Comments by "Luredreier" (@Luredreier) on "Germany Has a (Car) Problem. And With Them All of Europe." video.

 @bensnooks4830 Well, here in Norway we're at more then 80% of cars being sold being EVs here in Norway now, reaching 90% in some months. If we can do it then the EU can do so to.
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@tobiasbauer198 Europe is slowly starting to start producing 100% clean steel production with no emissions at all. We can't compete with China in quantity. But we can beat them in quality if we want.
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@Infusco A electric car driving 100% coal generated power is still more environmentally friendly then any gasoline car after just a few years of driving. Of course if you are planning to take a new car into a demolition derby within a year or two of buying it then yes, a internal combustion engine car is far more environmentally friendly in that scenario. That said, if you're using 100% coal power the emissions from battery production (including mining and refining) means that emissions from a large battery takes a long time to earn back with a electric car (about 20 000 km). So a plug in hybrid actually ends up being better then a full electric car with a big battery. As the EV with a big battery will never save more CO2 then the PHEV that's driving 80% on pure electricity in its lifetime if the power is 100% coal power. It'll simply wear out and be replaced before beating the PHEV. A smal battery EV does beat the PHEV though. So a EV as a daily drive then renting a efficient ICE car or a large battery EV for long distance driving is probably the best option if the power is 100% coal power. But short of that a PHEV is better. Once you start mixing in clean renewable energy you end up with the EV overtaking the PHEV and then pulling away from it as well as further distancing itself from the ICE cars.
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@vasiliyt8600 It's kind of a myth that the Norwegian economy runs on oil money. And it's certainly not subsidizing EVs. EVs are taxed now, they're just taxed less then ICE cars. And trust me, if everyone in practice on average had to pay 200% the price of a ICE car to buy it you'd definitely look into alternatives that costs less. It definitely works anywhere that doesn't treat guns and cars as a right instead of the privilege it actually is. And the EU does. We can make ICE cars prohibitively expensive, while EVs are more normal cost, and it would work as a charm. You wouldn't need a cent of subsidies. Just a lot of political capital and will. And people would switch. First gradually, then fast. Of course, if you also add subsidies that definitely helps. But they're not needed.
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@bustabloodvessel5327 To be fair part of the reason we're still selling gas is also that the continent (especially Germany) is kind of twisting our arm in that regard. While they've always wanted the cheap Russian gas they've wanted ours too to reduce Russia's leverage. And quite frankly us selling gas to the EU in general and Germany in particular was important for our geopolitical security. As we can't afford the EU suddenly turning a blind eye to Russia trying to do anything with us or Finland or Sweden etc just because the EU depended too much on their gas. As is with our production pretty much as high as it can be we barely made it through the start of the invasion... Germany also doesn't want to phase out gas and instead wants us to produce electricity, turn it into hydrogen and then send them hydrogen instead of natural gas to fuel their gas power plants... While using natural gas in the meantime... So they don't have to invest money into the infrastructure to become greener or deal with the "not in my backyard" nonsense that's leading to more windmills being torn down then built in Germany...
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@geroldfirl Norway has a storage capacity of 85 TWh already in our reservoirs... Northern Europe only needs 25 TWh. The problem isn't storage capacity of the reservoirs. We lack pumping stations and power transfer infrastructure. We need power transmission through superconductors I think... As well as more high capacity energy transfer in general. Just in general we need a lot, and I mean a lot of investments. In total the EU has a demand through the year of 2 794 terawatt-hours through a full year. So essentially Norway has the storage capacity in existing reservoirs of 1/33th of EUs yearly energy consumption. But remember that it's unlikely that the EU has zero energy production. So mixing a reduced production with our storage capacity should allow our stored energy to last long enough to smoothen out the swings in energy production. But yes, the Alpes will help. :-) But yeah, when there's excessive rain our energy prices actually goes negative as we have to release water in order to avoid collapse of our reservoirs. So that can make hydrogen production viable. On the whole I think it's possible for Norway to store enough power between pumped hydro and hydrogen production to keep the EU running for a couple of weeks even without any other energy production on the continent, and in a more realistic scenario with help from the Alps and some energy production I suspect that we can handle a month together as a continent between pumped hydro and hydrogen. We would still occasionally run out and need natural gas etc, but it should be possible to manage with extremely low amounts of that. Although the electricity prices when that happens would need to be really high. Doesn't mean we always would have that kind of energy stored of course. There needs to be enough price differences etc to make that viable. But yeah.
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@geroldfirl Yes, not enough for a long duration without power and of course if there's a draught and evaporation that energy is lost... But Norway is essentially just a mountain chain. So yes, in theory provided enough investment Norway should be able to power the EU for about 12 days if starting from absolutely full in every single reservoir, using pumped hydro only if my calculations are correct. Add hydrogen and we can probably add a little more capacity at times when power prices are low enough. Although I don't know how much hydrogen production is economically viable here (I know that it would pay to make some when our reservoirs are dangerously full if Germany starts importing hydrogen for their gas power plants, but I'm not sure if it would be profitable to import power to make much hydrogen, my guess is that at least in the beginning hydrogen might be mixed into natural gass or something like that rather then used separately) That said, power transfer infrastructure is severely lacking. When the war started and energy prices skyrocketed reservoirs in southern Norway was emptied to supply Europe with power, then we had shortages ourselves there and we where actually exporting power in northern Norway into Sweden while importing power into Norway in southern Norway paying far more for said power because we don't have the infrastructure to really transfer power through the country. The infrastructure mainly supplies major cities and urban centers from power generation in the periphery. But it operates kind of like multiple smaller grids only loosely with each other with fairly limited transfer capacity. Norways power transfer capacity is mostly going in a east-west direction allowing us to compensate for shortfalls in domestic production with Swedish power and well of some of our surplus to Sweden. While the Swedes actually have invested in power transfer capabilities going in a north-south direction, allowing them to function as a hub for energy trade between Denmark, Norway and Finland (and I think other countries like Estonia as well).
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@stevebaker8966 Our government income from the oil industry has been about 5,4% of our GDP each Yeon average since it was discovered, and our use has been about 3,3% Norway is financed by our tax system, not our oil revenues. Granted, oil is a significant percentage of our export and therefore our source of foreign reserves, but at the same time what that's doing is in reality making our currency more valuable reducing the competitiveness of our export sector... So other companies struggling with getting much exports going that's not oil related isn't really that weird... Sorry, but this is more a case of demand forcing us to supply you rather then our supplies creating a demand... By using our political capital to create a market for EVs we've helped them become cheaper and more competitive in other countries with less government incentives. Including in the countries we're selling oil and gas to. And we are investing in reducing various countries dependence on our oil and gas...
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@geroldfirl Actually, 100% renewable isn't that hard for Europe. Part of the plan is for Norways hydropower plants to function as energy storage, by pumping water from lower reservoirs to higher ones using excess energy when there's a lot of wind and sunlight. We're also planning on producing hydrogen that can be burned in hydrogen/natural gas hybrid power plants. A lot of energy is wasted but this approach allows the utilization of existing infrastructure during the transition period. 89% of Norways electricity comes from hydropower. And we also got produce quite a bit of wind energy and even a little bit of solar etc. In total 98% of our power is renewable right now (varies from year to year depending on precipitation, wind, sun, etc, some years we import a lot of coal, gas and nuclear power from abroad) In a dry year we'll still need other sources of energy, and I'm sure that part of the reason why Germany wants to burn hydrogen in gas power plants despite the wasted energy is to allow them to switch to natural gas again in bad years, or mix it together with the hydrogen. Just in case. As for the cars... 80% of the cars sold in Norway are EVs, not plug in hybrids etc, just pure EVs. With other electrified vehicles making up a significant part of the rest. And EVs makes up a third of all existing cars in Oslo, our capital now from what I understand. Germanys problem is underinvestment in EVs and too much focus on diesel cars for too long. And the country now has to catch up. Anyway, all Europe needs to manage with renewable energy is to build out our grid from northern Norway to Morroco and from Ireland to Ukraine, and Finland. And to build energy storage, like pumping stations in Norway. Er already have the reservoirs available that can be used for the energy storage. We're also building windmills, battery banks and hydrogen production facilities in Norway. We fully intend to keep exporting energy to the continent after the transition as well as function as a battery for Europe. The transition in question is already underway.
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@hotchihuahua1546 The infrastructure is one thing, but the lack of serious investment into EVs (battery tech, electric engines etc) has left European car brands behind their US and Asian rivals. They doubled down on diesel for a long time and only now are they starting to focus on electric cars the way they should have over a decade ago.
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@geroldfirl Honestly I don't have the faintest idea. I know that we have significant losses with our current AC transfers within the country. But that's about it... I know that high voltage DC is efficient. And work on high temperature superconductors is promising. But yeah, I really can't say anything about that.
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