I wholeheartedly believe, in order for electric vehicles to survive in the US, we will need government intervention not just simply in car subsidy. We will need some sort of infrastructure subsidy to make this happen. Either give incentive to gas station or even corporate buildings. Companies that provide more charging stations for employees to charge their cars during work gets bigger tax cuts. Also, the US will need to get rid of the gas tax and implement some sort of per mileage tax. Without these, I find it hard for electric cars to survive without destroying our current infrastructure.
Electric Vehicles’ Day Will Come, and It Might Come Suddenly
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Re: Electric Vehicles’ Day Will Come, and It Might Come Suddenly
#32Earlier quoted context omitted.
The prices have to come down too. the Electric cars are 5-6 times more expensive than the normal cars. By cheap normal cars i meant Hyundai Accent which costs $14,995, Or Toyota Yaris $16000 or Chevrolet Sonic $20K or a ford fiesta $14K.
What? A normal car costs something like $30k. Electric cars don't cost $150-180k.
If you're a lifelong buyer of used cars, the perception matches pretty closely. I've never bought a car for more than $4000 (and FWIW the used buys I've made have had a minimum reliable life of 5 years, and max repair costs before abandonment of another $4k).
I don't know what the used EV market is like right now. I don't remember seeing any. Then again, EVs are relatively new and rarer than ICEVs so I wouldn't expect them to have a big profile in used vehicle listings.
(If I were guessing, I'd speculate the economy choice for EVs right now might be some kind of conversion of a failed/old ICEV, but that's uninformed speculation...)
Re: Electric Vehicles’ Day Will Come, and It Might Come Suddenly
#33Earlier quoted context omitted.
The prices have to come down too. the Electric cars are 5-6 times more expensive than the normal cars. By cheap normal cars i meant Hyundai Accent which costs $14,995, Or Toyota Yaris $16000 or Chevrolet Sonic $20K or a ford fiesta $14K.
That's just not true. You can buy the Hyunday Ioniq for €32k, €38k for the maxed up model, Kona Electric for €40k with 500km range, soon the Kia Niro EV for €38k. These prices are only 20-30% higher than their ICE versions, and there are _many_ normal cars that go beyond this in the same categories.
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Re: Electric Vehicles’ Day Will Come, and It Might Come Suddenly
#34I'm on my third EV (Leaf, S, M3). Never going back. Since the Model 3 is so well built (after some startup hickups), I can recommend it on that alone. Tesla is very vertically integrated now (they make their own seats) and so the Model 3 is profitable for Tesla although the capital investment was quite high. Also, it's fun to drive next to a Viper and throw shade.
>>> I'm on my third EV (Leaf, S, M3). Never going back.
In how many years? Tossing cars on the junk pile every few years is an environmental nightmare. Who is taking these cars off your hands? I buy cars to keep. I demand that any car last at least 10 years, preferable 15+ without major work. My current Honda is nine years old. My last car ('92 BMW 325is) lasted twenty years. So I am very skeptical about advice regarding cars that have yet to prove their longevity. They are all great when brand new. How are they after the first hundred thousand miles/kilometers?
Re: Electric Vehicles’ Day Will Come, and It Might Come Suddenly
#35They neglected a huge part of the coming electric vehicle picture: lightweight, slow-speed electric vehicles.
Almost 60% of US car trips are 5 miles or shorter. (2017 ref: https://nhts.ornl.gov/tables09/ae/work/Job63697.html, 2009 ref: https://nhts.ornl.gov/tables09/fatcat/2009/vt_TRPMILES.html)
Scooters, e-bikes, and electric cargo bikes (not to mention the human-powered versions!) will soak up an enormous portion of the current automobile demand, and leave us with massively positive outcomes in terms of congestion, pollution, road safety and community cohesion.
Re: Electric Vehicles’ Day Will Come, and It Might Come Suddenly
#36I'm on my third EV (Leaf, S, M3). Never going back. Since the Model 3 is so well built (after some startup hickups), I can recommend it on that alone. Tesla is very vertically integrated now (they make their own seats) and so the Model 3 is profitable for Tesla although the capital investment was quite high. Also, it's fun to drive next to a Viper and throw shade.
It's fun that EVs are going to be the "sleeper" in transforming the energy grid; California needs tons of energy storage in order to transition entirely to renewables, and those EVs everyone is buying are a perfect compliment. A million Teslas on the road in California would be over 10GW of controllable charging load (roughly 10 stationary storage facilities PG&E is currently building with Tesla), and a more optimal…
Maybe. The battery chemistry for a car vs stationary storage differs greatly. Stationary storage they optimised for ability to hold charge for long periods of time, and not loose capacity over time. Car batteries optimised for weight and charging speed. If you cycled your car battery every night with the grid it wouldn't last all that long. Maybe it won't make a difference in the long run with how many EVs we have though.
Re: Electric Vehicles’ Day Will Come, and It Might Come Suddenly
#37Earlier quoted context omitted.
Range more than charging times. With EVs (and if you have a charger) waking up with a 'full tank' is pretty amazing... something ICE auto can never experience.
Never is not the right word. I owned a natural gas combustion engine Honda Civic for a decade and refueled at home.
That's fascinating. Curious how the gas is stored. I remember for a while there was talk of fuel cells based on hydrogen, but safely storing the gas was problematic.
Re: Electric Vehicles’ Day Will Come, and It Might Come Suddenly
#38Earlier quoted context omitted.
Ditto. I’m driving a Leaf and will never buy an ICE car again. In the article, I’m surprised the EVs are about the same sales as hybrids. I figured there would still be more hybrid sales.
Was talking to staff at the rental counter in Phoenix. They said that they stopped buying hybrids when gas dropped back down and the fact that they were costly to maintain... (More moving parts). Fleet sales were a big driver when gas prices were higher Plus, hybrids are a gutless jack of all trades and master of none
Depends a lot on the hybrid. Prius is the most reliable car you can buy. When I sold mine at 130k miles, it still had the original brake pads. You are right about the jack of all trades, and IMHO that's a good thing.
Re: Electric Vehicles’ Day Will Come, and It Might Come Suddenly
#39My big issue is that in the places that electric cars make the most sense (cities) it’s hardest to own them. What am I going to do, run a really long extension cord from my condo to the random parking spot I found around the block?
You won't like this idea but in Japan you're required to show you have a place to park your car before you're allowed to buy one. If there was a market for parking spaces with power it seems like they'd start showing up pretty quickly.
Re: Electric Vehicles’ Day Will Come, and It Might Come Suddenly
#40Seems just as likely that the correct interpretation is that exponential growth is difficult to appreciate when starting from a small base. The “inflection point” cited in the article could easily be a continuation of the exact growth rate present for the previous 10 years.
The prices have to come down too. the Electric cars are 5-6 times more expensive than the normal cars. By cheap normal cars i meant Hyundai Accent which costs $14,995, Or Toyota Yaris $16000 or Chevrolet Sonic $20K or a ford fiesta $14K.
>The prices have to come down too. the Electric cars are 5-6 times more expensive than the normal cars.
No they're not. More like 25%-50% more expensive, and the difference keeps narrowing.