One would think that the savings in pollution (not only for the car itself, but the transport of the fuel, pollution from refineries, etc.) would offset any lost revenue from gas taxes.
What makes this really nonsensical is that many states still have electric vehicle rebates. They give you a rebate of a few thousand dollars to reward you for buying an electric vehicle but then charge you a few hundred dollars to punish you for buying an electric vehicle.
[0]: https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2019/nov/16/wrong-tu...
[1]: https://theconversation.com/australias-car-industry-ignored-...
For example, recently there's been quite high electricity prices here (as in most of Europe) due to lack of rain. However this only affected the southern half of Norway[1], as the northern part had a fair bit of rain but limited distribution lines to the south.
There's been quite a bit of talk in the news about how much we need to spend to upgrade our grid for the future. It's not gonna be cheap...
[1] https://www.nordpoolgroup.com/Market-data1/Dayahead/Area-Pri... (compare Oslo with Tromsø for late September)
I bought a used sub-$20k electrical car a few months ago; it can be done. The market needs pressure to create cars in that price range; right now EVs are mostly luxury cars. Tesla is not the car we should be aiming for; what we need are things in the class of the E-Golf, Kia Niro, FFE, Fiat 500E etc. that are the size of a Corolla and cost 20k CAD or less.
Until that's common on the market, the value proposition is flawed and nobody is buying an electric car to save money except for people who buy used cars that someone else has eaten the depreciation on (like me), or people who drive a LOT. Everyone else is basically buying these things as luxury items, and the cost doesn't matter, especially when you can get near-0% financing over 5+ years.....
You're talking about a tax difference, not a price difference. We have the same taxes here in Denmark and our EV sales aren't anywhere near Norway's level. Probably because the actual prices end up being roughly equal, but the EV usually has lower range and takes longer to fill up compared to the equally-priced gasoline car.
https://reasonstobecheerful.world/norway-gm-electric-cars-mo...
Not just the numbers, but also the geography and climate. Make a car that can be used for a long trip any time of the year here, and you're set for most markets.
There's a reason why car makers come to Norway and Sweden to test their new cars before launch.
This is also because they are a small, very rich country and cannot be used as a comparison to others.
He was an oil expert who met a Norwegian au-pair in London, they got together, married, had a sick kid so they decided to move to Norway, and because he had the whole day before he could take the train from Oslo to her hometown, he decided to visit the Ministry of Industry to get leads on oil jobs...
[0]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Government_Pension_Fund_of_Nor...
[1]: https://www.themonthly.com.au/issue/2015/july/1435672800/ric...
There may still be some infrastructure for special use cases like long haul trucking or industrial vehicles, but it might become untenable for the average consumer to own an ICE vehicle, just like it was painfully difficult to own an EV before charging stations became widespread.
When that happens, it could further accelerate the decommissioning of old vehicles.
Recently I went on a road trip my partner (who really wanted to go), the whole time I couldn't stop thinking about how stupid of an activity it was given what we know about our future if we stay on the current trajectory. While driving I was looking around at hundreds of thousands of other people doing the same thing and just got me down.
The idea of hundreds of millions of machines driving around emitting carbon dioxide and other pollutants is just so stupid it's hard to imagine we collectively accepted the idea in the first place.
It's really hard to believe that none of the externalitiez are factored into the absolutely insane cost of climate change.
However, I guess what I really wanted to say by writing this comment is, at least there is some hope :)
I think they have just become the first country to unlock this tech IRL Civ.
So by 'electric', they mean what are commonly referred to as 'electrified' vehicles, and by ICE, they are actually referring to pure gas/diesel cars. I have news for you - hybrids still burn gas!
> seven out of every eight cars bought and sold in Norway a used car. The NAF’s numbers show that of the 357,176 ownership registration changes so far in 2021, electric vehicles only accounted for 12 per cent.
And their definition of electric cars includes hybrids (whereas I think most people interpret it to mean fully electric). So they're obviously doing great but the vast majority of the vehicles in Norway are still ICE only.
I ask because the lifespan of current batteries seems to be around 8 years (going by manufacturers' warranties), and the battery pack amounts to approximately 30% of the price of the car. So people buying an used electric car will likely face a large maintenance cost after a while.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eJpLm0uuVgA
"When will we have 100% EV adoption ? Norway was NOT fast, compared to what is coming." BestInTESLA
Comparing anything they do with your own country is a mistake.
Refer: https://www.ft.com/content/8574bd97-86e2-4665-9192-93dfde877...
Fuel stations make most of their profits from non-fuel items (in my country, fuel stations sell some of the best coffee), and people will still need those when commuting or travelling. In Norway some fuel stations have started to convert pumps to EV chargers [0], however there isn't really much cost needed to keep a couple of fuel pumps around. Petrol can last a few months in tanks, and diesel can last up to a year.
People are still going to be using petrol for motorbikes and gardening equipment for a long time, and diesel is going to be used by trucks and construction machinery for even longer.
[0] https://insideevs.com/news/532464/fuel-stations-norway-fast-...
Simply swapping pumps for EV chargers may not sustain a good-enough business. EV charging needs about 30-60 minutes. Current 5-minute shops that sell cigs and energy drinks aren't an attractive destination.
I think it's more likely that malls and supermarkets will add EV charging and take over both sides of gas stations' business.
(This is based on first-hand experience. My nearest fast charger is at a gas station.)
All of these events make more and more people recognize the relative weakness and fragility of an oil based civilization compared to an electric one.
> before charging stations became widespread.
They still aren't and there are no solutions for infrastructure and growth is still severely lacking and disappointingly slow. There is also no solution for people without a dedicated parking spot, which is especially common in cities.
To be precise, it's 14%, down from 26% in 2008.[0]
[0] https://e24.no/norsk-oekonomi/i/dOXzd1/norge-er-mindre-oljea...
Hypocritical facile criticism is hypocritically facile.
What's notable about Norway is that back in 1968, as the country was first becoming aware of its oil wealth through the newly-realised North Sea deposits (shared with the UK), the country had the foresight to tap the advice of an Iraqi ex-pat who advised the country to invest its oil funds for national growth, infrasturcture, and sustainability, and not squander it in corruption and gratuitous expenditures as so many other countries had and would.
That story is now in the HN queue:
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2878010
The consequence is that we can now face the ironic but heartening fact that, yes, an oil-producing and exporting country is now positioned as amongst the more prepared for a post-fossil-fuel economy and civilisation.
If you find yourself in a lifeboat with limited supplies and rations, it's not unwise to make use of those rations. It is unwise to squander those rations for purposes other than reaching safety. And it's extraordinarily unwise to criticise those who are using those rations to achieve a safer state.
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=28780108
The final "8" got truncated above, leading to a random 10 year old comment...
We also need oil for road building. I don't see that changing anytime either. After all, asphalt production produces far fewer greenhouse gasses than cement. Concrete roads have their place but the vast majority of road miles will be made with asphalt for the near future.
90% of everything in your direct line of sight probably contain petrol derivatives. From wall paint to shampoo, your t-shirt, phone, chewing gums, toothpaste, rugs, shoes... We just can't sustain our modern lifestyle without it
Maybe I'm being reductive, but isn't this essentially because we haven't electrified mine carts et al yet? Or are you referring to steel smelting?
And wood energy was used to jumpstart the fossil fuel energy age. There was a transition period before fossil fuel energy became the dominant way to extract more fossil fuels. Now wood for energy is economically negligible in advanced economies.
Many large oil exporting countries know the good times won't last, and are planning for it.
That's basically a text book example of the "strategy tax", which isn't about stopping profit from existing products, but to let new concepts cannibalise legacy products.
In which way do you see Norway hitting the brakes on new technology and future trends to protect the oil business ?
Of course second order effects might dwarf that, like the fact that increasing prices would incentivize oil extraction in currently unprofitable locations. That extraction may or may not be more carbon-intensive than Norway's (though probably more if it's currently unprofitable).
It sounds punchy to say "Norway should stop extracting oil" as much as it does to say "It doesn't matter whether they do or not since someone else will", but the reality is much more complex than either of those simplistic zeroth-order approximations.
Sure, other wells will produce more. But at a higher price. Higher prices encourage use of greener alternatives.
https://www.acea.auto/press-release/electric-cars-10-eu-coun...
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plug-in_electric_vehicles_in_N... has extensive details, but they've got a set of incentives that exceedingly favor BEVs.
This is essentially performative environmentalism from them. Still, it will help other countries by throwing up unforeseen problems in all-electric ground transportation, and some solutions.
Who would've thunk, economic incentives help!? Sadly in many other places the deciding economic incentives are the ones the politicians get from the oil and ICE car industry.
https://www.wsj.com/articles/norways-sovereign-wealth-fund-b...
Given their relatively contribution to the total global production and OPEC's supply management to control prices, it is unclear if a halt in Norwegian oil sales would raise prices significantly enough to matter. There is an argument to be made that is is better for Norway to capture those profit and invest them into the research we need to reduce oil dependence and sequester CO2.
I don't think that the electric car adoption is purely driven by environmentalism. Norway has extremely cheap energy that makes electric cars much more economically attractive.
They do have huge crude oil reserves, but do they have any refining capability?
Only two[1], but one of them is somewhat big[2], producing 4x the domestic consumption of gasoline.
[1]: https://no.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oljeraffineri#Oljeraffinerier_...
[2]: https://www.equinor.com/en/what-we-do/terminals-and-refineri...
It is however much more spread out. Driving from the northernmost to southern most town of New Mexico is ~700 km. Driving from the southern most to northern most town of Norway is over 2300 km, or about the same has from the southernmost town of New Mexico to the Canadian border.
800 cycles is about what a typical mobile phone sees in two years, after which most are seeing some moderate degradation (70% of new condition is fairly typical) but are still quite usable. And in fact a car spends much more of its time being recharged well before reaching full discharge (where consumer electronics runs dead a lot), so it would be expected to do somewhat better.
It's not really a problem, basically.
[1] Though we're seeing an increasing number of vehicles delivered with LiFePO4 cells. This chemistry has somewhat lower energy density and higher internal resistance, but has the advantage of an estimaged hundreds of thousands of cycles lifetime. Those will never wear out until long after the mechanical parts are dust.
An EV battery loses capacity faster in the beginning, slower later on. The falloff is perfectly predictable and easily estimated. You can check the health of a battery pack with a free app and a $10 OBD2 reader when buying one.
Yes, the maximum range will be lower than it was new, but it's up to the buyer if that is something that bothers them.
Compare this to the process of buying an old car. There's no way to know what kind of crap oil the previous owner has put in. You can't tell what shape the engine is in without actually opening it. The gearbox might just decide to break one day, the clutch might be on its last legs and the pistons might just come up for air some sunny summer day to enjoy the weather.
The only way to check for faults is relying on educated guesses (bring a friend who knows the specific type of car or take it to a shop for evaluation).
The difference between an ICE and EV is that ICE needs money frequently (oil changes, belts and chains and whatever wear down), an EV has That One Big Repair coming up at some point. And the price of batteries is steadily going down.
For example you can get a 3rd party battery for a Nissan Leaf _today_ that's 30% larger than the one that was in it originally. Just think what we can do in 2030.
That happened to a friend of mine, who was quoted around 50k NOK (~6k USD) of a car he bought used for twice that. Fortunately for him, it turned out there was one week left of the 5-year "new car" warranty so he didn't have to pay after all, but that was sheer luck.
https://insideevs.com/news/405885/tesla-model-s-battery-afte...
https://electrek.co/2020/06/06/tesla-battery-degradation-rep...
https://www.findmyelectric.com/blog/how-long-does-a-tesla-ba...
https://www.canada.ca/en/department-finance/programs/consult...
[0]: https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2017/feb/09/scott...
One could argue that the government would not be able to offer subsidies on EVs without that option.
0: https://www.norges-bank.no/en/topics/liquidity-and-markets/F...
The only real change from such a policy is how quickly wells will run dry, but I hope we can abandon oil long before running out is a serious concern.
If this is a business-side incentive versus a consumer-side incentive, I personally would much rather they just give them the money directly based on sales and avoid the dishonesty of making folk feel like, even after "savings", EVs are expensive.
The alternative would be "dogfooding", eat what you make.
It bootstraps companies like Tesla, and VW's electric cars. That will lead to more CO2 reductions happening sooner.
On an individual level basically no one in Norway buys an electric car due to environmentalism. It's 100% an economic decision. Buying a new gasoline powered car today in Norway simply doesn't make financial sense no matter how you look at it.
https://www.statnett.no/for-aktorer-i-kraftbransjen/tall-og-...
In addition to generation there is local distribution. Power lines, transformers, etc. Is there any information on that part of it? I wonder if they needed to upgrade their grid.
https://www.statista.com/statistics/1025497/distribution-of-...
93 percent hydro, 4 percent wind, 2.5 percent thermal.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Electricity_sector_in_Norway
Edit: The reason why this is the important measure is because what people care about is how often their trips require N charging stops not the maximum number of charging stops they might have to make.
https://www.caranddriver.com/news/a37872650/formula-1-auto-r...
Of course it's nice that they subsidize R&D for synfuels (we might need them for niche applications after all), but selling them as "carbon neutral" is just greenwashing.
Be like Norway and use the time you have left selling a natural resource wisely, because bans and cross border tariffs are coming, and you’ll be left with what you could build during your transition when the revenue dries up. Hopefully as a country, you don’t end up empty handed.
(Norway also supplies the UK with a large amount of clean hydro power, roughly 690MW continuous, through a newly commissioned underwater HVDC transmission line, so it’s not all dirty fossil exports)
They got a "live" counter here[1], so yeah around 1.3 trillion USD give or take. Estimates for corona spending is around 80 billion USD[2].
[2]: https://www.nettavisen.no/okonomi/regjeringen-advarer-oljefo...
Human capital is far more valuable, but most of the industrial knowledge of Norway is in energy production.
If you want to know what Norwegians really think about the tax, make it optional and see how many people pay for it.
If you want to see what Norwegians really think about paying for things in stores, make shoplifting laws completely optional, and replace cash registers with tip jars, and see how that works out.
Pipelines for liquid or gaseous fuel have a huge upfront cost and maintenance requirements compared to running power lines, so the incentives are to build them as big as possible.
Taking down a power station is certainly a viable attack vector, but the damage caused by losing a single station is drastically more manageable than losing a key pipeline that a massive region of the continent needs to feed continuously from to keep civilization running.
This is not even accounting for the further decentralizing and ruggedizing effect that comes when every rooftop subsidizes their own energy needs with solar and batteries.
It depends on which power station.
For instance, in my country, something like a tenth of the power of the whole country comes from a single place, the Itaipu hydroelectric dam. Most power from it flows through just a few power stations. In 2009, a weather-caused triple fault at one of them left half of the whole country, and the whole neighboring country, without power for a few hours (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2009_Brazil_and_Paraguay_black...).
(Not to mention that the long-distance HVDC power lines used to bring power from distant hydroelectric dams like the Belo Monte dam and the Madeira river dams do also have a "huge upfront cost and maintenance requirements". Given that the power loss is lower at higher voltages, and these dams are so far from the southeast where most power demand is, the incentives are to build them as big as possible.)
Major concerns are SCADA attacks against control systems themselves, or physical attacks against regional substations which could cripple distribution for weeks or months.
Hollywood is doing society a disfavour by misrepresenting the apocalypse. EVs and bicycles are the true modes of transport when trouble starts.
That's not much - $25K per person over 10 years, and with an average income of $70K per person, and something like half of their economy is energy (most if not all social programs are funded from energy production).
If oil were to stop tomorrow, they'd have around 10 years before the money runs out. (Maybe a bit longer since kids don't earn money.) And if they have to replace all the social funding, they'd have even less time.
Norway is relying on slow reduction in demand, and time to transition their economy. Will they have it? It's far from certain. I feel like Norwegians rely too much on this fund to save themselves, rather than transitioning away from oil now.
However, I find it a bit disingenuous to chide Norway which is doing far better than much larger countries like the UK, US or Germany in transitioning to renewables.
I am not worried for Norway (though when the North Atlantic jetbtream shifts they will likely suffer) - I'm far more worried for the poor and marginalized peoples - they will suffer far more.
It's no surprise that thought leaders are worried about climate change impacts. Some will perversely benefit (politicians who are anti-immigration will gain populartiy because climate migrations are clearly defined by US defense dept as a likely result from climate change). Others may benefit by providing mitigating solutions to climate change itself that alter economies.
You really think that's enough to replace the oil sector?
Additionally social funding in Norway comes from oil - without that funding taxes would have to go up a lot.
Life in freshly conquered Berlin was pretty harsh, especially in the first winter. There was a famous street graffitti that said "I envy the dead because their hands aren't freezing off."
Mad Max should have been about a heist of solar panels and batteries :)
They could use the huge battery in their car to charge devices and some people used them to warm their garage - something you can't do with a petrol/diesel car without, you know, dying.
https://arstechnica.com/cars/2021/09/porsches-new-synthetic-...
https://www.siemens-energy.com/global/en/news/magazine/2021/...
By this definition, no source is clean, because there are always "better uses" for energy.
Anyway, they are still extracting oil and probably will continue to do so for a couple decades. That gives them time to grow their wealth fund and gradually transition their economy. They are at a huge advantage compared to other oil exporters.
As it is the EV subsidies are really just helping homeowners buy luxury cars which seems a little backwards
The goal was to drive scale so that the price would drop, this has been successful. In the US the federal subsidy phases out after 500K. Tesla and GM have both passed that and have models that are less than the US average for a new car of $40K.
Many non-tree hugger analysts project that upfront EV costs will be equal to ICE by the middle of the decade.
Out of curiosity, what make and model? I'm trying to find an EV and like everyone is saying, it's all luxury vehicles.
This is why I think it was a mistake not to use plugin hybrids as a stepping stone to full EV's. They might be marginally more complex but you could make five times as many cars with the same battery capacity.
Currently C8s are appreciating their first year, which is really weird.
The Model S is really chonky at almost 5000 lbs, which is the same as a 4Runner.
Why is that weird? That seems typical for new, extremely popular cars where supply isn’t meeting demand. It happened years ago with the PT Cruiser, and when Mini (re-)entered the US market. It’s happened with Teslas too. Right now it’s happening with the C8 Corvette and Ford Bronco, which are both really tough to find on dealer lots. In 5 or 10 years, they’ll have depreciated like more typical used cars. The tough part is guessing when supply will become sufficient (and values will drop).
Yeah, not sure about that. Currently, used Model 3 LR AWD from 2019 with around 10k-20k mileage go for just a few grand cheaper than what I bought it for (new) in 2019[0].
0. https://www.cargurus.com/Cars/l-Used-2019-Tesla-Model-3-Long...
I used the historical data for the Model S. Will definitely check out the 3.
Maybe compare the Model S to an M5 or E63?
“I believe the best social program is a job.” — Ronald Reagan
It's bigger picture thinking, warmer summers, snowier winters, and turning major metropolitan areas back in coral reefs. Sadly, SF is too hilly for most of it to drown. Freedom is a full tank.
There are already taxes on tires, but they seem pretty nominal. I think you could hike them substantially (eg to $10 or $20 per tire) without upsetting too many people if you scrapped or reduced some other fee or abolished the necessity for a piece of paperwork.
Edit: as some pointe dout the real wear comes from trucks an dother big commercial vehicles. Tires are already taxed by vehicle weight class, but I'm proposing increasing the fees for that in order to simplify bureaucracy elsewhere.
They could be designed to last however many miles the state likes by putting more or less tread on them. And have a very obvious marker they are worn out so police can easily give tickets for people driving on worn out tyres.
Last time someone on HN discussed the Australia law I asked if Australia had a car ownership tax. It seems that they do, but that the money isn't enough to support road maintenance. Seems the easy answer to the new Australia law would be to increase the car ownership tax, lower the gasoline tax to match the increase, and then you don't need a special law for electric cars. No need to reinvent the wheel.
It’s the common erroneous argument of angry drivers against cyclists: get off my road, you’re not paying for it.
I like the idea of taxing tyres, as it explicitly taxes mileage and pollution. Would it create weird incentives? People running on tyres too long to avoid the tax? Reusing old, more polluting tyres?
Maybe we should just tax on mileage. In fact why not at the pump/charging station...
It's CERTAINLY a lot less than you'd be paying in gas tax if you used your car an average amount.
Taxes aren't punishment, anyway. Especially "road use taxes", which are, in this case, used to repair the roads you're driving on.
It does, in social impact sense (gas taxes in the US are universally way too low to cover the impacts).
OTOH, diffuse social benefit doesn't pay for road maintenance, and states have legal and practical requirements for short-run operating budget balance. The right solution would probably be increase general taxation, in a way that misses the low end (e.g., bump income taxes, but not the lowest brackets), to cover the costs.
Most of the wear and tear on our roads come from trucks, not passenger cars.
A tesla model s weighs about as much as a ford f-150.
I have a Tesla in CA and am only familiar with the electric vehicle credit (not sure what it is, I haven't looked into it) and the "you get to use carpool lanes" rule for EVs.
Otherwise, I'm not familiar with extra taxes :(
But I think they do charge extra to make up for the fact that you never have to smog an electric vehicle.
Are they really idiots if that's the reality of the situation? It's gonna be a long time before EVs are in the beater car price brackets.
As I've already noted, the complaint is common across the political spectrum. From the Left, it's usually couched as a minority / inequality argument that such policies disadvantage poor minorities. From the right, it's more usually aimed at latte-sipping, college-educated, elitist liberals.
Whilst there's some truth to both portrayals, the underlying reality is that the common weal is served by developing (and trialing) alternative technologies and solutions, and building out necessary infrastructures. If there are inequities that arise out of them, then other taxation and spending parameters can be adjusted to achieve a net-neutral economic impact, or to offer / promote conservation and efficiency options which are better suited to minorities and/or the white / rural poor.
Note that the whole divide-and-conquer tactic is also very often supported at least in part by the interests directly harmed by such initiatives: traditional fossil-fuel powered automobiles, coal producers, and the like. Look beyond the engagement at the front to see what the generals are scheming and whom they're manipulating to their own advantage.
There are many layers to this. Rich people, people who own houses, have a better time with electric cars than poor people who rent apartments. Poor people also cannot afford to replace a car every decade. They shy away from tech such as batteries that have life expectancies less than a decade. Certainly few second or third-hand buyers want to purchase a battery pack with only a few years left in it. So the separation between gas an electrics isn't all about sticker price, but it is about money.
https://leginfo.legislature.ca.gov/faces/billTextClient.xhtm...
I don't think taxes should be too low and don't mind paying moderate amounts of tax, but I do think the number of taxes should be as low as possible to maintain legitimacy in the population. Nobody likes to feel nickel and dimed to death, so it's better to have a small number of predictable and easy to understand taxes than an endless variety of fees that add up to what feels disproportionately burdensome for the public. Policymakers need to remember that very few of the public are economic rationalists with pocket calculator brains.
So...when you go to a restaurant and eat, paying feels like a punishment?
When you go to an amusement park, paying the entry fee feels like a punishment?
When you pay for a plane ticket...a new appliance...a movie...?
No, the only reason that "taxes are a punishment (or theft)" is a meme _at all_ is that there are a bunch of entitled, privileged, well-off folks who have decided that they have theirs and they don't want to spend anything that will improve or support society.
I've gone through these arguments a few times, and ... yeah, the naivete on the other side is profound. You're right that I won't "win" an argument with someone who espouses that, or at least I won't convince them of anything, but that's due to them ignoring reality.
In this particular case? A usage fee, for cars, that supports roads, for cars? Seems pretty damned natural-consequences to me. You're paying to use something, not "being punished" in any way.
Found it: https://www.gao.gov/products/109954
A couple of caveats: it's from 1979 and deals with interstates only.
We don’t need people in cars.
Whether roads are funded by road taxes or primary school fees doesn't matter - if we want to promote a behaviour we subsidize it; if we want to discourage it, we tax it.
Whether and how the books balance in the background isn't relevant.
https://electrek.co/2020/07/10/california-starts-charging-ev...
The question of who it is a subsidy to is important, but it is better to directly give them a subsidy than to skew the upstream market towards vehicles that damage roads and cost a ton of money to repair.
I doubt we'll get there though, I admit that we can't get anything effective done. And we'd need to effectively keep prices from rising at the register to even the playing field for infrastructure expenses.
While some people might enjoy some of the useless consumerism crap that's moved from China to your closest shopping center via trucks, I enjoy driving my old petrol car through the landscape and to the track.
Now let's all step back, calm down and compromise. :)
Income taxes are the major part of the income that society needs to function. The rest of the lot are just punitive ones, like estate and wealth taxes.
As a side note about angry drivers, I actively try to avoid being angry with cyclists. They have to be outside in the rain and cold, while inside the car it's pretty nice. I can wait.
Thank you!