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

Is the move to electric cars running out of power?

bbc.co.uk

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

31–40 of 53 posts

Re: Is the move to electric cars running out of power?

#31

Post by eigenspace »

ta1243 wrote: post #26
eigenspace wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, I accidentally dropped the k, I know you meant 5-10k. > UK average is about that. Yes, and the average UK person is driving more than they would if there was better public transportation availability. Sure, not every household is going to be well served by public transportation, especially in very rural settings, but way more rural areas can be well served by public transport than they currently are. If you thin…

The average car in the netherlands is driven about 8000 miles a year. Doesn't matter how good the public transport is, it can not sustain a journey from my small village to a larger village at 10pm at night on a friday night. Nor will it meet me at 2350 from the railhead in a city a 30 minute drive away. On the way back from that station at that time of night I pass maybe 2 or 3 cars, none of which came from or go to…

Yes, you may very well be in a situation where car ownership makes perfect sense for you. I guess my perspective (being originally from rural Canada) is that 5-10k miles a year is very low, and I equate that with city drivers, not rural drivers. Where I grew up, most people often do 400km day trips to the nearest city multiple times a month, in addition to regular day-to-day driving.

Rural England is a pretty different beast from rural Canada though, and also pretty different dynamics from urban Germany where I currently live.

People in your situation unfortunately probably won't benefit from electric cars for some time, because the tax incentives are generally being decreased, not increased, so we're going to have to count on competition lowering prices instead, which seems to be happening, but relatively slowly.

Re: Is the move to electric cars running out of power?

#32

Post by eigenspace »

Ekaros wrote: post #11
eigenspace wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Without tax incentives EVs are far more expensive for people who only drive say 5-10k miles a year. If you're only driving 5-10k miles a year, car ownership seems like a massive unnecessary burden, electric or ICE. But given you're measuring in miles, I guess there's a good chance you're not from somewhere with adequate public transit and bicycle infrastructure. In my opinion, we really need to focus less on person…

There is always opportunity cost... I like having car available even if I drive very little or short distances. It is there when I need it. And electric cars don't have same range as my cheap gasoline car. Not at least on same price point. So at times I need that range getting 160-200km to somewhere and then back without charging... And taxis here are expensive. It would not be that many trips in a month with all the…

Sure, it's definitely nice to always have a car on hand to use whenever you like, but how much are you really willing to pay for that? Your milage may vary, but I've found that so-called carshare services (i.e. app based car rentals) give me a good way of having an on-demand car parked within walking distance of my home that I can use when I need, but I don't actually have to deal with the expenses and hassle of car ownership, and ends up much cheaper overall since I'm normally very well served by public transit.

Obviously this isn't available everywhere, e.g. the person I was responding to lives somewhat rurally, so probably doesn't have such services available to them.

Re: Is the move to electric cars running out of power?

#33

Post by wcoenen »

denvrede wrote: post #3

For me personally (I spoke to others and they mostly agree) the biggest downside is that for "public" charging I pay a 100% premium. My costs at home (I live in a rented apartment with no possibility of charging an EV) for 1kw/h are 0.30€. The average price for charging publicly here are 0.59€. Plus the hassle of having a quadrillion providers for which I would have to check first what the cheapest one at a given cha…

Perhaps it would make sense if electricity contracts came with a "roaming" option for a certain region. As in, get the same electricity price as at home when using a charging station on the go. After all, I think it shouldn't make much difference to the electricity company whether I use electricity at home or elsewhere, as long as I stay within the region where the company offers the contract.

This would also help people with dynamically priced contracts (the ones that vary hour by hour based on the day-ahead electricity market) to make optimal use of cheap or even negatively priced power, e.g. during the daily solar peak, even when at work. That would also help with grid balancing and reduce carbon intensity.

There would still have to be a roaming surcharge to pay the operator of the charging station of course. But perhaps it wouldn't have to be as expensive as a 100% premium, at least for AC chargers on parking lots. (For DC fast chargers the premium would probably still be substantial, because you're paying for the ROI on the high power infrastructure.)

Re: Is the move to electric cars running out of power?

#34

Post by Ekaros »

eigenspace wrote: post #32
Ekaros wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There is always opportunity cost... I like having car available even if I drive very little or short distances. It is there when I need it. And electric cars don't have same range as my cheap gasoline car. Not at least on same price point. So at times I need that range getting 160-200km to somewhere and then back without charging... And taxis here are expensive. It would not be that many trips in a month with all the…

Sure, it's definitely nice to always have a car on hand to use whenever you like, but how much are you really willing to pay for that? Your milage may vary, but I've found that so-called carshare services (i.e. app based car rentals) give me a good way of having an on-demand car parked within walking distance of my home that I can use when I need, but I don't actually have to deal with the expenses and hassle of car…

It is not that expensive even counting depreciation. 30-40€ one way taxi rides get expensive pretty quickly and 40-60€ day rents for car is not that many uses...

Plus it really means no walking and waiting for public transport. Ofc, if you love moving stuff inside public transport and ten walking from stops to home the alternatives are great.

Re: Is the move to electric cars running out of power?

#35

Post by dartos »

edude03 wrote: post #30
denvrede wrote: post #3

For me personally (I spoke to others and they mostly agree) the biggest downside is that for "public" charging I pay a 100% premium. My costs at home (I live in a rented apartment with no possibility of charging an EV) for 1kw/h are 0.30€. The average price for charging publicly here are 0.59€. Plus the hassle of having a quadrillion providers for which I would have to check first what the cheapest one at a given cha…

I used to have a bmw i3 then a model y while I lived in an apartment building. In my experience although public charging is more expensive the amount you pay overall is cheaper than an equivalent gas vehicle such that it’s probably not worth trying to find the cheapest station more than once. For example to go “500km” in the model y charging at home with the cheapest electricity it’s about $6. At a super charger I pa…

What’s the weight difference between the SUV and the f150?

F150s aren’t known for having the best mileage

Re: Is the move to electric cars running out of power?

#36

Post by winternett »

audunw wrote: post #2

Norway had a little downward bump in sales around the 10-20% market share mark too if I remember correctly. But after going through that speed bump the sales have shot up to 90%+ I wonder if it’s kind of necessary to sit on that ~10% level for a while to drive infrastructure investments. And then when infrastructure gets up to a decent level further growth is unlocked. I remember it was a very short timespan where it…

The industry should have started out with smaller cars and motorcycles with swappable battery cells. It would have solved so many problems in even deploying charge centers, but unfortunately, it means reduced profit. Tech Companies focus on monthly subscriptions and planned obsolescence to guarantee revenue streams so much now that it's making intentionally disposable products that will do far more environmental damage than fuel burning vehicles. We're making bike and bus lanes and speed cameras that bottleneck traffic, while wondering why no one wants to work. The lead EV manufacturing company is led by someone with astronomical wealth that is impulsive and erratic, despite having a faulty and way over-stylized product that many are buying, but most fail within the first 5-6 years, and sit dormant due to very high repair costs. Even the quality and long-term reliability of gas powered vehicles has declined for unknown reasons as they become primarily software-based, which some believe are the result of trying to encourage EV sales.

The reason why EV markets are faltering now are simple... They're just not very viable and reliable in their current form in comparison to traditional vehicles.

We all need to reject the "new mobile phone + plan every year" model of car ownership. Not only is it not sustainable, it's not environmentally safe.

Re: Is the move to electric cars running out of power?

#37

Post by gary_0 »

denvrede wrote: post #3

For me personally (I spoke to others and they mostly agree) the biggest downside is that for "public" charging I pay a 100% premium. My costs at home (I live in a rented apartment with no possibility of charging an EV) for 1kw/h are 0.30€. The average price for charging publicly here are 0.59€. Plus the hassle of having a quadrillion providers for which I would have to check first what the cheapest one at a given cha…

I don't own an EV so I don't understand... when I go to a gas station, I just tap my debit card and fill up. The price and running total is shown on a display on the pump. Why don't EV charging stations work that way?

Re: Is the move to electric cars running out of power?

#38

Post by Log_out_ »

beAbU wrote: post #9

I think it's cost. Up to now, EVs have been very very expensive. We are only now starting to see EVs approaching the €20k mark. Al lthe rich folks who are interested in getting an EV got one already. The rest of us still can't afford them. I'm in the market now, but I'll be looking at the 2nd hand market because new is just too rich for my blood. Here in Ireland the grants are also drying up reducing the incentives f…

I honestly doubt that. Talked with someone from romania recently. They use the 2nd hand cars as battery packs for solar island solutions.

Re: Is the move to electric cars running out of power?

#39

Post by eigenspace »

Ekaros wrote: post #34
eigenspace wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sure, it's definitely nice to always have a car on hand to use whenever you like, but how much are you really willing to pay for that? Your milage may vary, but I've found that so-called carshare services (i.e. app based car rentals) give me a good way of having an on-demand car parked within walking distance of my home that I can use when I need, but I don't actually have to deal with the expenses and hassle of car…

It is not that expensive even counting depreciation. 30-40€ one way taxi rides get expensive pretty quickly and 40-60€ day rents for car is not that many uses... Plus it really means no walking and waiting for public transport. Ofc, if you love moving stuff inside public transport and ten walking from stops to home the alternatives are great.

It really is that expensive. Car owners routinely underestimate the amount of money their cars cost to own and operate. They are very unreliable narrators when reporting how much their cars cost them. So many costs are hidden, that it feels cheap.

Once you account for

* the opportunity cost of the up-front money you paid for your car (or the cost of the loan to buy it) compared to investing that money or simply putting it in a high-interest savings account

* the cost of car insurance

* the cost of car maintenance

* the cost of depreciation

* the cost of fuel

it adds up very very quickly to gigantic quantities of money.

___________________

> 30-40€ one way taxi rides get expensive pretty quickly and 40-60€ day rents for car is not that many uses...

Nobody is advocating you rely on taxi rides to get around. 40-60€ day rentals, or 1€/km metered rentals absolute can save you money relative to car ownership so long as you don't use them super often.

Re: Is the move to electric cars running out of power?

#40

Post by thelastgallon »

If EV sales are slowing down, that might be only in a few countries where prices are kept artificially high.

In the biggest car market, EVs are hitting sales records: https://electrek.co/2024/05/15/byd-just-hit-new-weekly-ev-sa...

The number of electric cars sold globally in the first three months of this year is roughly equivalent to the number sold in all of 2020. In 2024, electric cars sales in China are projected to leap to about 10 million, accounting for about 45% of all car sales in the country: https://www.iea.org/news/the-worlds-electric-car-fleet-conti...

Post reply on HN