Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

For most US drivers, EVs offer emissions benefits and cost savings

news.mit.edu

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

21–30 of 59 posts

Re: For most US drivers, EVs offer emissions benefits and cost savings

#21

Post by achow »

hellcow wrote: post #12
deathanatos wrote: post #10

Unless things have changed, when I looked a couple of years ago, I couldn't make the math math. The cost difference outweighed the savings, IIRC, even if we assumed electricity to be free. The bigger problem, though, was that the EV we were considering (a Prius) was scarce. So even though I couldn't make the alleged price make sense … well, if there's no supply, then the price may as well be $∞. So IDK, since that la…

Electric cars face a lot of depreciation, so you can get a really good deal on a used one. Plenty of supply, low cost, and cheap to keep running.

That would work other way too, EVs would be expensive to upgrade to newer models. Though nowadays it is not that big a concern, but battery pack replacement at some point need to be accounted for.

Re: For most US drivers, EVs offer emissions benefits and cost savings

#22

Post by 650REDHAIR »

apparent wrote: post #11

How do they account for the cost of having to rent ICE vehicles for road trips that do not suit EVs (some do, and some do not)? Do they factor in the cost of insurance, which some say is much higher for their EVs? I have owned PHEVs and like them quite a bit, but if I'd bought them new I still wouldn't have reached the payback period. It seems that a PHEV typically costs $12k more than the ICE version, so the payback…

What road trips are you taking frequently enough that an EV just won’t work?

Re: For most US drivers, EVs offer emissions benefits and cost savings

#23

Post by michaelt »

arijun wrote: post #5
sollawen wrote: post #2

But I think American drivers probably don’t care about these things.

You don't think Americans care about cost savings, with how much they complain about gasoline prices?

The 10 bestselling vehicles in the US are: Pickup truck, Pickup truck, SUV, Pickup truck, Toyota Camry, Pickup truck, Electric SUV, SUV, Pickup truck, SUV.

Americans don't like having less money in their pocket - who does? - but it's pretty clear that for American car buyers, fuel efficiency is just one concern among many.

After all, a gallon of gas costs the same no matter how rich or poor you are. If government policy keeps fuel affordable for families in the 25th percentile ($41k annual household income) then a family in the 75th percentile ($153k household income) can easily afford the fuel needed to commute to their office job in a crew cab F150, if they so wish.

Of course, that 25th-percentile family's demand for fuel will be inelastic in the short term if their house is a 45 minute drive from their workplace. So when prices rise they'll really feel the crunch - and they'll make plenty of noise about it. But they ain't the ones buying brand new vehicles.

Re: For most US drivers, EVs offer emissions benefits and cost savings

#24

Post by jerlam »

hellcow wrote: post #12
deathanatos wrote: post #10

Unless things have changed, when I looked a couple of years ago, I couldn't make the math math. The cost difference outweighed the savings, IIRC, even if we assumed electricity to be free. The bigger problem, though, was that the EV we were considering (a Prius) was scarce. So even though I couldn't make the alleged price make sense … well, if there's no supply, then the price may as well be $∞. So IDK, since that la…

Electric cars face a lot of depreciation, so you can get a really good deal on a used one. Plenty of supply, low cost, and cheap to keep running.

I'm not sure this will be the case going forward, as much of the depreciation in the past was due to Tesla's $10K+ price drops, the cancelled EV rebate, and luxury manufacturers making bad but expensive EVs.

Re: For most US drivers, EVs offer emissions benefits and cost savings

#25

Post by close04 »

eckesicle wrote: post #16
Faaak wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

EVs and PHEVs are completely unrelated though: price, reliability, and mileage wise

The linked website carcompare.com was quite interesting in how clustered the data is. Pretty much _any_ EV car is better both cost wise and emissions wise than _any_ PHEV. The same holds comparing PHEV with ICE. Not to mention that EVs are just so much more fun and satisfying to drive. Even a mediocre EV these days will do 0-60 in 5s. At this point buying anything but an EV for the typical driver is just objectively…

> EVs are just so much more fun and satisfying to drive. Even a mediocre EV these days will do 0-60 in 5s.

I always thought there’s a lot more to driving satisfaction and “fun” than slamming that pedal in a straight line. But most drivers will settle for 0-60 because it’s “accessible” fun, everyone can slam the pedal (and sadly this is so visible in daily traffic). There are very few EVs that manage to mask their weight in a corner.

Re: For most US drivers, EVs offer emissions benefits and cost savings

#26

Post by jerlam »

apparent wrote: post #13
arijun wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You don't think Americans care about cost savings, with how much they complain about gasoline prices?

I think they do care about cost savings, and the near-universal retrenchment of car companies culling their EVs in the wake of the expiration of the $7,500 federal tax credit tells you that these vehicles do not save consumers money. If they did, people would still be clamoring to buy them.

Used EV prices are rising, especially at the low end:

https://www.recurrentauto.com/research/used-electric-vehicle...

People who want EVs to save money aren't interested in buying brand new, expensive luxury EVs but that's where the supply was.

Re: For most US drivers, EVs offer emissions benefits and cost savings

#27

Post by BLKNSLVR »

The overall calculation is very personal to each household.

Do you even need a car?

Do you live in a house or an apartment?

If you're in an apartment, is there car parking with charging infrastructure?

If you're in a house, do you own it or are you renting?

Do you have solar panels?

How long is your daily drive?

How often do you need to travel further than the car's range?

How much can the car recharge overnight?

Can you plug the car in anywhere to charge overnight?

What public charging infrastructure is nearby?

What rate are you charged for electricity?

I'm in a house with solar and battery and have had a 2014 Nissan Leaf for nearly two years. It costs $11k, and in that time has saved us around $2,500 in petrol. We've since purchased another EV, replacing a petrol family car, both of which have about the same range with a 'full tank', except the EV costs about $5 to go from empty to full whilst the petrol car was about $70. We've only had the new one about 3 months, so I can't speak to reliability over an extended period. Both cars are charged overnight just at 10A, 240V, no fast charge and so far they cover our normal daily usage no worries.

I'm aware that I'm lucky in that my situation seems to be a perfect use-case for EVs.

(I'm also not in the US, and so the recent EV was cheaper or at least comparable to equivalent petrol cars; someone mentioned a 'payback period', in my case it doesn't apply).

Re: For most US drivers, EVs offer emissions benefits and cost savings

#28

Post by ZeroGravitas »

arijun wrote: post #5
sollawen wrote: post #2

But I think American drivers probably don’t care about these things.

You don't think Americans care about cost savings, with how much they complain about gasoline prices?

Like the national debt and a thousand other things, it seems to be just a stick to beat the Democrats with, not something they actually care about when their team spikes both with a pointless war.

Re: For most US drivers, EVs offer emissions benefits and cost savings

#29

Post by BoxwoodSeed »

wood_spirit wrote: post #9

My experience - in the Nordics, but this is transferable - is they are also much nicer to own and drive. I don’t know anyone who went electric and then went back. The generation who went electric a few years ago is now on their second or third electric car. The makes and models in favour is changing (cue tangent on Tesla brand death in Europe) but the power source choice is not. So as more people get one, I expect th…

EVs are great in, say, Norway. But the population of the country Norway isn't even half that of the city Tokyo. Less people means less cars on the street which translates to less cars using up charging stations.

Once things get crowded and you have to wait in line to get your vehicle charged, it becomes a bit annoying.

Re: For most US drivers, EVs offer emissions benefits and cost savings

#30

Post by plusmax1 »

wood_spirit wrote: post #9

My experience - in the Nordics, but this is transferable - is they are also much nicer to own and drive. I don’t know anyone who went electric and then went back. The generation who went electric a few years ago is now on their second or third electric car. The makes and models in favour is changing (cue tangent on Tesla brand death in Europe) but the power source choice is not. So as more people get one, I expect th…

I totally agree, I went electric last year and couldn't be happier. Got a hyundai ioniq 6 which is an amazing car. Charging is simple and cheap and where I live (nw europe) the charging infrastructure is great. Did a couple of long range road trips (germany, france) and fast chargers were easy to find. Take a small break, have a coffee and the car was already full again. I had some anxiety about this before, but this has 100% better than I was expecting.

The best thing is, at least here, there are so many "small" charging spots. If you take them into account when traveling to places (even the grocery store, or the museum, or near whatever relative or friend you are visiting), you can just charge cheaply there. This is the hardest habit for me to break: no, i don't need to visit a "gas station" to fill up, just charge wherever you can find a charger, and it doesnt have to be 100%. Even a short stop on a slower charging spot helps a lot.

Post reply on HN