hybrid technology, was not informed of the government’s intention to offer the rebates and was taken off guard that the announcement venue was a Chevrolet dealership, Mr. Beatty said. “The question is: Is this a well-thought-out industry strategy? Or is it sort of the next stage in advancing a particular product and helping a particular company?”
Don’t you just love rhetorical questions? No, then what about perks?
Drivers of electric cars would get green vehicle licence plates, allowing them to use less-congested carpool lanes, even if there is only one person in the vehicle, Mr. McGuinty said. Drivers of the cars would also have access to parking at Ontario government and GO Transit lots.
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Ummm why they complain?… what was the name of the company which the Japanese government subsidized their hybrid development? a ver a ver… ah, yes, it was Toyota.
Lo que es igual no es trampa.
Well then let Michigan dole out the welfare and not Ontario.
Toyota should have the wisdom to realize that Dalton McGuinty is one of the most inept politicians to come down the pike in a good long while. You should have heard him and his colleagues pumping ethanol until various people thought through the matter and realized that displacing food crops and using vast quantities of water and fertilizer weren’t great alternatives to oil. So, they jumped on the cellulosic ethanol bandwagon…we know how that turned out. Dalton is neither knowledgable or competent, so the surprise announcement of an ill thought-out subsidy should come as no surprise to anyone.
Mr. Beatty’s question is very valid and one that must be on the minds of execs in all the non subsidised automakers. McGuinty would be well advised to answer it.
Stingray, that assertion has been proven to be false time and again. In fact, Toyota had enough money to buy up and close down probably 1/3 of the automakers in the world, just from pocket change. They did not need assistance from their government to do anything with electric hybrid car technology, because they are actually – gasp ! – PROFITABLE. Or at least they were until the Greater Depression tsunamied the global economy.
Just to make it clear, this isn’t Canada’s subsidy; this is Ontario’s subsidy. Roughly 24 million of Canada’s 32 million souls live outside Ontario.
GM has been pulling jobs out of Canada (and the US) for decades.
Toyota has been putting jobs INTO Canada, specifically ONTARIO, for decades.
So this is the thanks Toyota get….
You Ontario folks have just as much of a “knack” for electing imbecils as we Americans do.
Story on hybrid subsidies for Toyota – or not
My electric is very expensive.
So….what exactly is the cost savings?
So you don’t use oil.
You use power supplied by power plants.
What I mean is, how much energy is required to charge auto batteries?
Is an electric car cheeper energy wise than a gas car?
@ paulie:
Not even close!
*caveat: Of course if you had a solar powered electric car…then yes when the sun is shining. Not if you plug it in and get electric power to charge your batteries from commercial electric companies.
Honda complained similarly about the “Yaris subsidy” when Toyota’s two fuel-sippers fell under ecoAuto and Honda’s did not. C’est la vie.
I am surprised the Volt qualifies for this as it’s not fully electric. If I were Toyota, that would be where my beef would be. Otherwise, incentivizing electric vehicles is a good thing, especially when your province is host to the city with the second-worst ground-level air pollution problems in North America.
Robert, you read my local paper?
I’m touched.
Now on topic, without any real thought process of his own, McGuinty tries and tries and fails and fails. Ontario is really on the path towards becoming permanently on the federal dole like Quebec.
McGuinty is a crackpot.
Did I read that right, $10,000.00?!! Holy hell.
My local paper, too. :)
(Regina, Saskatchewan.)
I don’t get it:
“Several car companies including GM and Toyota already have gasoline-electric hybrid vehicles. But the government rebates would be for the next generation of electrified vehicles, which are powered almost entirely by batteries and can be recharged by plugging them in.”
“Toyota is bringing a plug-in version of its Prius hybrid car to North America later this year. But that will be on a test basis only and in limited numbers, Mr. Beatty said. “We’re not entirely convinced that the technology is a winning proposition for consumers today,” he said.”
Doesn’t the Volt have that “range extender” engine in it? If the above is true, the Volt won’t qualify either.
Kurt
But isn’t the Volt a plug in?
So, in fact as such is really costly?
I was/am hoping one of the B&B explain.
Welcome to Liberal tax and spend Ontario!
Hard to imagine an electric car being good for the environment when the juice is produced from coal. And, what to you do with a $7,500, 800 pound dead battery?
@Gardiner Westbound: Yes, the special plates for electric cars in Ontario ought to be black, not green, for we still burn dirt (coal) to make electricity here. But before you get too smug and supercilious about “Liberal tax and spend Ontario”, have a thought for Conservative Mike Harris’ disastrous “Common Sense Revolution”. It stripped the province of much of what made life good and pleasant and easier, to provide the temporary illusion of fiscal restraint.
That’s about as ridiculous of a policy as the subsidies Toyota enjoyed receiving from the US government for its hybrid vehicles.
Menno You Ontario folks have just as much of a “knack” for electing imbecils as we Americans do. Absolutely we do, and I would never claim otherwise.
Gardiner Westbound And, what to you do with a $7,500, 800 pound dead battery?
Bury it deep in the same hole you would other useless objects such as Dalton McGuinty and pretty much all of his cabinet.
First off, Toyota should stop whinning and just put a bigger battery in the Prius and see if it sells (I assume the rebate will be tied to battery size).
Secondly, does anyone really think that Ontario would subsidize that many electric cars? Electric cars will still be a low volume endeavour for the foreseeable future and this ‘perk’ can be recinded in the next provincial election if the public don’t agree.
Thirdly, I still don’t get how the Prius can be ‘profitable’. Sure most of the initial money spent on R&D has been recovered through the million+ sales, but a Prius still has an electric engine, batteries and control systems that the Corolla doesn’t have. So if the Prius generates a profit the Corolla must generate a lot more.
I’ve got a question about electric cars.
How do you heat them in the winter? We know that cold weather reduces a battery’s capacity to release energy.
So if you’re releasing energy to “go,” how do you keep “warm?” Can you do both? How much heat can an electric motor create? How do they move that heat into the passenger cabin on a cold day? Do electric cars have heater cores?
And, what to you do with a $7,500, 800 pound dead battery?
Recycle it. I just sold more than four times the amount of batteries (by mass) when I upgraded our UPS room a few years back and I got a tidy sum for them.
Hell, Home Depot takes batteries to recycle. If they can make it worthwhile, I’m sure that huge, solid blocks of lithium or nickel are worth a pretty penny.
Rod: the old buggies had a wood stove.
Ontario is really on the path towards becoming permanently on the federal dole like Quebec.
Schwaaa?
Ontario, despite hurting very badly in the recession, was still stuck giving more money back to the Federal government than it gets back, all the while being screwed for employment insurance. Unlike, say, Newfoundland, which is making money but still on intergovernmental pogey, or Alberta, which has made hay on not having to pay from it’s oil revenues.
Not at all like Quebec. Not even close.
I’m reminded of the Kink’s Catch me now, I’m Falling when people dog-pile Ontario (or California):
I remember, when you were down
And you needed a helping hand
I came to feed you
But now that I need you
You wont give me a second glance
Now I’m calling all citizens from all over the world
This is Captain America calling
I bailed you out when you were down on your knees
So will you catch me now I’m falling
Toyota has two plants in Ontario producing more vehicles than GM does in Ontario. Pretty bright of McGuinty to poke them in the eye with a sharp stick.
Of course with McGuinty running Ontario most of the industry has shutdown so we now have lots of extra electricity.
So if McGuinty runs Toyota out of Ontario he will have succeeded very well in meeting the Kyoto treaty reductions in CO2.(actually he already has by destroying the economy) The government will be broke and nobody will be able to afford an auto and Algore will celebrate with champagne while criss crossing the country from mansion to mansion on his private jet.
How do you heat them in the winter? We know that cold weather reduces a battery’s capacity to release energy.
The prevailing solution is to use heating elements when you plug them in to the wall to supplement the natural heat from the charging process. Hybrids will capture engine coolant heat as well.
It’s a good question, though, and not one that’s oft considered by Boy Wonder engineers from Silicon Valley. I don’t know how many EVs actually do this.
Toyota has a legitimate gripe, but I don’t think they need to worry until the subsidy approaches $15,000.
Besides, people will hate the Volt and its reputation will precede it. Don’t fear, Toyota!
It stripped the province of much of what made life good and pleasant and easier,
To be fair, what the Harris government did was, basically, cut what was ideaologically palatable to cut, dump the rest on the municipalities and hide the fact that they weren’t going to increase transfer payments through amalagamation of local governments.
The Common Sense Revolution is better known, in practice, as the “Screw Ontario’s Cities” plan. It would have balanced the provincial budget, too, if they hadn’t realized that at some point the bill for all this nonsense was going to come due.
It’s harris’s fault! Ha! HA1
I can see after Obama finishes destroying the US economy, and that is what his spending is doing, the left will take no responsibility for their actions. This isn’t tiddly winks and we are going to have the Greatest Depression due to the big government policies.
psarhjinian:
Ontario, despite hurting very badly in the recession, was still stuck giving more money back to the Federal government than it gets back, all the while being screwed for employment insurance. Unlike, say, Newfoundland, which is making money but still on intergovernmental pogey, or Alberta, which has made hay on not having to pay from it’s oil revenues.
You’re saying that Alberta gets back more from the federal government than it gives out? Despite the fact that Albertans give more per capita than anyone else in Canada, and still you’re asking for more?
Despite the inference I’m supposed to take from the song lyrics, the RoC (rest of Canada) owes Ontario nothing. The power centre is moving west, and it’s about time. Ontario got rich on everyone else’s raw resources through its manufacturing capacity. Turnabout is fair play, I always say.
(note to my non-Canadian friends. As much as this sounds like a never-ending meta discussion, it really strikes at the heart of the matter. Robert, I will try to end this discussion civilly.)
Regarding the question about how much does it cost to run the Volt on electricty, at 10 cents US per kWh, and fully charging the battery to 8kW, it would cost 80 cents US to run 40 miles.
Regarding the ICE range extender, yes it has one and it is used to charge the battery. The Volt’s wheels are always driven by the electric battery.
More info here http://www.chevroletvoltage.com/
Also, some math I did last year and posted on the GMfastlane blog on September 22nd, 2008 at 12:44 pm
“Hello Nate, first I must let you know that I am a GM employe. I would like to invite you to check my math instead of relying on the GM propaganda that you don’t buy into. One source of info is from the LA Times blog article titled “What is This Volt Thingy, Anyhow?” . http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/uptospeed/
It has some facts regarding the fuel usage of the Volt. The Volt will use 8 kilowatt/hours per charge and one charge will allow a 40 mile trip before the gas engine turns on.
From US Gov’t web sites, one kWh of electricity generated from coal has a CO2 emission rate of 2.1 lbs. And one gallon of gas has a CO2 emission rate of 19.4 lbs. (Note that wind generated electricity would not have any CO2 emissions.)”
Today – the cost to charge the battery fully depends on how much you pay for electricty in your home because you can plug the volt into any 110 outlet.
“Let’s say you drive an internal combustion engine vehicle that gets 40 mpg in city driving, (this is usually a Highway mileage rating) then 19.4 lbs. of CO2 are emitted. If you believe GM’s Lutz and the LA Times, then the Volt will use 8kWh per 40 miles and 16.8 lbs of CO2 will have been emitted when the coal was fired to generate the electricity that charged the Volt battery. And the coal in the power plant was probably mined in the USA. That is 19.4 minus 16.8 or 2.6 lbs less of CO2 emitted per 40 miles driven. (Most people drive 40 miles or less in one day.)
In summary, reliance on foreign oil for gas was decreased, CO2 emissions were decreased, and depending on how much is paid for the kWh from the power grid, the cost to the consumer to fuel the trip was decreased. Using facts, GM’s Volt design is directionally correct considering US foreign oil reliance at the moment, the current financial crisis, and the case of global warming.
Best regards”
Electric motors are only about 80% efficient, so I assume there is at least some waste heat that can be harvested to warm the cabin.
My big question is, where in the heck are we in Ontario going to find the electricity to juice up 1/20 cars off the grid? I haven’t done the math yet, but I assume that will require quite a bit of power, in a province that already has had to reneg on its promise to shut down the coal-fired plants. (BTW, unlike the US, we don’t get anything like the majority of our electricity from coal – the lion’s share in Ontario comes from nukes and hydro). Oh, and to correct an error above, the population of Ontario is about 12 million, so that’s about 1/3 of Canada, not 2/3.
Also, to correct another error, fueling with electricity is WAYYYY cheaper than gas, at least here in Ontario. A litre of gas (32.3 MJ) currently sells for about 90 cents, so that is 2.8 cents per MJ. A kWh of electricity (= 3.6 MJ) goes for about 6 cents, so that is 1.7 cents per MJ. Add in the fact that miles per MJ are about twice as high for electric motors, and you are looking at 25% of the fuel costs for an EV. Roughly speaking.
You’re saying that Alberta gets back more from the federal government than it gives out? Despite the fact that Albertans give more per capita than anyone else in Canada, and still you’re asking for more?
Off-topic, but what the hell…
No, what I’m saying is that the formula was not even looked at until 2008, when Ontario was screaming blue bloody murder, despite Alberta raking in vast sums of money from the oil boom.
Alberta does give quite a lot, but their per-capita GDP is also much higher than any other province, Ontario included. Notice Alberta does not have a sales tax.
Equalization is supposed mean equalization, it’s not supposed to mean “Screw Ontario to the benefit of the rest of country, especially Quebec and the Maritimes”. You can see why the average Ontarian can get twitchy about this sort of thing, especially when we’re the one province that hasn’t been bitching about sovereignty
What McGuinty et al are trying to do is stimulate the creation of EV manufacturing jobs in the province by artificial demand. This isn’t really a bad thing, but it’s also hard to do effectively when the province has no real money. The program isn’t so much pro-Volt and I’m honestly surprised the Volt would qualify, what with GM not building any in Ontario.
For clarification, I’m generally a New Democrat or Green voter. I don’t particularly like the Liberals.
The Volt will use 8 kilowatt/hours per charge and one charge will allow a 40 mile trip before the gas engine turns on.
8kw is equivalent to about 9hp.
A little more than my 5.5hp gasoline pushmower.
0 to 60 in six minutes flat.
Equalization is supposed mean equalization, it’s not supposed to mean “Screw Ontario to the benefit of the rest of country, especially Quebec and the Maritimes”. You can see why the average Ontarian can get twitchy about this sort of thing, especially when we’re the one province that hasn’t been bitching about sovereignty
Not to worry about equalization. Soon all the governments will be broke. The equal sharing of misery will be the norm, these will be the good old days.
They have run out of other peoples money and are now firing Hail Mary passes. There is no plan to fix this economy and the investors are fleeing Obama. Maybe Obama’s plan is that the UAW will save the economy. That takes a good sense of humour.
Bright lad that McGinty! This is the same guy whose government just put a hold on 2 new reactors at Darlington. Just keep loading up the grid AND cut down on supply at the same time. Where are we going to get the juice from? Windmills? Maybe we can install a really big one outside McGuinty’s office at Queen’s Park to catch the hot air!
psarhjinian:
No, what I’m saying is that the formula was not even looked at until 2008
I’m pretty sure the Martin government made some adjustments back in 2004 or 2005, but I’m just going by memory.
Bottom line, you won’t get any disagreement from me that equalization is screwy. In fact, if you really pushed me, I wouldn’t be adverse to saying can the entire program. It might do Quebec and the Maritimes some good.
As an Ontarian you say you get twitchy about this, which is fine. But think about how a Western Canadian would feel about it, when their moment in the sun has arrived but they feel something pulling at their pocket. You could just as easily make the argument that BC, Alberta and Saskatchewan are getting screwed now, too, but we could go in circles on this all day.
Back to the original point of contention. If Ontario continues down this road, if they get too reliant on the feds bailing them out with equalization, nuclear power plants, and the like, then they will start to resemble Quebec in their attitude.
Comparing Ontario (eventually) to Quebec shouldn’t be thought of as a throwaway provocation, but a call to arms for the province to diversify beyond its manufacturing base if it is to emerge from the underside of equalization someday.
Period.
Edit: Psar touched on my last point a little bit as I was typing up this response.
bluecon:
That was 8 kWh (kiloWatt hours) of *energy*, not 8 kW of *power*.
BTW, 8 kWh costs between 50 cents and 1 dollar. Not bad for enough fuel to go 40 miles!
@YellowDuck
one hp = 746 watts
You have 8 kw for one hour of power.
Or about 9hp for one hour.
Kinda underpowered for a go kart or a riding lawn mower let alone a car. Maybe just about the right power for a snowblower but not quite up to Model T standards.
Where are we going to get the juice from? Windmills?
McGuinty has that one solved.
Destroy the industrial base and there is no need for all that extra electrical power.
Mission accomplished.
Equalization is supposed mean equalization, it’s not supposed to mean “Screw Ontario to the benefit of the rest of country, especially Quebec and the Maritimes”. You can see why the average Ontarian can get twitchy about this sort of thing, especially when we’re the one province that hasn’t been bitching about sovereignty
Well sir, down here in the Maritimes, we’d like to give a tip of the hat to you generous Ontarians, and kneel down and kiss your feet.
Boy, we’re living high on the hog with all the money you give us.
What a load of rubbish, sir, as one Canadian to another. Especially as Ontario is about to receive equalization payments this year.
Comparing Ontario (eventually) to Quebec shouldn’t be thought of as a throwaway provocation, but a call to arms for the province to diversify beyond its manufacturing base if it is to emerge from the underside of equalization someday.
Diversify into what?
Ontario is going down the tubes California style.
Just in Ontario they don’t need to balance the budget.
What a load of rubbish, sir, as one Canadian to another. Especially as Ontario is about to receive equalization payments this year.
:)
I have several in-laws from Newfoundland (and currently living in Ontario) who’ll back me up on this.
Again, the point isn’t so much that the other provinces should at all feel grateful anymore than, say, Alabama or Alaska should feel to California and New York. It’s the “hur, hur, Ontario can’t balance it’s chequebook” jabs, often from other Ontarians and the occasional westerner, completely ignoring that Ontario has, for decades, been underwriting quite a lot of the rest of the country to the tune of billions dollars in shortfall.
Those get to me, much as the “hur, hur, California/Michigan/New York…” pokes must piss off residents of those states.
I don’t think I heard much at all in the way of complaints and grousing from Ontario until things got truly bad this past year. Again, there wasn’t so much of a “the rest of you should be thankful” as much as there was a “how about taking the boot off our neck and let us get back on our feet?”.
When Ontario is seeing significant unemployment and loss of tax revenue, it ought not to have to arm-twist the Federal government into relaxing the EI rules in such a way that we can actually float unemployed people until the economy picks up. As it stands (stood?) it is pathetically easy to get EI in the Maritimes or Manitoba by comparison, and crushingly hard in Ontario and Alberta. We lost a huge number of jobs in auto and manufacturing, and the only way to get that back (and avoid what happened to Michigan) is keep the rest of the economy going in the interim.
Again, to draw a parallel to California: laugh at the state as you will, but if it fails it is a much, much more serious issue than the failure of one of the flyover states because it has been, for some time, the money, wealth and R&D centre for the country as a whole. If California and it’s west-coast brethren/interdependents fail, where does it’s industry go? Who picks up the economic slack? How long and how bad will the hurt be?
Ontario is similar; it’s failure would result in a huge gap, one that Alberta and BC aren’t really able to fill.
psharjinian: If California and it’s west-coast brethren/interdependents fail, where does it’s industry go?
California the state and the industries located within its borders are different entities. The failure of one does not mean that the other is guaranteed to fail, too.
In answer to whether batteries are insulated and electrically heated to preserve battery capacity while charging in extremely low ambient temperatures a commenter wondered…..
I don’t know how many EVs actually do this.
I can answer this – professionally designed units have temperature controlled fan systems to prevent overheating while charging. They have no provision to counter the problem of low temperature AFAIK.
Reliance is probably placed on the fact that the 110lb battery is usually sited in a sheltered location inside the vehicle and is also going to present quite a large thermal capacity. The battery mass alone will ensure the battery will not freeze on the first day of exposure.
As far as amateur electric vehicle car clubs are concerned here in Canada, word has gotten around and battery insulation and built-in warmers are a requisite.
ChristyGarwood
Somethings seems amiss here.
Now, I do not know much about this Volt, how the testing was done or what speed and type of driving is being used for the results as stated.
But I DO know what my electricity cost.
To run the filter on the pool pump alone cost me 300 MORE a month.
That’s just a small electric motor just moving water, let alone my fat ass and any of my like friends.
I truly wish somebody had some real facts here…NOT just GM bull.
@psar:
I’m reminded of the Kink’s Catch me now, I’m Falling when people dog-pile Ontario (or California):
While I can’t speak for Ontario, people dog-pile on CA due to it’s incredibly boneheaded decisions and the massive amount of debt it has accumulated and completely mismanaged.
Then there are the moronic voters most of whom have never balanced their own checkbooks, let alone done the arithmetic to know that you probably shouldn’t keep spending more than you take in (especially for things you don’t need, like high speed rail projects to Vegas or SF, when flights are cheap and available).
We can’t forget the wonderful social programs that keep generation after generation of illegal immigrant cozy, illiterate and poor, while continuing to import even more poor people to make sure we have a steady supply of 3rd world wage earners to pick lettuce and pay them just enough so it takes 20 of them to live in a house to afford the rent.
Yeah, I wonder why people dog-pile on this place.
@bluecon,
No, sorry. A kWh tells you how much energy is available. It is an energy unit. It doesn’t tell you how much time you use it in. Seriously, trust me on this. you can use a kWh of energy in an hour, or in a minute, or in a second. Your electric bill tells you how may kWh you used – but that is your energy consumption, not your power.
Or, another way to think about it…a kWh equates to a certain amount of gasoline, not a certain amount of hp.
Hi paulie,
I am not a motor/ engine/ tranmission guru. I work in the sheet metal group at GM, so I can only tell you about the Volt based on GM public data and my interpretation of it. That is why I sent the link to the new GM web site, chevroletvoltage.com. I watched one of the videos and it seeemed informative. As to the veracity of the info, I’ll quote Ripley, “Believe it or not!”.
If you don’t believe GM, Lyle Dennis created his own site http://gm-volt.com/about/ and he is not a GM employee. Some of your questions can be answered there.
As for your pool pump motor, maybe it’s time to invest in a new one! I run mine 10 hours a day here in MI and it doesn’t cost any where near as much as yours. This cool summer has been costing an arm and leg to heat it with natural gas though!