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Driving 1725km in an electric car in 2 days

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Re: Driving 1725km in an electric car in 2 days

#11
post #2

> And everyone should stop driving fossil vehicles starting now. [...] There’s no excuse not to. I have my doubts that everyone can switch over to a (prices starting at) $70,000 electric car like the author can.

People who are financing brand new cars are either wealthy enough or uneducated enough to not worry about a $40k+ MSRP.

I've frequently championed my Chevy Bolt. Caveat being the recent recall on the battery fires, but ignoring that...My 2017 Bolt, bought used with ~35k miles was ~$16k USD. 238 mile advertised range, 50kW "DC Fast Charging". My Bolt (and I believe all of the new ones) still have the pathetic 50kW "fast charging" which is pretty shortsighted, but I still think a used Bolt is the best entry into the EV world.

Another point I'd like to make is that even with the slow "fast charging" on some of these EVs, the use case of long road trips is very infrequent, and often biased online by users presenting their edge case commutes or 'frequent' roadtrips. According to https://nhts.ornl.gov/vehicle-trips 95% of trips are < 30 miles.

Re: Driving 1725km in an electric car in 2 days

#12
post #5
post #2

> And everyone should stop driving fossil vehicles starting now. [...] There’s no excuse not to. I have my doubts that everyone can switch over to a (prices starting at) $70,000 electric car like the author can.

Standard Range+ Model 3: $39k. 2021 Nissan Leaf: $32.6k. These are reasonable numbers. If you're buying a new sedan, electric is the way to go.

Reasonable numbers...if you can afford it. Saying $40k is "reasonable" depends on how much you earn. That is 20-25% more than US median annual gross income...it is a lot of money.

Also, most people who are unable to buy this kind of car aren't polluting a great deal anyway. A huge share of pollution is caused by wealthy people jetting around every few days on planes.

I have an ICE car, it cost something like $4k, it does 50+ mpg, I haven't taken a plane or boat in something like two decades, I do at most 5k miles in my car per year...sorry, I don't really think I should be forced to buy a car that costs 10x, probably pollutes about the same amount, and is only being suggested because some rich person had a "come to Jesus" moment (after polluting as much in a year as much as I do in a decade). It is the worst kind of puritanical grandstanding.

Re: Driving 1725km in an electric car in 2 days

#13
post #6

Wait until the author finds out how the batteries are made. EDIT: just to be clear, I am not a "climate change denier"...although always interested to have lots of random people attempt to diagnose me. I worked in equity research, I have seen mountains of reports on this topic: lithium and cobalt production are terrible for the environment (ignoring issues with forced labour and human cost at mines, most people who m…

You're making a stock-vs-flows comparison: a battery is manufactured ~once for the lifetime of a car and then produces ~zero emissions per marginal mile driven. Combustion engines produce emissions for every mile driven (and require some emissions to produce as well).

Re: Driving 1725km in an electric car in 2 days

#14
I did a similar roadtrip back in 2015 (!) in my ex-boss's Tesla Model S: we traveled from Montréal to Atlanta for a weekend conference (JSConf, IIRC). We were driving continuously, switching drivers every time we hit a charger (we were 4 in the car). I think it took us about 24h to do the trip.

My main takeaway from the experience is that charging wasn't actually "painful" at all. On the contrary, it was a welcome break every time. Most times we even exceeded the charging time the car was asking for, because we found something interesting to do (like eating dinner in a nice restaurant).

When I was on the marked earlier this year, I really wanted to get an EV, but there aren't any that comfortably seat 6 (I have 4 kids). We ended up with a PHEV (Chrysler Pacifica), and I love it. Next car is going to be an EV, though.

Re: Driving 1725km in an electric car in 2 days

#15
post #2

> And everyone should stop driving fossil vehicles starting now. [...] There’s no excuse not to. I have my doubts that everyone can switch over to a (prices starting at) $70,000 electric car like the author can.

New Nissan Leafs are extremely affordable. Range is more limited, but they still have DC fast charging options.

VW was running a promo for a 3-year ID.4 lease for like $175/month. That's cheaper than a Civic.

Re: Driving 1725km in an electric car in 2 days

#16
post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Standard Range+ Model 3: $39k. 2021 Nissan Leaf: $32.6k. These are reasonable numbers. If you're buying a new sedan, electric is the way to go.

Reasonable numbers...if you can afford it. Saying $40k is "reasonable" depends on how much you earn. That is 20-25% more than US median annual gross income...it is a lot of money. Also, most people who are unable to buy this kind of car aren't polluting a great deal anyway. A huge share of pollution is caused by wealthy people jetting around every few days on planes. I have an ICE car, it cost something like $4k, it…

It's also very close to the average price paid for a new car in the US: $39k.

> A huge share of pollution is caused by wealthy people jetting around every few days on planes.

This is true, I'm not really into Tesla for the environmental aspect, I like them because they're fun appliances that break less.

Re: Driving 1725km in an electric car in 2 days

#17
post #2

> And everyone should stop driving fossil vehicles starting now. [...] There’s no excuse not to. I have my doubts that everyone can switch over to a (prices starting at) $70,000 electric car like the author can.

How about having the luxury to even park or charge your electric car near your house or place of work? So often a very important factor forgotten by more well off EV drivers who are wondering why people still buy ICE cars

Re: Driving 1725km in an electric car in 2 days

#18
I'm from Helsinki but live in Berlin, and drive between the two somewhat regularly. For this trip you essentially have two options - either via Denmark and Sweden, or Poland and the Baltics. You need to take a ferry to reach Finland regardless of which route you pick.

The experience and emissions differ pretty dramatically. Intuitively you might think the total emissions would be lower for the Baltic route because of the significantly shorter ferry trip, but this is more than negated by how dirty the grid is in Poland and Estonia. Polish electricity production is about 100x as polluting as Swedish electricity.

The Nordic route also wins in terms of infrastructure. There are plenty of Superchargers as well as non-Tesla charging stations, located at highway rest stops with good services. Making the 1000km+ drive in one day isn't a big deal at all, and I find that plugging the car in for the time it takes to go to the restroom and grab some food is enough to continue the trip.

Re: Driving 1725km in an electric car in 2 days

#19
post #2

> And everyone should stop driving fossil vehicles starting now. [...] There’s no excuse not to. I have my doubts that everyone can switch over to a (prices starting at) $70,000 electric car like the author can.

In the UK at least, I think the thing with electric cars isn't so much the price (leafs are pretty cheap-ish, seems like a perfectly good A->B car) but that you basically need land or a safe area to be able to charge them. That's what makes them a toy for the rich at the moment.

Re: Driving 1725km in an electric car in 2 days

#20
post #13
post #6

Wait until the author finds out how the batteries are made. EDIT: just to be clear, I am not a "climate change denier"...although always interested to have lots of random people attempt to diagnose me. I worked in equity research, I have seen mountains of reports on this topic: lithium and cobalt production are terrible for the environment (ignoring issues with forced labour and human cost at mines, most people who m…

You're making a stock-vs-flows comparison: a battery is manufactured ~once for the lifetime of a car and then produces ~zero emissions per marginal mile driven. Combustion engines produce emissions for every mile driven (and require some emissions to produce as well).

No, I am not. I didn't mention a flow. You seem to be assuming I said something I did not.

The battery has a life of ~120k miles, constructing the battery (and often, but not always, the electricity used to charge it) is so polluting that ICE cars will typically pollute less over that same period of usage. That is what I am saying: nothing about stocks or flows. The difference in pollution is, if it exists, very marginal.

EDIT: I will add, look at how cobalt is mined...it is a slave commodity from the Congo, no rules, no environmental laws...same for many other constituents of the battery.

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