I wonder if the terminal value of an EV will be higher than ICE. This seems possible if there are secondary users for batteries, motors, or if the mineral content is more valuable (e.g., obviously rare Earth and lithium but also the frames tend to have more aluminum).
Readit Newsdpierce9 commented on EVs are depreciating faster than gas-powered cars restofworld.org/2025/ev-d... · Posted by u/belter
Not Gödel's theorem, but inference for first-order logic is undecidable in general for other reasons. You can still get pretty far with heuristics though. Don't let perfect be the enemy of good =P
First order logics can be provably sound and complete when they do not express certain arithmetic operations.
dpierce9 commented on Apple's Software Quality Crisis eliseomartelli.it/blog/20... · Posted by u/ajdude
Window placement with multiple monitors is broken beyond belief. I am hoping someone from Apple is reading this thread.
This reads as less than useful research to me. E.g.:
"The analysis does not account for the purchase of market-based instruments that are meant to represent investments in new renewable energy in the US and that tech companies buy to offset the pollution from their electricity consumption. ... 'Unlike carbon emissions, the health impacts caused by a data centre in one region cannot be offset by cleaner air elsewhere,' said Shaolei Ren, associate professor at UC Riverside."
Why not? Does clean air elsewhere not matter for the individuals elsewhere? Where is that "elsewhere?"
My admittedly ungenerous interpretation: factoring this context in would be really hard and would decrease the headline factor of the findings, so... publish without.
Without agreeing with the paper’s general point, imagine a coal plant that emits particles which cause asthma within a 25 mile radius of the plant that also buys legit offsets for all the carbon they emit. They aren’t buying offsets for the local harms.
dpierce9 commented on Caltrain's electric fleet more efficient than expected caltrain.com/news/caltrai... · Posted by u/ssuds
Out of the 25GW being generated right now only 3GW are renewable. There is a corner where there is more demand from "100% renewable" customers than there actually is available renewable energy. There is no point at which this gets made up.
There are two views of this.
The first is that at any given point in time, my instantaneous energy use is offset by renewables.
The second is that over some period of time (e.g., one month) my aggregate energy use is offset by renewables.
The second is MUCH easier. When people say things are 100% renewable, I generally think they mean the second thing. This is a bit of a fudge (not wrong but not 100% level).
dpierce9 commented on Caltrain's electric fleet more efficient than expected caltrain.com/news/caltrai... · Posted by u/ssuds
They claim that "Caltrain is running its service on 100% renewable energy", but they are connected to the same grid as everyone else. It doesn't really make sense to say, half of our electricity is green, so customer X is renewable, but customer Y is not renewable.
Power is pooled. If I buy from a supplier or group of suppliers that (1) procures only from renewable resources (2) isn’t reselling power from non renewable sources, (3) hasn’t sold the power more than once, and (4) is capable of providing my energy demands at any given time, then I am buying green power from the pool. It doesn’t matter if the actual electrons come from Ng or coal because I bought enough for the pool (the electrons I added to the pool will be used by someone else if I am using ng electrons).
Not 100% sure this is how Caltrain works but the fact that everyone is physically using the same pool does not imply that you cannot be 100% renewable if you buy from suppliers to the pool with the above properties.
dpierce9 commented on Microsoft Bob: Microsoft's biggest flop of the 1990s dfarq.homeip.net/microsof... · Posted by u/rbanffy
IIRC that was the Windows 95 CD, not XP. Wikipedia seems to agree:
Missed the part about XP. Question still applies to the 95 disk.
dpierce9 commented on Microsoft Bob: Microsoft's biggest flop of the 1990s dfarq.homeip.net/microsof... · Posted by u/rbanffy
> Microsoft included an encrypted copy of Bob on Windows XP installation CDs to waste space to discourage piracy.
This feels like an urban legend made up after the fact.
It would be way easier to just generate random bytes, and nobody could ever tell the difference.
Especially since no decryption key exists.
It's just a funnier story if that's the only thing Bob was ever good for...
Is this why there was a copy of Weezer’s Buddy Holly music video was on there too?
dpierce9 commented on Rivian is opening its charging network to other EVs thedrive.com/news/rivian-... · Posted by u/peutetre
DCFCs are much more than a “fancy switch”. It’s a circuit capable of converting 3-phase high voltage AC into variable high voltage DC at 150-350kW. The power electronics are very, very expensive. As far as I’m aware, the large transformer you see usually hidden somewhere nearby is not the primary cost (although it is expensive, especially for very high wattage ones).
And yes, it’s 200k per dispenser including the infrastructure. It doesn’t scale as well as you think it does. I think Tesla has been quoted as around 50k per dispenser including infra though, so some of it is just poor efficiency in costs by other mfgs.
The fast charger is the expensive part, the dispenser is not nearly so. Just like a gas station, dispensers to chargers are many-one. I was being a bit glib when I said the dispenser is a fancy switch (esp if the lines are cooled) but only just a bit.
I see a report that has Tesla’s cost as 43k per installed dispenser. That is a fully load cost, not the marginal cost of dispenser but it is good enough.
Looking at listings for gas stations for sale (with a convenience store but no auto repair), I see about 150-300k per dispenser. That isn’t exactly apples to apples but suffice to say it isn’t exactly cheap and much closer to representing the cost than the cost of a pump (which is I assume cheaper than a dispenser).
dpierce9 commented on Rivian is opening its charging network to other EVs thedrive.com/news/rivian-... · Posted by u/peutetre
When it started taking 30 minutes to "fill up" your car.
High speed chargers can cost >$200k installed.
A gas pump costs about $25k installed.
If the average person spends 4 minutes at a pump, that comes out to:
The time value of a slot at a super charger can be >$5 for each charge.
The time value of a slot at a gas pump is ~$0.07 per fill up.
The economics of a charging business are awful. High CapEx, few cars, not many of them need chargers since they can charge at home.
The economics of a gas station were not terrible.
There's a reason you don't see immigrants from all over the world coming to the US to open charging stations the way you saw them opening gas stations.
And that's the reason you have charging monopolies.
This doesn’t seem right to me. Is this 200k per dispenser? The dispenser is really just a fancy switch and a plug in a kiosk. If you are talking about the central transformer/switching systems, then yes that makes sense. But you can add a lot of dispensers to that.
A pump is only 25k to install if you don’t include the infrastructure to support the pump (tank, canopy, fire suppression, filters, etc).all that costs more than 200k.
Let’s say 25k is the marginal cost for an extra pump. What is the marginal cost for an extra dispenser?