Abandoning EVs

[CarbonaNotGlue]

Eight years ago, my neighbor was an early adopter of an electric lawnmower. It was under powered, small blade sized, and needed 3 charges just to complete a mow of his yard. I stuck with my gas mower and all the downsides, like tearing my arm off the darn chord, as well as maintenance and cleaning to ensure I could get it to start. Fast forward to six months ago and I was able to try out another neighbor’s electric dewalt mower. It had the same blade size as my gas mower, easily mowed my full lawn with minimal battery depletion, and had so much power, it was even self propelled for a price slightly higher than my current gas mower. It was a no brainer to switch. No more pulling that chord for me. When EVs get like that I’ll consider switching over. Until then, my next car will be an ICE.

 

[audreyh1]

Recently (I guess this year) two big (12+ bays) charging stations have popped around here. Before that, there were none within ~70+ miles. Anyway they are both "tucked away" and out of sight from the flow of traffic. No signs of any type letting folks know they are there. (Yes I understand there are apps that point these out for EV owners). It seems a little advertising, like "we have charging stations here", may help start making folks a little more comfortable with thinking about getting an EV.

I mean gas stations aren't bashful about having big signs, convenient locations and brightly lit stations everywhere.

Yes, pretty much our car navigation has already routed us there as well as showing availability, so we don’t need those big signs.

 

[freedomatlast]

Here's an analogy I'd like to explore with the diverse group of ER members.

For heating your home, heating with fuel oil or natural gas is almost without exception, cheaper than heating with base board electric. Why? Because you're converting the fuel oil or natural gas, to heat, right at the source where you need it. The infrastructure is already in place to fill the oil tank or pipe the natural gas right into your home. With the electric heat, the fossil fuel is turned into electricity at a generating station, run through wires for many miles where considerable loss takes place, then is turned into heat by heating high resistance wire or coils using high voltage. No wonder it's less efficient and more expensive.

With EVs, the same scenario takes place. Instead of putting the fossil fuels directly into the vehicle where it is transferred to motion, the electricity is generated elsewhere using a high percentage of fossil fuels, many miles away, loss takes place getting the electricity to the charger, then the electricity is stored in heavy, expensive, environmentally hazardous batteries, and then converted to motion.

I admit I'm not an energy expert and I must be missing something, but to me EV's just don't seem to be an efficient way to turn energy into motion at this time using current technology.

 

[REWahoo]

I admit I'm not an energy expert and I must be missing something, but to me EV's just don't seem to be an efficient way to turn energy into motion at this time using current technology.

One very big thing you are missing is the efficiency of an electric motor vs the efficiency of an internal combustion engine.

Electric motors makes vehicles substantially more efficient than internal combustion engines (ICEs). Electric motors convert over 85 percent of electrical energy into mechanical energy, or motion, compared to less than 40 percent for a gas combustion engine.

The majority of the fuel burned in an ICE goes towards the production of heat, not motion.

 

[11522914]

+1

I don’t understand the need to choose between EV and ICE. They both can coexist and continue to be viable.

+1

I plan on replacing my 2004 Toyota Avalon with an EV when it dies. It has 195,000 miles and just keeps on running. Once I replace it we will have 1 ICE and 1 EV which will work out great for us.

 

[REWahoo]

Once I replace it we will have 1 ICE and 1 EV which will work out great for us.

+1

This combination, an ICE or hybrid plus an EV, seems to be ideal for many two-car families. It definitely works well for us.

 

[Andre1969]

For heating your home, heating with fuel oil or natural gas is almost without exception, cheaper than heating with base board electric. Why? Because you're converting the fuel oil or natural gas, to heat, right at the source where you need it. The infrastructure is already in place to fill the oil tank or pipe the natural gas right into your home. With the electric heat, the fossil fuel is turned into electricity at a generating station, run through wires for many miles where considerable loss takes place, then is turned into heat by heating high resistance wire or coils using high voltage. No wonder it's less efficient and more expensive.

That's not a given. It's highly dependent on where you live. My old house had home heating oil, and one of the best things I did was ditch it for an all electric heat pump. Overall, I figured it saved me about $1,000 per year, plus no need for a maintenance contract anymore, which had been around $300/yr when I converted in 2008, and probably would have been over $400 by the time I sold. Plus, I got the added benefit of having central air conditioning, although admittedly it was a bit weak upstairs, so I still ran one window unit. But, that's the risk you take when you retrofit an old house that never had it, compared to building it new with the system integrated.

There was also no natural gas available in that neighborhood. Distribution of home heating oil is also dependent on trucks, which bring it out to your house. If you live in an area where it's common, that's not an issue, but I have the feeling that the further south you go, the less common it is.

My current house has a hybrid system. It's dual zone. The upstairs unit is pure electric heat pump. The downstairs unit is heat pump, but it has an oil backup that kicks in when temps get below 40.

Heat pumps get less and less efficient, the colder it gets, and I think at 32 degrees they're totally useless, and have to go to some kind of backup, whether it's pure electric, or oil/natural gas/propane/etc. Right around 32 degrees, the electric probably isn't THAT inefficient, but the further you dip below freezing, the less efficient it becomes. So if you're in a climate where it regularly gets brutally cold, electric backup doesn't make sense.

Where I live, it might get down to single digits every once in awhile at night and before sunrise. I think it might have gotten down to below zero maybe once, in the past 20 years.

Things may have changed in recent years, but all-electric heat pumps used to be pretty cheap to install. So even if they weren't so efficient, you saw the savings up front, as natural gas and oil furnaces/boilers were traditionally pricier, from the get go.

So coincidentally with a house, just like an automobile, often a hybrid is the way to go, vs all electric, or all fossil fuel. It just depends on your own situation.

 

[Aerides]

I think many here overestimate the number of folks who want/need to take long, all-day driving trips on a regular basis. Sure it's not a small number, and I have no idea what it is, but there are probably many just like me that almost never travel beyond where a full tank would go in a day.

For many like me, once an EV can go 500 miles on a full charge, and is available with nice features and comforts, starting under $40k, I'll line up.

Similarly, as they expand beyond sedans and start offering more pick ups and SUV's, others will be right behind me, as will parents that can help their kid buy their first Honda-Civic equivalent entry car for the same price as an ICE.

There's no abandoning, with such low adoption so far that's silly.

 

[RetMD21]

We have done more long cross country driving than most but I think the extra time charging on a long trip would be more than offset by the time saved by skipping the weekly fill up locally.

 

[pb4uski]

One issue will be EVs at apartment buildings or condominium complexes.

We live in a condominium complex with 68 units across 5 buildings. We each have our own outside parking space. Let's say that we all agree that perhaps 20 years from now that we'll have all or predominately EVs. How do we get from here to there?

Our complex has a EV charging policy that an owner can install an EV charging station at their parking space. The thing is that it is impractical to tearup lawns, sidewalks and pavement as needed to run the wiring from the electrical room to each parking space, so it is allowed if the owner is willing to use underground boring, so it is prohibitively expensive. At the same time, the owners have little appetite to pay for the cost of having EV charging stations installed when we currently have so little EVs. At best, when we repave the parking lots 19 years from no there might be appetite to incur the cost to run the wiring from the electrical room to each parking space.

As an interim solution until enought mass happens, we may install a couple EV charging stations at the clubhouse for owners who buy EVs... they can charge at the clubhouse and have their car notify them when it is fully charged and then retrieve it and park it in their parking space. The charge for the charging would be designed to recover both initial and operating costs.

 

[braumeister]

One issue will be EVs at apartment buildings or condominium complexes.

We live in a condominium complex with 68 units across 5 buildings. We each have our own outside parking space. Let's say that we all agree that perhaps 20 years from now that we'll have all or predominately EVs. How do we get from here to there?

I think these issues will be worked out. When I was visiting CCRCs last year I always asked about it. Some had charging stations in central locations, others were in the process of installing them. When a car was charged, it would shut off and notify the owner. If you left it plugged in for more than a set number of minutes you were billed for the idle time (I think Tesla chargers do this also).

I talked to a couple of residents and they said it worked very well. And you needed a specific card to activate the station so you were charged for what you used.

 

[joesxm3]

We have done more long cross country driving than most but I think the extra time charging on a long trip would be more than offset by the time saved by skipping the weekly fill up locally.

I just finished a trip to the gas station for my backup ICE Acura TSX that I only use for church and maybe for groceries just to keep it from seizing up. It has been four months. What a pain making the special trip from church to gas station. Not far, but maybe 15 minutes driving and pumping. Enough time to keep me from being able to get groceries before I needed to be back to wake up stepdad.

With the Tesla I just put it in the garage when I get home and plug it in. Avoids sun or ice damage and keeps the leaves off the paint.

 

[Midpack]

I think many here overestimate the number of folks who want/need to take long, all-day driving trips on a regular basis. Sure it's not a small number, and I have no idea what it is, but there are probably many just like me that almost never travel beyond where a full tank would go in a day.

For many like me, once an EV can go 500 miles on a full charge, and is available with nice features and comforts, starting under $40k, I'll line up.

That isn’t possible at $40K, but manufacturers could offer 500 mile range EVs now if they wanted, it’s not hard to put in a larger battery.

But the battery is the most expensive component so it would increase the cost and therefore price significantly, not to mention the reduced efficiency of adding weight to the vehicle that the owner carries around every day. The reason most EVs are more like 250-350 mile range is precisely for the reason you note in your first paragraph - most people don’t do “long, all day driving trips” regularly. The sweet spot between range and price seems to be in the 250-350 mile range.

For those who actually need and want to pay for 500 miles of range, may never want an EV. Battery tech is pretty mature, though there still may be scalable breakthroughs…

 

[Faraday]

Speaking of early retirement, lol,

Looking forward to Bailing out the big three again with our taxdollars aren't we!
Big oil too! You'll have to pry that gasoline pump from my old cold dead hands.
Isn't oil for fighting wars? Why use it for going to the grocery store and back to the gas station, repeat.
Might have been Sandy Monroe, not sure but we took a CA. Made Mdl S plaid, a 4 Door family sedan up against a new Corvette and the Plaid beat it on every metric. And you can't aphxiate yourself with it running in your garage, ?

look out, China's numerous High quality builds are in your rear view mirror,watch it!, passing on the right!

SAIC

Little history :

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/General_Motors_Chapter_11_reorganization

I know there are a number of people who love their EVs and think that it is the best thing out there... and it seems that gvmt was pushing for ONLY EV sales by 2030 or 2035...


But some of us were skeptical... it now seems that the big auto makers are also getting skeptical... some are starting to go the way of Toyota, producing hybrids.... which a bunch here said was more practical...



From the article...


Ford lost an estimated $36,000 on each of the 36,000 electric vehicles it delivered to dealers in the quarter - even more than its estimated $32,350 loss per EV in the second quarter.


Ford said its EV unit posted a loss in earnings before interest and taxes of $1.3 billion, bringing its nine-month EBIT loss to $3.1 billion. The company had forecast a full-year pretax loss of $4.5 billion for the Ford Model e unit.








https://www.reuters.com/business/au...ws-2023-forecast-warns-ev-results-2023-10-26/


There are other articles out there about GM and Stelantis dong the same...

 

[Fermion]

I just finished a trip to the gas station for my backup ICE Acura TSX that I only use for church and maybe for groceries just to keep it from seizing up. It has been four months. What a pain making the special trip from church to gas station. Not far, but maybe 15 minutes driving and pumping. Enough time to keep me from being able to get groceries before I needed to be back to wake up stepdad.

With the Tesla I just put it in the garage when I get home and plug it in. Avoids sun or ice damage and keeps the leaves off the paint.

45 minutes total time per year is too much?

 

[Closet_Gamer]

That isn’t possible at $40K, but manufacturers could offer 500 mile range EVs now if they wanted, it’s not hard to put in a larger battery.

But the battery is the most expensive component so it would increase the cost and therefore price significantly, not to mention the reduced efficiency of adding weight to the vehicle that the owner carries around every day. The reason most EVs are more like 250-350 mile range is precisely for the reason you note in your first paragraph - most people don’t do “long, all day driving trips” regularly. The sweet spot between range and price seems to be in the 250-350 mile range.

For those who actually need and want to pay for 500 miles of range, may never want an EV. Battery tech is pretty mature, though there still may be scalable breakthroughs…

I'm surprised none of the auto manufacturers have included two weeks of an ICE car rental for the first 5 years of owning an EV. They could do this quite easily themselves or in partnership with the rental car companies. It would make an excellent closing incentive. And people could get the smaller car they need day-to-day but have good access to a big SUV for family trips.

The "I drive far on vacations" concern would get knocked back substantially.

 

[JoeWras]

I think many here overestimate the number of folks who want/need to take long, all-day driving trips on a regular basis. Sure it's not a small number, and I have no idea what it is, but there are probably many just like me that almost never travel beyond where a full tank would go in a day.

Here's the rub: many of us only need to do this one or two times per year.

We go from NC<->IL many times, usually twice per year. We can do it in one day if pressed with a gasoline engine, but easily in two days, arriving late morning, thus giving a "bonus day."

As it is right now, 1 day is not possible with EV unless I want to risk my life with night driving and sleepless hallucinations. I speak of these from real life experience. Two days is fine, but we miss the "bonus" and arrive in the evening instead of morning.

So, we'll keep an ICE available before we go all EV. I think you'll see that a lot among many families.

Also, I do actual work, i.e. construction work as a volunteer. I go to very rural areas of NC. I will be screwed (today) if I had an EV. It just isn't possible to do this kind of dirty work. It seems plausible sitting at a desk on a computer, but when you are out there in the field dealing with running around finding clients in areas that not only don't have EVs, but also don't have restaurants, you appreciate a 450 mile range of a gasoline engine. Yeah, sometimes we have actual "feeding anxiety."

Too many of people view the world from ivory towers of city life.

 

[rodi]

As for availability of chargers... I live in a place (San Diego) where there are chargers everywhere. At the zoo. In the Kaiser Permanente parking garages. At the Kohl's parking lot. I would guess that half of my neighbors have an EV (along with an ICE or hybrid.) We are strongly considering getting an EV as a second car when we retire the gas-hog camping Scooby Van. It's pretty common here to have an ICE or hybrid car as well as an EV. And most families have 2 or more cars.

As for people who live in condos... most of the condo's I've seen have at least one EV charging station for shared (billed) use. Or they allow you to install an EV charger at your space in the underground garage. We've been looking at condos towards an eventual downsizing so we've seen quite a few of these mentioned in the listing or when we've gone to see the unit.

Just my observations from here... as a non-EV owner.

 

[Turbo29]

At least one business has decided that having chargers available in their parking lot was a negative and removed them. It will be interesting to see if this picks up steam.


Shoppers celebrate after H-E-B removes Tesla chargers from Montrose store

 

[audreyh1]

They built a larger capacity one nearby then closed this location that had insufficient parking. No big deal.

 

[Aerides]

Too many of people view the world from ivory towers of city life.

No city or tower here, so I'm not sure where that comes from. But either way, there are many millions in this country and around the world for whom an EV is a good choice. And many millions not. Choices are good.

At some point there will likely be a convergence of price and features (including charging infrastructure, battery capacity, more models to appeal to more price points and styles) that expands the appeal to those who might be on the fence for the next 5-10 years.

 

[Alan]

At some point there will likely be a convergence of price and features (including charging infrastructure, battery capacity, more models to appeal to more price points and styles) that expands the appeal to those who might be on the fence for the next 5-10 years.

Toyota are on track to produce EVs with a new class of Lithium battery within about 5 years. Range over 600 miles and 10 minutes charge time.

https://newsroom.toyota.eu/toyotas-advanced-battery-technology-roadmap/

Breakthrough with Solid-State Batteries [Lithium-Ion]

Long seen as a potential game-changer for BEVs, Toyota has made a technological breakthrough in its quest to improve the durability of Li-Ion solid-state batteries.

Toyota solid-state batteries have a solid electrolyte, allowing for faster movement of ions and a greater tolerance of high voltages and temperatures.

These qualities make solid-state batteries suitable for rapid charging & discharging and delivering more power in a smaller form.

The trade-off, until now, has been an expected shorter battery life. However, recent technological advancements by Toyota have overcome this challenge and the company has switched its focus to putting solid-state batteries into mass production.

The aim is to be ready for commercial use by 2027-28.

And, while solid-state was initially slated for introduction on HEVs, Toyota’s focus is now primarily on next-generation BEVs.

Toyota’s first solid-state battery is expected to offer:

20% increase in cruising range vs. the Performance battery (approx. 1000 km)
Fast charge time of 10 minutes or less (SOC*1 = 10-80%)

 

[mpeirce]

10 minutes charge time.

Imagine the power draw of that charger!

I'm envisioning a Buc-ee's with 100+ charging stations - it's going to need it's own modular nuclear power station on site to supply it's needs.

 

[Texas Proud]

Imagine the power draw of that charger!

I'm envisioning a Buc-ee's with 100+ charging stations - it's going to need it's own modular nuclear power station on site to supply it's needs.

LOL, I have always thought about Buc-ees when people say that they can have enough charging stations... I bet most do not know what one is...


Even with 100 gas pumps you have to wait at times... and that is with only 5 to 10 minutes to fill up... are there going to be that many charging stations? I doubt it...


BTW, it is 100 pumps... from the web...



100 gas pumps




Yes, gas is the company's deal with over 100 gas pumps at most stations and a variety of fuel options like diesel exhaust and ethanol-free.

 

[Ronstar]

Imagine the power draw of that charger!

I'm envisioning a Buc-ee's with 100+ charging stations - it's going to need it's own modular nuclear power station on site to supply it's needs.

That would be nice. Buc-ee's will have to up their game a little to get to 100. We just went to the Buc-ee's in Robertsdale, Al a few days ago. They have a Tesla Supercharger area - with about 15 stalls.