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Why Electric Cars Will Be Here Sooner Than You Think

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Re: Why Electric Cars Will Be Here Sooner Than You Think

#131

Post by james-watson »

thinkcontext wrote: post #121
andykellr wrote: post #44

Unless Tesla goes out of business and nobody manages to produce a similar electric car, I will never buy a gas car again. Electric cars are quick, fun, quiet, clean, safe, and convenient. It would feel like a big step backwards for me to buy a gas car again. They're not for everyone right now and I think it will take a long time to reach significant penetration, but more people will try it and many will never go back…

The Chevy Bolt will beat the Model 3 to market and have similar specs, ~$37K and 200 mile range.

The BlackBerry was also the first widely adopted smartphone. Many experts laughed at Apple's attempt to enter the phone industry.

Re: Why Electric Cars Will Be Here Sooner Than You Think

#132

Post by fludlight »

secabeen wrote: post #123
antisthenes wrote: post #117

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's even worse than that, because eventually the battery pack will have to be replaced. While Tesla may cover that under some warranties, people who bought something like a Nissan Leaf are SOL. Their cars start losing range much quicker than a Tesla, because of the need to charge almost daily due to lower range. Google shows the replacement cost for a Nissan Leaf battery at $5,500. Going by your calculations for 100…

Does that replacement cost for the Leaf battery include the core credit for returning the old battery? Those batteries still have value, and if they can be re-manufactured or re-purposed as stationary storage batteries, that could reduce the cost significantly.

How much is this credit?

Re: Why Electric Cars Will Be Here Sooner Than You Think

#133

Post by clarry »

overcast wrote: post #90
foobarian wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My household income is way more than that and I still found it painful to buy a $20k car. I find it hard to understand why people buy cars at such high relative prices.

People, like myself, don't want to buy into someone's problems. Sure you pay a bit less, but you also have a bit less car. 35,000 miles into a car, how long before you need to buy just another used car? I buy new, and then run it into the ground after the warranty runs out. Typically by then, normal defects have been covered. Change your own oil, filters, tires. Keep up with things like alignments, wash/wax, and keep…

A bit less, or maybe a lot less. If you're buying an used car, you take your time to look for signs that tell about how well it's been taken care of (or abused). And of course you take it for a test drive. I don't think there are that many critical (as in very expensive / impossible to repair) defects that you can't spot by looking, feeling, smelling, and listening.

In my case, I got my newest car just a few weeks ago. For the price of a battery and a tank of gas to drive it home. It's only 20 years old and runs great, has 230k km on it, and will likely last at least double the kilometers, possibly much much more, up to around 1000k.

I could get a dozen used cars in the $0 to $1000 range and still have $15k or more for repairs before I've spent as much as the average new car costs.

Re: Why Electric Cars Will Be Here Sooner Than You Think

#135

Post by loco5niner »

antisthenes wrote: post #126
rob74 wrote: post #100

So, a plug-in hybrid will be lugging around a gas engine and (probably full) gas tank which it won't be needing for 90% of all trips. Am I the only one who thinks this is terribly inefficient?

Not as inefficient as using a 1.5 ton vehicle to move 1 person around. It's somewhat ironic to see that question posed as a genuine concern, when presumably you already made the choice to travel by automobile, the least efficient form of transportation.

Least efficient in economic/environmental terms, not necessarily in time/safety terms.

Re: Why Electric Cars Will Be Here Sooner Than You Think

#136

Post by clarry »

SamPhillips wrote: post #54

One interesting development is that I see the small "Nissan Leaf" style electrics competing against electric bikes now for the "second car / commuter car" role. For 1/10th the price ($4000) you can get a very top-of-the-line electric bike which is free to park, doesn't get stuck in traffic, has no regulatory costs, more flexibly to charge (removable battery), etc, etc. Of course it also has downsides (weather, exerci…

I mostly commute by cycling, and would like to consider an electric for longer commutes. There are a few problems, but the biggest one I'm concerned about is theft. It's so darn easy to steal a bike and get away with it.

Re: Why Electric Cars Will Be Here Sooner Than You Think

#137

Post by dwaltrip »

kylec wrote: post #36
tjbiddle wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But of course, this is specific to your father's scenario. A quick Google search shows the average cost of electricity in the US actually is $0.12/kWh.

Of course, but I would encourage anyone that's thinking about getting an electric car to figure out what they're paying for electricity and run the numbers to understand what the cost impact is. To add another anecdata point, I live in the San Jose area and I just checked my latest PG&E bill; It's kind of complicated because there's a weird tier system, but I paid a weighted average of $0.2095/kWh last month. However…

Wouldn't you often charge at night, when electricity is cheaper?

Re: Why Electric Cars Will Be Here Sooner Than You Think

#138

Post by secabeen »

fma wrote: post #10

I was looking at buying a new car recently. I wanted a commuter car while my wife kept the utilitarian Rav 4. I wanted to buy the GM Spark, the electric version. http://www.chevrolet.com/spark-ev-electric-vehicle.html The irony being that a car named Spark originally isn't electric, but only in certain markets.

You should! The Spark EV is awesome.

Re: Why Electric Cars Will Be Here Sooner Than You Think

#139

Post by secabeen »

fludlight wrote: post #132
secabeen wrote: post #123

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Does that replacement cost for the Leaf battery include the core credit for returning the old battery? Those batteries still have value, and if they can be re-manufactured or re-purposed as stationary storage batteries, that could reduce the cost significantly.

How much is this credit?

Depends on how much the old battery is worth. It's like replacing your transmission in an ICE. When you replace your transmission, you get a rebuilt one for like $1k. The actual price for a transmission is like $2, but if you send them the broken one from your car to rebuild for the next car, you get a Core credit.

Re: Why Electric Cars Will Be Here Sooner Than You Think

#140

Post by jjtheblunt »

kylec wrote: post #17

I was talking to my father a few weeks ago about electric cars, and I wanted to quantify how much going electric would save him so I ran some numbers. Where he lives gas is currently somewhere around $2.20/gallon. His car gets around 30mpg combined, so he's paying ~$0.073/mile. Tesla's website contains a "charging estimator" for the Model S, which estimates a cost of $12.04 for a total charge of 300 miles in a 90D. I…

His electrical rate is terrible, however. And, Tesla is not particularly efficient compared to, for instance, the BMW i3...
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