State-owned Irish electric car?

weird

I think you're on to something. The TATA nano, the car selling for $2000 is set to take off in India. This is going to spur on employemnt and the economy in India to epic proportions. It's a car everyone could afford and can be sold factory direct.

I think if we were to do a "green" nano we could sell them through out europe and make them right here in Ireland.

The green economy will be the next boom and we should be on board.

http://experience.tatanano.com/

generalmiaow

weird wrote: »

I think you're on to something. The TATA nano, the car selling for $2000 is set to take off in India. This is going to spur on employemnt and the economy in India to epic proportions. It's a car everyone could afford and can be sold factory direct.

I think if we were to do a "green" nano we could sell them through out europe and make them right here in Ireland.

The green economy will be the next boom and we should be on board.

http://experience.tatanano.com/

Agree about the TATA nano. It's the EEE PC of cars. Even though the main product is not electric, I can definitely see it preceding the normalisation of electric cars. Nobody in their right mind is extrapolating a future of more polluting, fuel-consuming cars. I don't know how long it will be, though.

We should be aware alse, that we couldn't yet possibly power all the cars in Ireland with our electricity capability as it stands, even with what we buy in. We would need a nuclear power station or something of the same scale.

nicksinthemix

I suppose TATAs big service could be the popularisation of the small car.

But don't expect it to be 2k here. Off the top of my head, I would say that by the time you get one into a showroom here its sticker price will be more like 6-8k. I know this is hard to believe but it's probably more expensive to import than to build. And I can't see the governemt waiving the import duty on these fellas. If anything they'll penalise it because it's still a combustion engine.

As regards to the original question, state run monopolies of this kind are utopian. All our politicians are out of work barristers and actual business people stay away from government. I wouldn't be confortable with a civil servant having the job that car company execs have now (the latter can get fired for don't a woeful job)... but let's not get into that rant.

Yixian

nicksinthemix wrote: »

As regards to the original question, state run monopolies of this kind are utopian. All our politicians are out of work barristers and actual business people stay away from government. I wouldn't be confortable with a civil servant having the job that car company execs have now (the latter can get fired for don't a woeful job)... but let's not get into that rant.

The question is, how does a nation rid itself of this ilk of politician. It's been almost 200 years and Italy hasn't managed it For some reason whenever a largely agricultural country industrialises and develops very quickly, you're lumped with these goons.

This seems to be the most decisive factor that determines the politics of modern European nations.

Contemplative

... and given some of the criticisms lobbed against it without any accompanying alterations/alternatives, perhaps a good fix would be simply a commitment by the state to purchase and distribute EV's.

The marketing costs (branding) may or may not remain with the manufacturers.

All other costs would remain with the manufacturers.

In essence, the state would operate one or several retail franchise operations. Since this is a political priority (reduction of emissions in the Transport sector, fuel security, etc.) the state would be willing to incur the initial losses, removing some risk from existing EV manufacturers. This would allow small manufacturers from around the world to build up economies of scale while keeping the state out of the car building business. Agreements could also be made to move parts of the production processes to Ireland.

Also part of the agreement would be that EV manufacturers could only sell through the state retail operations. That way, once the EV has been adopted by the typical car buyer as a legitimate alternative (perhaps even the standard?), future margins may go to reimburse the taxpayer for the initial investment, and for additional investments in infrastucture. Of course, this assumes that there will be a positive margin for the product at some point.

The car manufacturing industry is an oligopoly. A state initiative to buy stock from a few promising small manufacturers would foster competition, thus removing the distortion in the market which is delaying the widespread adoption of a superior product. This is something which incentives to car buyers cannot do because the state cannot force an individual to buy. Thus, it will not be possible to ensure any number of orders to a particular car manufacturer. It has to be this targeted, and probably needs to be on the supply side.

Irish wages, knowledge, cultural dimensions, input capabilities would not enter into the equation then. However, you would not have created an Irish auto-manufacturing industry. You may succeed in creating some support industries and input industries, and you would certainly have sped along a process which is dragging its feet; one which will ultimately have great benefits to the Irish consumer. You would also have saved some car salespeople's jobs around the country and it could well pay for itself in the long run, or even be profitable!

Came up with this in a few minutes time... It might have serious flaws, but at least its constructive, and it could lead to better ideas (as I hope it does).

Maybe future posters could start from the assumption that there is a way to get the OP's idea to work, or at least offer an alternative along the same vein rather than just railing against it in a cynical way.

Amhran Nua

It is quite doable, but there needs to be a recognition of the breadth of industry involved in something like that. Local costs and cultural attitudes are nonsense, we wouldn't have 90% of our exports as FDI if those were serious issues. Cost is an issue, but not the dealbreaker as some would have it.

What you need is to build up the value chain, starting with university courses or dedicated institutes to master the components, materials, manufacturing processes, energy and so on. You could get a good headstart by building wind turbines and working on maritime engineering, both of which will have an instant domestic market to pay for the costs. You could cut import duties for raw materials in certain cases if required.

Then you get the government to put in seed capital and link up graduates with experienced businesspeople, maybe purchase some patents, and let them repay that as and when the company becomes profitable, there are lots of ways to finance an operation like this. It might take twenty years to get going, but the Koreans weren't building cars thirty years ago. The market is there, all you have to do it make a niche for yourself.

nicksinthemix

Stripped down, that idea essentially means that government strategy will involve spending on pilot projects. It wouldn't exactly be a state owned industry, more like a state owned fleet and this is very much in process though we've all got to understand taht this won't mean chucking away millions in one go. The ESB and SEI are being careful in how they go about this but hopefully we'll see it develop into something really comprehensive.

I must say that one encouraging fact about this are the organisations in charge. ESB is very focused on its goals for carbon neutrality and energy independence. They've involved themselves quite deeply in some of the behind the scenes stuff going on for EVs and infrastructure (an example of a simple yet tricky point: what type of plug will be used and what voltages are we talking about?).

Anyone who was at the most recent conference on EVs (Green Power Forum in UCD) probably walked away with the impression that Ireland has its own particular possibilities if we bundle together renewable energy, electric vehicles and our prowess within the ITC sector. It makes a great package and I'd be of the opinion that the strongest case for EVs lies within that bigger picture.

It is less likely that we'll manufacture here but that doesn't mean that there still isn't a value chain. EVs are basically laptops on wheels and all cars will be like this in the future. It means that there are extraordinary opportunities in ITC for everything from in-car entertainment to traffic modelling and data indexing. I believe the biggest prize is, in conjunction with renewable supplies, a step towards energy independence. There will be a day where the rich and the poor get divided on their ability to pay for fuel. We'd better hope that we're not one of the many countries that falls on the wrong side of resource scarcity.

... we have to remember just how short this era of history really is. Running out of your energy sources shouldn't mean returning to the 1700s. When you look at what's happened since we started using fossil fuels, you start to wonder just how much is at stake.