What Needs to Happen Before Electric Cars Take Over the World

https://www.nytimes.com/2017/12/18/business/electric-car-adoption.html

by runesoerensen • 9 years ago

217 452 9 years ago

nytimes.com

mfeldheim• 9 years ago

Paywall

gnclmorais• 9 years ago

https://outline.com/VEjrjG <- paywall bypassed. Enjoy!

ckastner• 9 years ago

Price of an electric car powertrain: $16,000
Price of a conventional car powertrain: $6,000

Can anyone provide a better source for this?

This is exactly the opposite of what I expected. I thought electric powertrains had far fewer (in the hundreds, even) moving parts?

Edit: Coffee hasn't kicked in yet. As user analognoise points out, this is literally answered by the sentence that follows the above: How soon that day arrives is almost solely a function of the price of batteries.

analognoise• 9 years ago

Batteries aren't cheap.

bigbugbag5• 9 years ago

Are batteries part of the powertrain though ?

benjaminl• 9 years ago

Almost all of that is the battery. Even though batteries are coming down in price, they are still very expensive.

For example GM’s list price for the Bolt battery is $15,734. Now this is the replacement cost Bolt owners pay for a new battery not the actual cost, but it gives an indication of their cost.

https://electrek.co/2017/06/12/gm-bolt-ev-battery-pack-price...

ianai2• 9 years ago

How much power does the electric motor need?

-edit- found it https://www.quora.com/How-much-power-is-required-by-the-moto...

80kw to accelerate and 1 kw to maintain.

-edit 2- how come no ones put 3 solar panels on top of an EV? Three of the following could output 1 kw and fit in the space available.

http://www.solarwholesale.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/10/Sil...

Seems like an obvious for electric semis where there’s often plenty of sun (aka an ever increasing portion of the US)

Cthulhu_16• 9 years ago

The article doesn't have a headline that takes total cost of ownership into account. I mean annual oil change, the odd broken alternator (probably also a problem in electric cars), filters, distribution drive / chain, and a ton of extra moving parts that all need maintenance.

Mind you I wonder if electric cars can get a million miles out of them, like well maintained conventional cars can do.

skookumchuck4• 9 years ago

The lithium may not be that much of a problem if existing aged batteries can have the lithium in them recycled.

leereeves3• 9 years ago

Once the whole world has converted to electric cars, perhaps, but in the near future vast quantities of lithium will be needed to increase the number of electric cars.

delbel2• 9 years ago

Its not the Lithium that is a problem. Its the Colbolt-59 that's next to it. A typical Tesla has about 15 pounds of Colbolt-59. If a small tactical weapon would be used near the location of a single parked Tesla, the Colbolt-59 will transmute to Colbolt-60, the deadlist substance known to earth. 15 pounds of Colbolt-60 is enough to kill 24 million people. Imagine a parking lot of them. 4 tons of it is enough to annihilate all life on earth. These Tesla cars are the biggest extensional threat to human kind. Anyway, have a nice day!

spiznnx• 9 years ago

If a small tactical weapon would be used near the location of a single parked Tesla, the Colbolt-59 will transmute to Colbolt-60.

Source?

varjag• 9 years ago

It's cobalt. Also, my physics is rusty but transmuting an isotope should involve a nuclear reaction.

cletus• 9 years ago

Sorry but polonium 210 trumps any cobalt isotope.

cjslep• 9 years ago

The entire cross section of a Cobalt 59 atom is only about a barn. Since a nuclear weapons dispersion of neutrons is in three dimensions and therefore the concentration of neutrons drops quite quickly as a measure of distance the car will have to be uncomfortably close to transmute a meaningful amount of Cobalt 60.

Since this phenomena is very much geographically constrained by the properties and physics of the blast, using over the top comparison of "15 pounds could kill 24 million people" should instead read "15 pounds generated from 240,000 micronuclear explosions generating this material near 100 people each could kill 24 million people if they decide to linger near the Cobalt 60 on the order of years due to its long half life".

Edit: It is important to understand the underlying physics to make an accurate characterization of the risks involved. Cobalt 60 is not the most deadly substance to humans; I would argue alcohol is higher than Cobalt 60.

Symmetry• 9 years ago

Nuclear wars would mostly involve thermonuclear weapons detonating high enough up that their neutron flux will essentially dissipate before reaching the ground where all the cars are. That will maximize the area destroyed by the shock wave.

It's true that a neutron bomb used tactically against ground targets could transmute car batteries. But those would tend to be used in the countryside against armor formation rolling through rather than against cities where all the cars are. And they have a fairly small radius of effect anyways.

EDIT: And in any event, I'm sure that the transmuted cobalt will be the least of our problems if it ever becomes relevant.

ecpottinger6• 9 years ago

And how many mega-tons of that deadly heavy metal known as Lead is out there in cars now.

So you claim is we should worry about a possible future nuclear bomb going off while not bothering the dangerous metal already out there.

Tade03• 9 years ago

It was never a problem in the first place. There's more than enough lithium in seawater.

pasta• 9 years ago

It is a problem for now because at 0.1ppm we are still years away from getting enough lithium out of the seawater/ocean.

Most lithium is 'mined' from salt (water) lakes by evaporation. Which is for now much easier and cheaper.

adrianN2• 9 years ago

How difficult is it to extract that Lithium? There are huge quantities of Gold and Uranium in sea water too, but it's too expensive to filter them out.

bigbugbag5• 9 years ago

Energy was never a problem in the first place, there's more than enough energy in a supermassive black hole.

If you have a practical and affordable to mass produce lithium batteries from seawater please share with us.

pretendscholar• 9 years ago

What percentage of the lithium in the battery can be recycled?

myroon5• 9 years ago

"CARMAKERS’ ANNUAL PROFIT: $400 billion"

This seems hard to believe. Revenue, maybe?

cma2• 9 years ago

$400 billion / ~80 million passenger cars per year would be $5000 per car.

reacweb• 9 years ago

A large part of the profit is made on spare parts.

leereeves3• 9 years ago

Gross profit, maybe.

Toyota alone reported $43 billion gross profit on $247 billion revenue.

FabHK• 9 years ago

You probably mean billion.

Daimler made EUR 9 billion profit on EUR 160 billion revenue, so that's the right ball park.

MrKristopher• 9 years ago

"According to the consulting firm PwC, the global automotive industry generates about $400 billion a year in profits; about 41 percent of that — or about $164 billion — comes from new vehicle sales."

From another NYT article -- https://www.nytimes.com/2016/12/22/business/automakers-prepa...

curun1r• 9 years ago

I doubt it's revenue. A little Googling leads to estimates of the total global number of new cars sold annually being between 75 million and 90 million. Divide 400 billion by the more conservative estimate and it still gives you a bit over $5k per vehicle, which seems way too low to be an average sales price. So revenue has to be quite a bit higher.

Also, Google lists the size of the US auto loan industry (i.e. money owed by buyers) as $1.1 trillion. Since auto loans average around 5 years, that would mean that the US alone spends at least $200 billion per year on automobiles (more probably, since that wouldn't count people who buy their cars outright or pay their loans off early), and we're nowhere near half the world market. IIRC, our auto market is only slightly larger than Europe's.

Cthulhu_16• 9 years ago

The car industry is one of the biggest industries of the world, so I'm not surprised. That + the oil industry.

megablast• 9 years ago

Hopefully they never take over the world, and we can stop this car nonsense. Having over a million extra people not killed by cars would be nice.

czechdeveloper• 9 years ago

But how would you move around? Public transportation cannot reach everywhere. I would just stop seeing my family without having a car.

craigds• 9 years ago

We'll find a way though, after some pain. Maybe we'll just become less mobile, and be okay with that. Denser housing and more distributed community hubs seem the obvious solution.

The harder question is how would you get from here to a world without cars in the first place. There are some pretty massive political and social hurdles to overcome. I don't think this will happen until we basically run out of fuel, unfortunately.

bigbugbag5• 9 years ago

Walking, bikes, trains and other public transportation. Maybe carpooling.

But in countries built around roads and cheap oil such as the U.S. the consequences of those choices will be harsher. Specially as the people in charge know of this but did and still do nothing to address the issue.

ManlyBread• 9 years ago

I concur, the push for mass adoption when the tech behind the electric cars are in such an infant stage makes me nervous. On top of that it won't be any better for the environment in countries which still have majorly coal-based power plants.

adrianN2• 9 years ago

It will be much better for the air quality in cities though.

bigbugbag5• 9 years ago

It's gonna be a major ecological issue even in countries where the power plants are not coal based, topped with rare earth material related problems.

Fredej• 9 years ago

That's true in the short term, but one of them has to be the first to move. Shifting from coal to renewables does nothing for the environmental impact of cars in an all-ICE system. If we get a larger percentage of electric cars, the impact of switching to renewables will also increase.

scarlac• 9 years ago

The western market doesn't work like that. It's not a single budget controlled by a single entity, and as such it cannot shift focus in the way you are asking.

Once you realise this, you can see electric cars for what they are: An improvement to personal safety (not explosive, no human exposure to toxic fluids, bigger crumble zone).

bigbugbag5• 9 years ago

It's already happening in Germany and E.U. IIRC Germany set 2030 for getting rid of all vehicles with combustion motor and E.U. set the date around 2050.

pvdebbe• 9 years ago

Banning new ICE vehicles or banning all existing ICE vehicles?

_greim_3• 9 years ago

Drivers will have to shed their attachment to the sound, smell and feel of gas-powered engines.

I for one will not feel the least bit sad when continuous, smooth acceleration becomes the norm, and lurchy, awkward automatic transmissions fade into distant memory.

I'll probably feel slightly nostalgic about the sound and smell of fuel-burning cars someday, but it won't inform my buying choices in the slightest.

Swizec• 9 years ago

There are transmissions other than automatic. And I agree, they’re better if you know what you’re doing.

But modern high-end automatics are in fact smoother than most humans. Racecar drivers might be smoother still but even they use flappypadle automatic sequential gearboxes at the very top end of racing because even the best trained humans are just too slow.

Curiously, racing electric cars use gearboxes too.

gambiting• 9 years ago

Yep. ZF 8 speed automatic, Mercedes new 9 speed dual clutch, are probably the smoothest transmissions available on the market. I've got years of experience of driving manual cars and I can't even pretend that I would be able to change gears as smoothly as those boxes. And I drive a Mercedes-AMG with a 7-speed dual clutch and under hard acceleration that box changes gears within 100ms(actual number supplied by AMG) - there's no way a human could change gears that quickly.

clouddrover• 9 years ago

Curiously, racing electric cars use gearboxes too.

Some do and some don't in Formula E:

http://www.fiaformulae.com/en/news/2016/october/insight-how-...

hodgesrm• 9 years ago

Speaking as a manual transmission fan I agree fully with your assessment about current automatics. My BMW 328d xDrive ships with an 8-speed automatic transmission that shifts at least as well as I can myself under normal road conditions. It really changes the equation for manual vs. automatic.

wojt_eu• 9 years ago

I already feel nostalgic about gas-powered cars, their place is alongside steam locomotives as movie props and tourist attractions. Imagine people doing gas-punk cosplay in a couple of decades.

farrisbris• 9 years ago

I really really really do not share that nostalgia. I live in a city center and the only amount significant source of noise is from cars/buses. Sure you will have sirens or people shouting every now and again, but there is a constant buzzing sound from motors that goes on throughout the day and most of the night. I moved from a relatively quiet neighbourhood to where i am a few years ago, and the sound of motors ( and the smell. Lets not forget that cars smell ) is the only thing i about living here. This would be a great place to live if it wasn't for the constant sound and smell of motors.

mac01021• 9 years ago

Imagine people doing gas-punk cosplay in a couple of decades.

Like some of those "Mad Max" movies?

Tade03• 9 years ago

Dieselpunk enjoys a pretty substantial following, but then again it's emulating a different era.

cmrdporcupine5• 9 years ago

I bought a couple 1980s Saab 900 turbos to restore. After driving my Volt for months just the act of turning a key and hearing an engine roar feels anachronistic, very retro.

I think a small number of ICE cars will stick around as a kind of hobby classic experience. A small minority of people will want the experience of having dinosaur juice explode in front of their feet just like some people like to use Super 8 cameras.

Still, the ICE backup on my Volt has been kind of handy and pleasant to have when it dropped below -10C here last week...

Cthulhu_16• 9 years ago

Imagine people doing gas-punk cosplay in a couple of decades.

The Mad Max look is already a thing. See also: Mad Max.

gadders2• 9 years ago

I wonder if there will need to be a replacement noise given to electric cars for safety reasons. Will they all have to make a fake broom-broom noise, or will some other noise be chosen? Maybe they'll be silent until they detect pedestrians or in built-up areas.

PeterisP2• 9 years ago

IIRC many places already have a legal requirement for replacement noise for safety reasons, usually the criteria is that it must be active below a certain speed.

squarefoot2• 9 years ago

"I'll probably feel slightly nostalgic about the sound and smell of fuel-burning cars someday"

I don't know about the smell, but once people realize how dangerous is a car you can't hear coming, they will start adding some sound, and what's better than a traditional car sound? The sound will be easily faked using samples from well known engines played according to the current speed by transducers under the car. There will be probably a market for such addons and traditional auto makers could even patent their sound once they realize there is a market for their recordings. Allowing paid download in realtime of "today's hottest car sound" in seconds when you start the car in the morning could become a business, so that news like someone arrested for pirating the sound of a 911 Carrera could even become the norm one day:)

Doxin2• 9 years ago

Modern gas car engines are already pretty much inaudible over tire noise at slowish speeds. Electric cars don't make any less tire noise. People will manage without artificially adding sounds to electric vehicles.

draugadrotten• 9 years ago

once people realize how dangerous is a car you can't hear coming, they will start adding some sound

Already there... I love this UFO sound from 2010: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/motoring/motoringvideo/8015988/El...

KozmoNau7• 9 years ago

once people realize how dangerous is a car you can't hear coming

Modern cars are already very quiet at low speeds, what you're actually hearing at higher speeds is tire noise and (to a lesser degree) wind noise.

Several solutions present themselves. Firstly, people should learn to use their eyes, dammit. Secondly, a lot of electric cars have subtle noisemakers when driving at low speeds.

cmrdporcupine5• 9 years ago

All EVs actually are currently required to have a noise added, unfortunately. My Volt makes a weird whirring that you can't hear inside the cabin, but can outside. The Leaf has an odd noise, and even has a backup 'beep beep' like you'd normally hear on tractors or bobcats, etc (tho quieter).

chrisper4• 9 years ago

continuous, smooth acceleration becomes the norm,

This was achieved with CVT (Continous Variable Transmission). I did not like to drive one, but it already exists.

Also I currently have a car with 7 gear automatic transmission and the acceleration is pretty smooth.

lurchy, awkward automatic transmissions fade into distant memory.

Again, newer automatic transmission aren't bad anymore.

IndrekR6• 9 years ago

I drive a hybrid with CVT. After getting used to its smoothness driving with a "normal gearbox" feels really awkward.

Tade03• 9 years ago

I've test driven a Hyundai Ioniq which comes with a six speed automatic transmission and if it's a representative example then I guess it's still not "it" - at least in my view.

There's a level of smoothness and instant response that I haven't seen in cars which are not directly propelled by an electric motor.

c38331742• 9 years ago

Continous Variable Transmission

If it's anything like the ones installed in most scooters I'd say it's pretty bad.

cmrdporcupine5• 9 years ago

CVT or many-gear auto transmission is nothing like the experience of direct drive EV.

CVTs are mostly gutless because gas engines are gutless except at a very narrow RPM band.

The 0-60 times on EVs are impressive. But it's their 0-30 ranges that are absolutely mindblowing. My little boring Volt easily zips past even 'muscle' cars straight off from a red light (of course they easily catch up later, but I don't care)

skookumchuck4• 9 years ago

Nobody cares about the sound of auto transes. But a 4-on-the-floor V8, that's another matter entirely. See the movie Bullitt for proof.

I'll get an electric car like everyone else. But I dream about having a '68 Mustang :-)

kasey_junk2• 9 years ago

But performance cars are already using electronic sound generation in gas cars. Just do that for electrics too.

Cthulhu_16• 9 years ago

A movie may not be an accurate representation of reality. But, point taken.

audunw4• 9 years ago

I'll probably feel slightly nostalgic about the sound and smell of fuel-burning cars someday, but it won't inform my buying choices in the slightest.

The sound can be pleasing, but the smell? I always thought gasoline smells and exhaust fumes smell awful. Maybe it's because I never owned an ICE vehicle myself.

Fueling a car is a very unpleasant experience to me.

It's part of the reason why, after my last road-trip, my wife and I decided we would rather wait for the EV to charge (and grab some food, stretch legs, maybe even a short hike etc.) than to borrow or rent an ICE. To be fair though, the other reason is the ICE we usually borrow is stick shift, so the difference in comfort when driving is huge, especially on curvy roads (In addition to no gear shifting, EVs usually do a lot of regenerative breaking when releasing the gas pedal, so you don't have to use the break pedal as much. I really missed that).

Some here have commented that the sound can be a safety feature. A lot of EVs/hybrids already have added that, but generally only at low speeds. Sometime it can be turned off, so if don't want to disrupt the neighbors, like late at night, you can turn disable it (since it's on by default, I'd think people would drive extra carefully if they turn it off).

_greim_3• 9 years ago

but the smell?

Yes! Well admittedly, I have somewhat of a redneck past. [cue Ben Fold's Five music.] Having grown up in small-town Midwest and worked on Farms the smell of gasoline is linked to lots of boyhood memories and male-bonding experiences :)

scythe• 9 years ago

Battery manufacturing is hard. Everyone was really impressed by that "record-breaking" installation Tesla made in South Australia, but that 100 MWh installation is really less than 2000 cars, and Tesla needs to build five times that much per month to keep up with demand. I think people focus on lithium because it's in the name, but lithium access is nowhere near the hardest problem facing battery manufacturers (and correspondingly it's a small percentage of the cost).

paol3• 9 years ago

These articles keep omitting a pretty big barrier to adoption: street parking. (Maybe it's a function of US being suburb-centric? But at least the New York Times ought to know better.)

One of 2 things needs to happen, either charging technology improves to the point where you can charge at a gas station in a span of time comparable to refueling a conventional car, or all street parking spots need to be fitted with charging ports for overnight charging.

Neither thing looks likely to happen soon.

samcheng• 9 years ago

Or street parking needs to make way for bike lanes, transit, and pedestrian space!

To be honest, though, electrifying public parking isn't that outlandish either. Fairbanks, Alaska has done it for a while to power engine block heaters.

paol3• 9 years ago

Sure, it's entirely possible but it represents a major capital expenditure for urban municipalities, probably more than most could afford without external subsidies.

kozak5• 9 years ago

Wow, an image search for the query "engine block heaters public parking" gave me a peek of how our all-electrified automotive future is going to look like. Impressive.

jmnicolas• 9 years ago

This is what I never understood : why don't they create cars where the battery is removable and when you go to a "gas" station there's a machine that just change your empty battery for a full one.

In fact I thought about patenting the idea 10 years ago but I didn't have the know-how.

empyrical• 9 years ago

Tesla was going to have something like that, but they ended up dropping the idea for a while. Looks like they might be considering it again, though

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H5V0vL3nnHY

https://www.teslarati.com/tesla-shuts-down-battery-swap-prog...

https://electrek.co/2017/09/15/tesla-new-battery-swap-techno...

afterburner• 9 years ago

They did this in Israel. Maybe still are.

chrisper4• 9 years ago

Kind of like how you can swap the gas canister of a BBQ grill!

eloisant• 9 years ago

Because batteries get old and need to be replaced, so you'd have to pay for the aging of your battery when you get the new one

fergie2• 9 years ago

The battery-swap idea has in fact been fairly well established for a while, but nobody has actually made it work. I believe that Tesla considered going down this route for a while.

Here is a HN classic about "Better Place", a company that rolled out "battery swap" electric cars in Israel. https://www.fastcompany.com/3028159/a-broken-place-better-pl...

dagw4• 9 years ago

People have been talking about this for as long as they've been talking about electric cars, and several companies have demoed prototypes. The two main problems are that the machines needed to do this change are very expensive and tricky to maintain compared to a simple gas pump, and more importantly, unless you can get all car manufacturers to agree to a universal standard for batteries and battery access you're going to need a half dozen different machines and batteries at each gas station, driving up the costs even further.

aquadrop2• 9 years ago

I think it was too complex for a demand it has (most people can just charge car at home every night). They will probably revisit it when more electric cars are around (especially later with self-driving fleets, it's a no-brainer).

ThomPete• 9 years ago

Better place did that but it's actually far worse idea than it sounds. People have electricity in their homes and it's much easier to establish a grid of super chargers than building for changing batteries.

It might happen over time when infrastructure is better established.

stephengillie• 9 years ago

The size of battery needed to propel a full-size car makes swapping mechanically prohibitive. It would be like swapping a 4U rackmount server loaded with HDDs.

IndrekR6• 9 years ago

Why can't your (or shared) car go and charge itself while you are not using it?

mamon• 9 years ago

You are confusing electric vehicles with self-driving ones.

toAnswerIt• 9 years ago

in Norway they have free charging in the street for electric cars. https://youtu.be/zSjYra7cYqY?t=4m8s

dagw4• 9 years ago

Only in a tiny handful of places. But it at least shows that it can be done.

mikepavone3• 9 years ago

This gets mentioned a lot, but I think the point is really over stated. First, there's a huge amount of room for growth in electric vehicle adoption even if we assume that EVs are a non-starter for people who park on the street at night. The problem is worth solving, but we're no where near the point in which it's the main obstacle to further adoption.

Second, cars that are being used will generally spend a fair bit of time parked places other than home. For some subset of street parkers, enough of that parking time will be spent at facilities with public chargers to meet their weekly charging needs. This subset will grow as electric charging infrastructure expands to more places.

My wife and I actually own a Chevy Bolt as our only car and park on the street. We don't drive especially far in a typical week (I take mass transit to work and she works from home), but we generally are able to get all our charging in from our parking when we're out and about. And that's just using Level 2 AC chargers. If we drove further each week (or parked in places with chargers less often) we could easily get enough charging in by shifting some of our grocery shopping to Whole Foods so we can use the DC fast charger there while shopping.

Now this is in a city with pretty decent public charging infrastructure (Berkeley, CA) and obviously even within my city this approach won't work well for everyone. Still, I think it shows a possible way forward that could potentially work for a lot of people without necessarily having to have chargers at every street parking space.

paol3• 9 years ago

we're no where near the point in which it's the main obstacle to further adoption

Sure. I'm talking about universal adoption because the article is ("take over the world")

We don't drive especially far in a typical week

This is a good point, EV range is already long enough that many urban drivers will not need to charge every day.

For some subset of street parkers, enough of that parking time will be spent at facilities with public chargers to meet their weekly charging needs. This subset will grow as electric charging infrastructure expands to more places.

My point exactly: to reach close to 100% EV market penetration, so will the infrastructure need to grow to 100%. Tricks like going to that one Whole Foods store that has the fast chargers won't work when a significant % of cars are EVs, there simply will need to be a lot more public chargers (or, charging time will need to decrease).

Shinchy• 9 years ago

Let me put it this way, I looked at buying an Electric Car but I live in a house with no driveway so there is no way I can ever own one. I would never risk the idea of driving to a supermarket hoping there is a free charging port for my car, just in case there isn't any free - it's not like I can just queue up the car. It's a huge fundamental hurdle and one that until solved will stop me from ever buying an Electric Vehicle.

aquadrop2• 9 years ago

I think that will happen if it will be needed. But there's plenty of people who can just charge car at home every night, that's a big market for adoption

ZeroGravitas6• 9 years ago

Note that as battery prices drop, just having a larger battery that only needs charged once a week becomes more and more possible. People in suburbs need to drive further for a daily commute, but have easier overnight charging. People in urban centers have more trouble charging but need to drive less distance (and often in the kind of start-stop traffic that EVs work so well for, which changes their range in comparison with an ICE car).

Cthulhu_16• 9 years ago

Larger batteries are prohibitively heavy though; electric cars are already pushing the weight up, compensating it with being more powerful, but at the same time they cost more energy to get in motion, which lowers battery life.

Lighter and higher capacity batteries would be ideal, but I'm not sure how feasible that is with current battery tech. I gathered one manufacturer was working on solid state batteries for use in cars, which should give more capacity at the same weight? not sure.

lazyjones5• 9 years ago

As an electric car owner, I can assure you, that that isn't an issue. You don't need to charge every time you park. A trip to a fast charging station once a week is enough for the average driver (perhaps these will be installed at shopping malls, supermarket parking lots eventually).

People who drive a lot will typically visit fast charging stations when they cover longer distances anyway and also usually own a garage.

So, this is a non-issue. Enough peak (fast) charging capacity (when millions of Germans drive to their holidays in Italy e.g.) is a real problem.

tomohawk3• 9 years ago

Half the range is really a non-starter. And is that range a "best case" range with ideal weather and new batteries and all down hill, or is that a worst case when its 20 below and the batteries are 5 years old? What's the minimum guaranteed range?

Having to have the car tied up to a charging station for long periods of time just to do normal kinds of around-the-town kinds of trips - also a non-starter.

Can you imagine a hurricane evac with primarily electric cars? Well, kids, we only made it 50 miles because daddy didn't have hours to charge the car after he got back from work...

Currently gas powered cars have a common fuel and storage that does not "wear out" or become obsolete (a tank). Battery powered cars are not quite that way. Kind of in the same way that battery powered tools all have different, incompatible batteries. Those battery powered tools become obsolete all the time when you can no longer find the batteries, or if you can, its cheaper to buy a new tool. So, until they get interchangeable batteries with compatible interfaces, there's significant risk of premature obsolescence, which could significantly inflate the cost. What are you going to do with a 5 year old car in this situation? That same situation is highly unlikely with gas powered cars.

lostlogin• 9 years ago

I’ve seen work electric vehicles advertised that let you plug your electric tools in. No battery powered tools required and no generator. However not all tools are better when attached by a cord - my lithium ion drill is incredible.

kuro68k3• 9 years ago

I am on my second Nissan Leaf and can tell you that your concerns are largely unfounded. Most charging is opportunistic, and when you do need to do a big evacuation a Tesla sized battery can last longer than you can safely drive. In fact in the EU legal limits on commercial drivers are already exceeded by battery tech.

As for wearing out, taxi companies with leafs have over 200k on the packs and they are still good. Teslas have hit 500k miles and are still find. All that "new battery every five years" stuff turned out to be nonsense.

Shivetya• 9 years ago

worse, the range issue is exaggerated in winter. all these range numbers are for mild and warm weather. people need to understand how much range you lose in winter which only gets worse the more internal heat you use.

range > charge times > cost. of the first two I am not sure which is easier. besides the cost difference of the power trains there is a serious weight difference as well that was no addressed

flexie3• 9 years ago

First world city streets already have electricity supply (for the street light and for the buildings). Setting up charging ports is already rather cheap and once cities realize that they can

- drastically reduce air pollution

- make more money selling electricity than just charging for parking

they will quickly start installing plugs everywhere.

Battery range is already at around 500 km for Tesla model S and X and the long range version of model 3, and close to 1,000 km for the new roadster. With the current incremental improvements, in 4-5 years battery range for ordinary medium priced EVs will go beyond 7-800 km on a single charge, super chargers and other chargers will be abundant, and charging will become a non-issue. Within 8-10 years, even the lowest priced EVs will have a range beyond that of combustion engine cars (6-800 km), unless innovation mysteriously were to end.

walshemj5• 9 years ago

Id speak to an electrical engineer before you make such wild assertions - upgrading supplies like this will be massively expensive.

Also battery tech doesn't follow mores law so we aint going to get an order of magnitude change in battery tech ever

qaq2• 9 years ago

"First world city streets already have electricity supply" powering a light bulb in 100 street lights and having enough capacity to charge 100 electric cars are 2 totally different animals and will require significant infra. upgrades.

_up• 9 years ago

Are you needing parking spaces at all. I think the big benefit is that you wouldn't need parking spaces in cities at all. "Uber" cars could instead drive to the next passenger. You also could avoid driving around over a ton of batteries. Instead you could use self driving battery packs that are laid out on the side of the road and can follow you and dock on to your car if you need an extension.

unabst• 9 years ago

You're still talking today. By the time electric takes over, there is a good chance self driving will be here also.

That's when this becomes possible: Your car will drop you off, go get charged, and come back if you want it to, or just park off-site and pick you up in the morning.

But now think about zip cars and Uber/Lyft. The price of point to point transit will fall from human wage level to robot wage level.

Imagine those services at a fraction of the cost. And more rides would be available also without the need for paid drivers. They'd also deliver mail and food.

Of course... all this was also omitted by the article. But this does appear to be the consensus regarding where this is all headed.

rohit2412• 9 years ago

By the time electric takes over, there is a good chance self driving will be here also.

Either you are very unoptimistic about electric cars, or have an unrealistic view of what self driving is going to mean.

Electric cars are gaining traction, and by all accounts will be 10-20% of new cars by say 2023-2025. A completely driverless self driving car on the other hand is still a fantasy, despite Elon musk's constant claims.

Retr0spectrum• 9 years ago

In the slightly more distant future, when we have perfected autonomous driving, it could be feasible for a car to drive itself to a large parking facility on the outskirts of a city, for example.

Assuming people still want to own their own cars by then.

Cthulhu_16• 9 years ago

The low-tech version of that already exists - a lot of big cities offer P+R, that is, you park your car outside of the city and get cheap public transit the rest of the way.

Still only feasible if you're okay spending an extra half an hour traveling and your destination is hard to reach / expensive park at though. If that's automated it'd be neat. I mean it already sorta is if you have a good bus network, but those generally aren't door-to-door. There's also taxis, that is, if you're rich enough you can afford to take a taxi to work every day. Might even be the gig economy / uber becomes cheap enough to make it compete with public transit.

audunw4• 9 years ago

These are misconceptions, that stems from applying your expectations from how ICE is used, to BEV.

You don't need to get the time down to the same as it would take to refuel a conventional car, because unlike filling an ICE with gasoline, you can walk away from a charging BEV.

As BEV become popular, you won't see gas stations that offer fast charging. You'll see supermarkets, shopping malls, stores etc. Places that want to attract customers that have 10-30 minutes to kill. You already see this at places where the infrastructure is ahead, like here in Norway.

For most drivers, this is a win. Although charging takes longer, you're usually wasting less time.

Street parking is not much more of a challenge than any other infrastructure improvement. Does your street have light poles? Adding a charging pole isn't that much more difficult. The two can even be combined. Again, you can look to Oslo, Norway. There are street-side charging poles all over the place.

I get that the US is a bit more challenged when it comes to infrastructure. The governments isn't very effective these days it seems. But it's not impossible.

With all that said. The first people who adopt BEVs, will be people with a garage. Of course the people who have the easiest time adopting a new tech, will be the first to adopt it. But once the BEV+PHEV market hits a critical threshold, you'll see the infrastructure bloom.

It's a pretty simple business model: there will be companies that offer to install chargers for free, on the street side, in shared garages, at shopping locations, etc. In return they'll charge a small fee on top of the electricity. Who wouldn't want a free improvements for their citizens, shoppers, apartment tenants, etc?

Once investors realize that these companies will essentially grab most of the revenue of gas stations in a relatively short span of time, getting investments for this business model will not be an issue.

LeifCarrotson• 9 years ago

No, street parking is unique enough and inconvenient enough already that electric cars can take over for everyone else and force those who rely on street parking to adapt. Looking for some sources on the population distribution of street parking, I found this [1] (admittedly from 1999, but still pretty informative even if the numbers have changed by more than I'd expect):

PARKING: Slightly more than nine in ten American households (91 percent) have at least one car, van, or light truck at home for personal use.
Because 71 percent of homeowners and 35 percent of renters have more than one vehicle, parking space can be a real concern. Garages or carports are common for households living in single-detached units–just over three in four of these homes (76 percent) have a covered shelter for vehicles. Townhouses or row houses, on the other hand, include a garage or carport less than half the time (46 percent). In both mobile homes and units in multi-unit buildings, the proportion is 26 percent.
At homes without a garage or carport available, vehicles may be left either on the street or in a driveway, parking lot, or other off-street space. For homes without a garage or carport, some kind of off-street space is available at 87 percent of the detached units, at about 75 percent of both the single attached units and units in multi-unit structures, and at 90 percent of the mobile homes.
All this leaves about 7.8 million households who must rely on street parking. Of course, not all of those households have vehicles. Four in ten households who report no offstreet or garage parking also have no vehicles.

That suggests there are roughly 4.7 million of 100 million households that park on the street. That's small enough that electric vehicles could 'take over' even if those people were holdouts.

[1] https://www.census.gov/prod/99pubs/ahb-9901.pdf

thinkcontext• 9 years ago

London is installing electric car charging stations inside lamp posts for street charging

https://electrek.co/2017/11/14/london-electric-car-charging-...

kuceram• 9 years ago

I think that the market will decide. It will be a balance between few major things like: price, range, efficiency, safety and fancyness (cars are more emotional than rational :-).

The same happened in the beggining of car industry. https://auto.howstuffworks.com/fuel-efficiency/hybrid-techno...

jackaroe78• 9 years ago

Shhhhh!

Cthulhu_16• 9 years ago

cars are more emotional than rational :-)

Depends; in my country there were / are significant cost / tax benefits for getting hybrid and fully electric cars (for lease cars, and there's quite a lot of those here). If driving an electric car is cheaper then people will go for that too. Does Tesla still do free usage of the supercharger network for the Model S? That's another incentive, given the cost of electricity over time.

fergie2• 9 years ago

"But the automakers’ existing expertise — building internal combustion engines — will no longer give them a competitive edge."

Interesting- this would mean that the real innovation in cars comes _after_ electric drivetrains have become the standard, when any moderately capitalised company without substantial experience of internal-combustion motors can create their own take on a car with any kind of new features they see fit.

unwind• 9 years ago

Call me naive, but I'd hope that at least some of the competitive edge with existing auto manufacturers comes from experience in designing workable cars, that also are successful at the various collision tests that are required.

Safety is not easy.

greedo3• 9 years ago

Thinking that the ICE is a competitive advantage/disadvantage is what has led to Tesla struggling with building the Model 3. The competitive advantage held by the existing automakers is based around building cars cheaply; in quantity; and in quality. They also have established brands that inspire tremendous loyalty, and they have dealerships that offload a lot of the support issues.

When electric drivetrains become the standard, nothing will be different. These automakers will still have these advantages over upstarts.

ecpottinger6• 9 years ago

Right, by that logic Tesla should not have any sales.

jokoon• 9 years ago

Once global warming becomes a real problem and the politics are driving laws to be enacted towards using electric vehicles, the situation will change pretty quickly.

I'm sure governments could sink a lot of money into battery research if the situation would make it so.

Although I've read in several places that once global warming is engaged, you cannot reverse it because of stuff like melting methane ice spots in the tundra.

Cthulhu_16• 9 years ago

Although I've read in several places that once global warming is engaged, you cannot reverse it because of stuff like melting methane ice spots in the tundra.

I'm fairly confident that point of no return has already been passed. Permafrost has stared to melt a while ago, causing bacteria to take hold of things they couldn't for x amount of years, catching up on releasing co2 and such that would otherwise have been in the atmosphere a long time ago already.

okreallywtf2• 9 years ago

Note: this doesn't mean despair and do nothing. I'm not saying this is what you mean't, just feel like we need to point that out because despair is very counterproductive. Also, this doesn't mean that climate mitigation is the only choice either, it is still cheaper to "diet" than it is to "exercise" to use a weight loss analogy. Lowering CO2 emissions is still going to slow climate change and hopefully give us time to come up with other mitigation strategies.

f_allwein• 9 years ago

How about: We need to shift from individual car ownership to more public transport? Sure it will be great if cars turn electric, but that does not solve issues like crowded streets etc. This would be partly addressed if cars were self driving and shared, i.e. would spend less time standing around unused. Nevertheless, I assume (=don't have data) that public transport would be much more efficient than electric cars in terms of energy/ resource/ space usage.

Maybe in the future, the line between private and public transport will be more blurry, i.e. you take a shared, self driving car to the railway station etc.

peterwwillis4• 9 years ago

It's clear that buses are vastly more efficient in terms of moving large numbers of people around, and so ride sharing alone (even automated) will just continue to tie up traffic. At a point, uber and lyft will have to introduce buses in order to keep their single-use services attractive. But, as long as there is private ownership, we won't have wide adoption of public transportation.

Everywhere in the world I have traveled, I have noticed that usually 1) public transportation is limited only to a town/city, and 2) private buses to move between cities/provinces are limited by market forces, and thus put a penalty on people living farther from economic drivers. Which forces people in remote areas, who on average make less money, to own cars to get to jobs [which robs them of time and money they could be investing in their future etc].

The only way to change the inequality of people getting to jobs/goods/services is to remove private car ownership and institute nation-wide public transportation, and subsidize the more expensive parts of the network. Not only would this be cheaper overall and more efficient overall, it would raise the GDP, reduce pollution, reduce debt, reduce traffic fatalities, and increase upward mobility.

People think cars give them freedom, but they never think about the societal cost.

lazyjones5• 9 years ago

People think cars give them freedom,

They don't just think so, they know it

but they never think about the societal cost.

There is a "societal cost" attached to everything. Housing, Eating, going to the restroom. Society should evolve to make known improvements to people's lives available to more people and not devolve to a point where most modern amenities are considered too expensive for most people.

That said, pretty much everybody hates public transport everywhere in the world. It's better than nothing of course and in some densely-populated areas it's actually an improvement and faster than using a car (the subway). But given a reasonable choice, people prefer having their own cars, just like they prefer to have their own homes instead of sharing one with dozens of other people. Whatever the "societal cost" may be (what's the cost of individual housing?).

def_true_false• 9 years ago

and institute nation-wide public transportation, and subsidize the more expensive parts of the network.

Isn't this how e.g. state owned rail companies work already?

drcross• 9 years ago

If cars moved to mobility as a service model instead of car ownership people wouldnt care about getting into a small two seater car instead of owning a four seater for the times they do need it. You could probably fit six autonomous smartcars into the road space where one F150 is manually driven so we have lots of space to increase road density.

Cthulhu_16• 9 years ago

A few problems with more public transit. First, public transport is not door-to-door; for my commute atm, public transit would take 2 hours (for a 60 km distance), more if there's a hitch on the way. It'll pretty much always take longer because you're stuck on one or multiple schedules.

The other problem in my country is that the public transit networks are already at maximum capacity - train network in particular is struggling. There's pushes to spread people out more, away from rush hour, but employers and the people themselves have to be okay with that too. But yeah, public transit has a maximum capacity, just like roads do.

And of course in the US, the public transit network is substandard, and getting it up to par will take a huge investment - cities will need to be uplifted, etc. But in the US the problem is more political - there's no business that wants to invest billions in a public transit network. And if a government sets it up people will complain that their tax dollars (all three of them) go to things they don't make use of. It's a cultural issue there. The US - and SF in particular - could be in the forefront of public transit for everyone, but nope, muh government.

Full rant mode engaged: The US is the richest country in the world with some of the richest people in the world, but it's not being invested in basics like access to transportation, health care and education to make quality of life for its inhabitants better.

that escalated, sorry.

visarga2• 9 years ago

I approve of your rant :)

audunw4• 9 years ago

In Norway we have a common expression: "Ja takk, begge deler". When given a choice between two things that are implied mutually exclusive, it means "Yes, I'll take both please".

Maybe that's why we have more EVs per capita than anywhere else, and are still investing heavily in improving public transportation. You can do both.

You can even do electric buses. Oslo just got deliveries of its first ones.

I think we'll start to see many smaller self-driving buses, and that more people will prefer these over driving. I know I would. The only reason I prefer driving to work right now is that I have to switch from bus to train when doing public transportation. I don't get enough time in one vehicle to calm down and read something. If it was more or less direct, I'd prefer it, even if I had to walk a bit longer (I consider that a benefit actually). Buses have dedicated lanes here, so it shouldn't take much more time even with a couple of stops along the way.

But that's the future. There are still millions of personal cars sold, and will be for a long time forward. These needs to be EV. Besides, EVs technology will facilitate the development of these self-driving buses. It's easier and safer for a bus to charge itself, than to fuel itself. It's also easier to test self-driving tech in a large fleet of smaller cars.

1_2__4• 9 years ago

Whenever I run into an argument for something society-wide like this I do a little though experiment: Imagine the world as the argument suggests - in this case that public transportation is the norm. Now imagine I came to you and said, hey, what would you say to a personal conveyance device? Small and cheap enough to park at your residence, can carry you and all your friends/family/churchmembers/whatever as well as their cargo, and there's an existing, nationwide system (highways) they can use to literally get anywhere in the entire continental US, door-to-door, with the only requirement that you pay a little more.

Virtually everyone would dash off their shitty trains and busses in a moment and hop into cars. Even if you told them it would lead to mass congestion they'd point to people whose job it is to stuff people onto trains when they get too full. If you told them it would lead to pollution they might be swayed, but then if you told them electric cars were basically right on the horizon that would seem like an acceptable trade off.

You are arguing for a world that for most of the US would be considered objectively, demonstrably worse than the status quo. Just because you and your personal social circle lives in urban areas and doesn't need or want cars is virtually irrelevant to the national conversation because you are a tiny fraction of a minority that is not going to get any traction as self-driving and electric vehicles become the norm.

Public transportation in the US has already hit its apogee. Nobody wants it outside of dense urban cores, and the nation is largely not urban cores, nor will it be just because you wish it was.

Decade3• 9 years ago

I am not concerned with wishes, as much as inevitabilities.

Getting a car seems attractive because it gives you control over your movements. But with enough congestion, it becomes unattractive, because now your movements are constricted by the movements of other people on the same highway. Suddenly, taking a train becomes more attractive.

Or spread out, live and work in suburbs. Then you run into the Suburban Ponzi Scheme. The suburbs are becoming less safe, and physically declining, as the bills come due. http://www.businessinsider.com/strong-towns-growth-ponzi-sch...

francisofascii• 9 years ago

But there is a middle ground solution between large buses and trains and single occupant vehicles. Here is another thought experiment, stand by a busy road or highway for a few minutes. Notice all the single occupant vehicles and how they are all traveling in the same direction. Now picture if some of those occupants were grouped together in the same vehicle and how much more efficient that would be. Lyft line, for example, works pretty well. Wider adoption would make it work better. It should be noted that the U.S., according to recent census data, is "gradually" shifting back to urban core living.

tyu100• 9 years ago

Rare metal shortages are self-solving. There's already dozens of mining juniors prospecting in western countries and China has near-limitless resources. Additionally, graphite, lithium and cobalt are substitutable to some degree.

Anecdotally, the resource exploration stock message board forum I follow has almost given up on oil and gas companies and has moved to cleantech (or marijuania). Sign of the fast-arriving future.

3chelon3• 9 years ago

I'm totally in favour of electric cars, but I'm surprised the article never mentioned the problem of sourcing all the power.

There have been a lot of contradictory claims over how many more power stations would be needed for a fully-electric future, with some sources claiming the UK alone would need an extra ten nuclear power plants, and other sources massively downplaying that, but clearly if everyone was driving an EV by, say, 2040, then that only gives us 20 years to work out and deliver the answer.

NIMBYism and hyper-inflated public infrastructure costs mean this could be a significant problem, both in terms of cost and feasibility.

alex_duf2• 9 years ago

I hope that we never reach the point where everyone buys an electric car. By then most big cities will heavily rely on a fleet of car pool, potentially self driving.

That decreases the number of needed cars by an order of magnitude.

dagw4• 9 years ago

The number of cars is irrelevant when talking energy needs, only distance traveled matters. And I can definitely see how easily available self driving pool cars will increase rather than decrease the total distance driven, and thus increasing the total need for electricity.

3chelon3• 9 years ago

Yes, I think autonomous/shared vehicles could be a massive factor in reducing the number of vehicles, but it wouldn't reduce the power consumption unless the number of actual journeys was reduced. A shared EV running 24/7 would use a huge amount of power.

And that's assuming we could get people to share. Cars seem to be unique in bringing out the very worst in humanity. Jeremy Clarkson, for example.

cesarb• 9 years ago

Most electric cars will charge at night, which is when power consumption is currently at its lowest. Power stations (and other parts of the power infrastructure) have to be sized to the daytime peak, plus a safety margin to cope with at least the loss of any single element. So until the extra consumption from cars charging overnight grows above the difference between the nighttime low and the daytime peak, not much extra infrastructure is needed.

On the other hand, there will be cars charging at daytime (either at fast chargers, or while the owner is at work); and there are some power stations that can only work during the day. I don't know which of these two factors is bigger.

Cthulhu_16• 9 years ago

On the other side of the spectrum, there's been reports of some countries having a negative energy price at some points, thanks to all the windmills and such generating so much energy there's a surplus. Pump those into charging cars (during the day or night), and they can also act as components in the smart grid, switching charge on and off depending on peaks in the power grid / power generation.

I wonder if fusion power will become viable within the next 50 years, and whether it gives us fuck-you amounts of power at low cost. Probably not, nuclear power is far from free too.

3chelon3• 9 years ago

Well this brings up another related but often unmentioned aspect to the debate. Governments get heaps of revenue from taxing fossil fuels. If people managed to sidestep that by using renewable (yeah, or fusion!) power, what will governments do? I'm about 100% certain that in the UK they will slap a massive tax on all electricity used to charge EVs. TANSTAAFL, as Robert Heinlein said.

tomxor6• 9 years ago

Price? (for normal people)

Yes there are EVs cheaper than teslas at a comparable price to ICE cars, but they don't seem to have comparable performance and utility. I can't make an economically minded decision to buy an EV today unless i'm an EV enthusiast or I have lots of money to spend on luxury. (That was Elon Musks whole point of Tesla in the first place, but the market doesn't seem to have substantially shifted since)

Also for second hand cars, maybe it's different in the US, but in the UK the vast majority of people buy used cars at prices well below the "new price". It's going to take quite a while for EVs to trickle down to that price range for it to be economical for 90% of people to bother considering it.

sandworm1015• 9 years ago

Every EV owner in my area seems to also own a gas car too. My landlord commutes in an EV but his wife has a normal suv for all the kid stuff. (Im in BC where long higheay trips are very much the norm.) EVs are fine if you can afford to keep a second vehicle to cover all the things they cannot do.

jbob20002• 9 years ago

BC is a bit of an exception because of the low density. In a higher density area, you can count on public transit to take you long distances and use the electric car to make up the difference.

One of the benefits of going full electric would be smog reduction. Again, BC doesn't really have a smog problem because of low density, but somewhere like Toronto or LA would benefit hugely from not having gas and diesel vehicles clogging up the streets (and air).

smudgymcscmudge• 9 years ago

I know two couples who have replaced one of their ICEs with Nissan Leafs. Now one of them is economically commuting in an EV daily and they retain the ability to take road trips in their partner’s car.

But I don’t see a reasonable way for a single person to have only an EV in my area either. There’s just too much >50 miles away.

Retric9• 9 years ago

Over the last 20 years a 250+ mile range electric would have worked fine for every trip I have actually taken. (Assuming the current charging infrastructure.) Now, with slightly different habits renting an SUV 0-4 times a year is minimal effort and cost.

So, yea if you do 1000+ mile trips monthly without flying then electric is not going to work, but that's unusual.

opportune2• 9 years ago

This is probably a reflection more of the demographic that can own EV's: wealthy people, likely older with children. Personally if there were a good EV in my price range (perhaps the model 3) I would have no need for a gas-powered car. I don't regularly need a large range and on the once-very-few-months occasion where I do need more range, I can just rent a car

dalbasal• 9 years ago

I agreed. It's about prices

Musk realized the economics and decided (best underpants plan ever) to start at the enthusiast-luxury end with the sports car.

But, his crucial point was that for people already in the luxury market, he'd be able to quickly drop the enthusiast requirement. The cost of batteries that compete with a fuel tank on range does not scale with the rest of the car. Tesla now competes on a side-by-side basis, price considered. They are only in the higher price segments still, but have definitely reached the tall part of the curve with the 3s. He also predicted that the luxury threshold^ above which an EV competitive, would gradually fall.

So, so far he's been right (tsla as an investment... separate discussion. The other stuff ...charging stations, used car markets, etc.. those are are effects, not causes.

I do think the last leg of the price game will be tricky though. Subsidies don't make sense anymore. The innovation has been stimulated already. The volume is going up and keeping up subsidies will be expensive. People will also eventually kick up a fuss about subsidizing some yuppie lawyers nice new car. Cleaning these up is a process because they're a mess. Manufacturer subsidies, buyer subsidies. Lower car tax, which is now a carbon tax.

The biggest subsidy is probably fuel. 40l of petrol (about 500km) costs €50-€55. Half of that is tax. VAT & excise. EVs are exempt by default. These are serious, budget busting taxes. My guess is that EVs will eventually need to pay these, one way or another. They still need roads and such.

Long road until you can pick up a 7 years old Tesla for €5k, but we seem to be on it. The destination will be inevitable long before we reach it.

^The price category.

dragonwriter• 9 years ago

Subsidies don't make sense anymore. The innovation has been stimulated already.

Debatable; subsidies can make sense for other reasons (internalizing externalities unrelated to innovation) than stimulating innovation.

ctdonath2• 9 years ago

Georgia (USA) had a very lucrative EV tax incentive: US$5000 on a purchase or lease. The city of Atlanta is perfect for such vehicles: commute under 50 miles, desire to mitigate smog, temperature conducive to good battery performance. Result was a lot of people (myself included) leased a Nissan Leaf for 2 years at practically no cost[1]. This jumpstarted the EV market, persuaded installation of a LOT of chargers, and persuaded many people that EVs are a desirable option (if a bit more expensive up-front).

Eventually demand for the tax credit got so high, and revenue from gasoline taxes dropped enough, that the state dropped the incentive - going the other way even, charging a straight-up $200 annual tax on EVs for road use. The market for EVs evaporated (understandable, because no more free-for-2-years cars). The ripple effects from the artificial demand being abruptly cut off will affect the EV industry for long: people found them desirable, but expect them cheap.

I expect the EV market will eventually happen. They're very nice cars, and starting every day "topped off" is very convenient. Battery technology has progressed well, with enough money & interest to see it thru to seriously competing with petrol.

[1] - The net cost was $zero + upgrades, but it did require considerable cash flow to pull off: you had to lease a $36,000 car and get your credits at tax time - possibly years later. Atlanta has a good confluence of incomes, high-tech interests, and weather facilitating this.

fjsolwmv9• 9 years ago

The USA massively subsidizes gasoline spending. First of all you have externalities of pollution, and the health related expense for that. Next you have a $trillion/yr in military spending dedicated to providing a secure oil supply.

Zigurd• 9 years ago

Subsidies are justifiable as long as there is a need to counter-balance existing subsidization of the gasoline car ecosystem. In other words, a subsidy that one should be able to do without in a vacuum is still needed in an environment where extraction, transport, refining, etc. of fossil fuel is all more or less subsidized.

ZeroGravitas6• 9 years ago

The general prediction is for the total-cost-of-ownership to be lower in the next few years, and for the upfront price to be lower a few years after that.

Governments and corporations are making plans based on those assumptions. I've not heard anyone credibly argue against it, though there may be quibbles about the exact timing. (And of course, there's geographical variation based on gas prices, government policy, average driving distance etc. so some areas will get there first).

Price deflation of new cars should force the prices on second hard cars down too.

So any argument about EVs being expensive or elitist or whatever is wrong in the medium term.

tomxor6• 9 years ago

Yes i agree, it's all timing. My comment is in response to the current state of the EV market.

The general prediction is for the total-cost-of-ownership to be lower in the next few years, and for the upfront price to be lower a few years after that.

I think upfront price is more important than most people think. The problem with the "total cost of ownership" argument is it ignores the fact that money now is worth far more than money later, effectively increasing total cost of ownership.

For a concrete worst case example consider the difference in upfront cost between ICE and EV, make it into a loan, add interest and _then_ compare it.

Personally i'm totally up for all the benefits of low maintenance though and would happily trade in an equivalent price up front. I hate the complexity and unreliability of ICE, although the excessively integrated computer systems in EVs sound like another mess to look forward to.

coredog64• 9 years ago

I've been watching the used Tesla market, and it would appear that the reduced TCO is already priced into cars in that market. They're very close to the new car price.

ghaff8• 9 years ago

Product life and price for batteries will be a big consideration. A lot of young and poorer people buy pretty cheap "beater" cars that they keep running as best they can.

kriro• 9 years ago

I feel like the answer is "let some time pass". I think the majority of electric cars will eventually come form China. They are serious about the banning of non-electric cars and will be set up to deal with it once that happens. The pricepoint/quality will be attractive enough for non-Chinese markets and that'll be that.

ransom1538• 9 years ago

"About 65% of this electricity generation was from fossil fuels"

These EV cars should be renamed "Coal Cars" so people understand the true harsh carbon footprint. Because you plug the car into a wall doesn't mean the energy is clean.

https://www.eia.gov/tools/faqs/faq.php?id=427&t=3

jbob20002• 9 years ago

Maybe in certain parts of the world, where they're still stuck in the industrial era.

Ontario's power generation is primarily nuclear, then hydro, then wind, with a small percentage being gas turbines. https://cns-snc.ca/media/ontarioelectricity/ontarioelectrici...

I can charge my electric car here and comfortably assume that it is clean energy.

Cthulhu_16• 9 years ago

How does the emissions of a coal plant (plus the loss from transfering over the power line, battery, into motors) compare to the emissions of a regular petrol or diesel car?

ecpottinger6• 9 years ago

Don't forget to carbon footprint needed to process/make that petrol/diesel .. that oil from the ground needs to be processed and transported too.

Zarel• 9 years ago

As I understand it, even electricity generated from coal is significantly cleaner than the equivalent in gasoline.

Spooky232• 9 years ago

Depends on where you live. Not all states are coal states.

Where I live (NY), coal is either gone or on the way out. Electricity comes from hydro, gas and nuclear. Coal is getting killed by natural gas.

sideshowb• 9 years ago

Even with unsustainable generation the carbon footprint of one big generator is less than the footprint of lots of tiny ICEs. https://www.withouthotair.com/c20/page_131.shtml

embro• 9 years ago

This has been proven false back in like 2008. Even if electric cars were to run off coal plants, they would still be more efficient because the plants can capture and reuse heat with boilers.

That being said, coal has to go anyway. I run my electric car from 98% hydro power and 2% wind power and I pay 6,9 cents per kWh, and that's Canadian money, pretty cheap.

cowmix• 9 years ago

The amount of energy it takes to refine one gal of gas my EV drives about 27 miles. ICE cars double dip:

https://greentransportation.info/energy-transportation/gasol...

audunw4• 9 years ago

These EV cars should be renamed "Coal Cars" so people understand the true harsh carbon footprint.

That's just incredibly dumb. If you do this, you have misunderstood the entire point of EVs.

An EV could be fuelled by coal today, and wind/solar tomorrow. They are extremely flexible and becomes greener as the grid does.

If you're concerned about the environment and green technology, you're obviously going to fight for both EVs and a cleaner grid. Both those solutions are absolutely necessary to solve the problems.

Meanwhile, an ICE is just not part of any viable solution at all.

The only time perspective that matters for the environment, is the long term. It doesn't matter what 100'000 EVs emit today. What matters is where we are in 20 years: hopefully with 100s of millions of EVs charged by a mostly clean grid.

This "EV fuelled by coal" talking point is primarily pushed by the fossil fuel industry btw. They are not concerned about the environment. They're just interested in protecting their industry. I haven't heard anyone who actually cares about the environment focus on this, because if you do care, you know better.

yardie• 9 years ago

From my view I have 2 nuclear power plants, a couple of natural gas/oil generators, a bunch of small solar plants, and a single coal fired plant in the state for our grid. No one from this part of the state is getting their power from coal in any appreciable quantity. So no, coal cars is not an apt name since not everyone is getting power from coal.

Dowwie• 9 years ago

Are electric buses even necessary when electric autonomous sedans are available?

Cthulhu_16• 9 years ago

Depends on how big and busy your roads are. Gridlock might be alleviated a bit due to autonomous driving and planning, but by the time that rolls around the world's population will probably have gone up by a couple billion again (wikipedia says it's projected to be 10 billion by 2050) so there'd be more cars on the road.

There'd be less gridlock if people did more carpooling, buses, or drove more on motorcycles.

cmrdporcupine5• 9 years ago

Honestly, manufacturer supply is the limitation at this point. At least around here I can't think of a single EV that sits on lots and accumulates inventory. The manufacturers are making 30,000 or so vehicles a year of their product and consumers are buying all of them.

And this is almost certainly related to battery supply constraints.

brownbat• 9 years ago

car companies will have to radically streamline their dealership networks

Electrification won't kill inefficient dealerships. They're too entrenched in politics.

https://www.inc.com/magazine/201411/paul-keegan/collision-co...

UMadBreaux• 9 years ago

I find Japan's car buying culture very interesting. Dealership services in Japan are much more of a concierge service, where the dealer brings the car you are interested in right to your house, and buyers generally have an ongoing relationship with the sales staff and others at the dealership.

mschuster919• 9 years ago

Biggest problem I guess will be expanding the charger network, simply due to physics.

On the country side, laying cables for 1MW peak load (4 superchargers @ 250 kW) will be expensive - the grid in rural areas is enough for some farms and small villages, that's it.

In cities, electric-car chargers will have to deal with political obstacles (no one wants to sacrifice free-for-all parking spots!), in addition to the electricity problem - while in a city there might be more available 10+ kV lines (you don't want to do 250 kW over 230V AC, it's over 1k A current!), sidewalks are often enough very slim as it is and it will be difficult to get a charging station installed there, and digging in earth filled with cables is not exactly fun either (been there, done that, it's manual work of the worst kind as you can't even use a proper showel...). Getting chargers in garages will face obstacles of the HOAs, plus the house uplinks usually are without much reserves - my 12-apartment house, for example, is linked to the grid on 3x63A with each apartment (~60 m2) being fed by a single 40A phase. Not much, certainly not enough to feed even two electric cars in the backyard.

Either way you'l have to rebuild the entire grid more sooner than later if electric cars should have a future... there's not enough money to rebuild Detroit's water, where should the money for a full scale grid rebuild come from? It's all decades old infrastructure, no matter if in the US or Germany. Replacing or significantly upgrading it means billions to trillions of dollars.

fjsolwmv9• 9 years ago

The USA installed Cable TV, why would charging cables be harder?

The USA spends $500Billion on cars and $400 Billion on gasoline every year. A onetime $trillon upgrade isn't an outsize amount.

mschuster919• 9 years ago

The USA installed Cable TV, why would charging cables be harder?

Because a TV coax cable is 1cm slim and can be installed very easily. Run it over the air on poles, dig it into a small trench, run it via the sewers. Whatever fits best.

A 10 kV or, worse, a 1 kA-capable 3x230V line, not so much. The 10kV (or more) line has special requirements in terms of distance to other cables, a 3x230V line at that capability is pure hell due to its sheer thickness and mass.

Also the charger station will require a transformer... which aren't tiny, and transforming 250kW produces significant heat loss. So either find some free place in earth where you can bury it, or deal with adjacent house owners to install the transformer in their basement.

The USA spends $500Billion on cars and $400 Billion on gasoline every year. A onetime $trillon upgrade isn't an outsize amount.

Problem is, the car/gasoline spend is done by individuals on small-ish scales. A multi-trillion investment must be fronted by the state - the utility companies don't have nearly enough cash to finance this. But, as noted, the US can't get enough funds to replace Flint's potable water infrastructure or Puerto Rico's broken grid...

neospice• 9 years ago

For reasons she just explained, like digging where there are already cables or lack of budgeting for even higher value utilities like water.

twothamendment5• 9 years ago

Parts of the USA. Eagle Mountain, UT has a population of 30,000 and no cable TV. It is just down the road from the NSA building, it isn't like it is in the middle of nowhere. There wasn't much there in 1999. For a city that is very young - nobody wanted to put up money for cable.

https://www.google.com/maps/place/Eagle+Mountain,+UT/@40.335...

I'm almost sure the county I live in now doesn't have cable TV anywhere. It costs a lot to roll out a network of anything. I'd guess a power network costs more than cable or fiber.

davidgh• 9 years ago

In terms of rural areas, this will be an interesting challenge. When you drive cross country in the USA, you can expect to find gasoline reasonably close to even the most remote areas. The distance to the next gas station from anywhere in the USA is well below the range of the typical car.

However, in regards to cities, you are presenting a situation where the charging station comes to the parked car, rather than the car going to the charging station. While that would be quite convenient, if the charging times are rapidly decreased, there’s no reason car owners in cities would not be able to drive to stations to charge up, as drivers do with gas stations today.

mschuster919• 9 years ago

if the charging times are rapidly decreased

Charging times have an upper bound: physics. 250 kW is an insane amount of power and still you'd need around half an hour to fill a 100 kWh battery, to get even close to the 5-10 minutes of charging like at a gas station you'd need megawatts of peak power... and as there are two steps of conversions involved (grid => HVDC => battery voltage), even with 99% efficiency you have 1% (or 10 kW) of heat loss alone. That heat in the small space of a battery pack is a challenge.

jdietrich3• 9 years ago

Electric cars have the potential to be a key part of the solution to load management on a fully renewable grid.

The vast majority of people will usually charge overnight and don't need to regularly charge at peak times. Through intelligent charger management, you can distribute the load of charging across the entire off-peak period. The UX for this can be fairly straightforward - by default you charge at the cheapest rate, or you can press a button to get the quickest possible charge.

The real dividend comes from bidirectional charging, using the collective resources of plugged-in cars as a load balancing reservoir. In exchange for a discount on your electricity, the grid can take a small percentage of your EV's battery capacity when needed. A typical mid-range electric car has a 40kWh battery, which represents about four days of electricity consumption for a typical European household.

Nissan and the British utility regulator ran a two-year trial to examine the long-term impact of EVs on local grid infrastructure. The trial used intelligently-managed unidirectional charging. They concluded that about 32% of local electricity circuits will need to be upgraded by the time that EVs represent a majority of vehicles on the road. This figure could potentially be lowered further by bidirectional charging technology.

http://myelectricavenue.info/

America still has huge potential for efficiency savings, because of the immensely high average household electricity consumption. The average American household uses nearly three times as much electricity as the average European household. Air conditioning is only a small part of this disparity, representing about 18% of the electricity consumption of American households according to the Energy Information Administration.

sathackr• 9 years ago

Great comment!

Currently utilities buy power during peak times from other utilities, or fire up expensive peaker generators to manage the load.

A network of charging cars could be managed as another resource with a price attached to it that may be cheaper than the alternatives. I like the concept of varying the price of the charge based on your participation in the network.

At least in Florida, USA, most residential electric meters are flat-rate (same price per KWh, no matter what time of day you are using). A good portion of commercial meters have a peak and off-peak rate, as well as a single line item charge, based on peak demand, that is often 30-40% of the entire bill. The off-peak rate is often 50% or more cheaper than the peak rate.

Since most people would charge at night, it would probably make sense to have these residential services switched to a demand and time-of-day based meter, which would further reduce the cost of electricity. If someone spends a significant time at home, the charging car could buffer peak loads during the day to offset the additional draw of the nighttime charging.

Fuzzy_Logic2• 9 years ago

Even if the expensive infrastructure was put in place to allow electric car batteries to be used as a peak load reservoir, utilities would still need to maintain traditional on demand resources, such as natural gas fired power plants. Using a large number of cars is not dependable, utilities need on demand dependability. What happens if during peak consumption in the evening winter months more people stay out late (such as on New Years Eve) and most people park in places where there's no way to plug in? This would only add to overall infrastructure costs, adding a huge bidirectional grid in addition to traditional power sources that must be maintained year round for on demand use.

enraged_camel• 9 years ago

I was talking to a professor of electrical engineering who performs research on the electric grid. She said that while in theory it is possible to configure cars to charge themselves when electricity is cheapest, currently residential utility plans don’t adjust pricing based on time of day. Your electricity bill’s tiers are based on your total consumption.

Edit: lol, I get downvoted for relaying what a professor of EE told me. Stay classy HN.

rangersanger2• 9 years ago

A potential issue I see with this is the fact that some people need to get to and from work during hours that would prohibit them from charging at off-peak hours. Night-shift jobs tend to be on the lower end of the pay scale (though there may be a bonus for taking that awful shift compared to their day-time peers.) So there is an opportunity for some regressiveness in this scheme.

hermenaut• 9 years ago

Over the next 50 years if solar roofs take off ( https://www.tesla.com/solarroof ) I don't see it being that much of a problem on the country side. We probably won't need to rebuild the entire grid, may be able to leave some part of the grid behind. May even be cheaper to do so with savings compared to the alternative options

GuB-42• 9 years ago

Solar roofs are just fancy solar panels. And they wont help it there is no sun.

There are two ways of making sure you still get power when there is no sun for your panels: storing power locally and using the grid. For storage, you can have enough batteries to deal with the day-night cycle, but a week of overcast weather in the winter is likely to be prohibitively expensive. It means that the grid is necessary, and it has to be able to cope with peak load.

kozak5• 9 years ago

If charging happens at the place where the car spends most of its time, then even domestic 16A/230V sockets would be enough for typical usage (for atypical usage, there are superchargers).

kurthr2• 9 years ago

Exactly, charging is greater than 10mph at 16A (typical dryer load). If you drive 40mi (1hr commute?) each way and only charge at home, you can charge in the 8 hours between 11pm and 7am.

godman_8• 9 years ago

Why can't this just be solved with solar panels and batteries?

ajuc3• 9 years ago

That's interesting. Cheap 15% efficient solar panel produces 0.75 kWh per square meter per day in "average US location" [1], whatever that is.

Let's assume average parking space area is 10 square meters (it depends, but it's close [2]) - so that's 7.5 kWh per day.

Average energy consumption of electric cars is 11-16 kWh/100 km [3], let's assume 10 kWh/100 km - that's 75 km range for a day of standing in sun.

That's actually not bad, and should be enough for driving back home from work. Actually, why not just put the solar cells on the car and do away with the batteries (car already has them). It would be less area, but even 20 km of driving for free would be enough for many people.

Hell, I use a car maybe twice a week, usually to drive for less than 10 km. Such a car would basically drive for free for my use case :)

[1] https://dothemath.ucsd.edu/2011/09/dont-be-a-pv-efficiency-s...

[2] https://www.quora.com/What-is-the-size-of-a-standard-parking...

[3] http://pushevs.com/2017/05/23/electric-car-range-efficiency-...

visarga2• 9 years ago

How do street mounted charging ports cope with rain, snow and dirt? Is there a risk of electrocution?

danans• 9 years ago

I have an outdoor ev charger (no garage) and I've plugged it in during downpours with no issues. EV charging plugs (J1772) have recessed contacts that you can't touch without tremendous effort and electronics that ensure that they don't turn on the charging current until they are securely affixed to and communicating with the car.

There is a pilot current to establish the communication that coordinates this but it's nothing that would electrocute someone (probably similar to an Ethernet cable).

greglindahl3• 9 years ago

There are places that have charging stations built into streetlights.

anovikov• 9 years ago

But that replacement doesn't need to happen quickly, cars won't get replaced sooner well... than the cars are replaced, which is, about once in 15 years. Even if market share of electric cars in dealerships is 100%. So grid requirements will evolve slowly through about 2050, not overnight - which is hardly faster than its normal renewal rate.

ams61102• 9 years ago

In my neighborhood there has been no electrical grid upgrade (other than repairs) since the 1960s (when the subdivision was built). I think your 15 year timeline for normal grid renewal is wildly optimistic at least for most established suburban areas.

Also few people keep their cars for 15 years. I think 5-7 years is much more normal (though perhaps you meant the total life of the car, from original owner to the last).

NickM• 9 years ago

Tesla has already started incorporating stationary storage into some of its supercharger stations to help cut down on peak load. This is not just an act of goodwill, it actually makes economic sense for them, since it cuts down on demand charges from the utilities for high peak loads, as well as reducing the need for bigger transformers and such leading up to the station.

The electrical grid is already sized for peak usage, not average usage. Supercharger stations are also being sized for peak usage, and most of the stalls usually remain empty. Incorporating stationary storage cuts down on the costs incurred by both of these inefficiencies.

pilom3• 9 years ago

Incorporating stationary storage cuts down on the costs incurred by both of these inefficiencies.

at the cost of 10% more power usage due to the inefficiencies of charging and discharging batteries. Might still be worth it from an electric company's bottom line, but in most markets, it increases greenhouse gas production because we need more kwh of power.

LinuxBender• 9 years ago

Would it be feasible to put inductive chargers and battery banks under the parking spot, so that no wires are exposed and the spot could be used by non electric cars if required? Maybe a signal to/from the car to determine charge rates and negotiate power feeds? Or is that too much power to pass through a special thin layer of say, epoxy concrete? Seems like a good place to have a battery box, to protect it from heat/rain/lightning.

kwhitefoot• 9 years ago

You mean like this from five years ago? http://www.bbc.com/news/technology-18984160

ZeroGravitas6• 9 years ago

The UK grid company (who also run some of the US grid) put out a report on the impact which I'll summarise as "no big deal". They mapped out a few different scenarios, the most extreme of which got taken, then mangled and exagerrated and turned into scary headlines about EVs destroying the grid.

They then had to issue a second report pointing out that their first report said it wasn't going to be a big deal.

http://fes.nationalgrid.com/media/1264/ev-myth-buster-v032.p...

deevolution• 9 years ago

I can't wait for the day where public transportation is replaced by more efficient, cheaper and more personalized ride sharing services. Public transit is horribly broken, at least in NYC... personaly I dont see my self ever sinking 35k into a new car unless it would be making me money.

bradleyjg• 9 years ago

I don't see how ride sharing services are ever going to be more efficient than public transit. Or how it will even be barely possible to replace the one with the other in a place like NYC.

Riding sharing is about utilizing a vehicle in a temporally more efficient way, but it does little to improve spacial efficiency during peak times.

The commuter rails, subway, and buses are far more dense than a fleet of self driving cars with one to two people in each can possible be. Even with the increased density that might plausible come from better driving and so more tightly spacing, it would simply be impossible to get everyone into and out of their offices across Manhattan during the communing windows without the density of mass transit vehicles and the utilization of underground space.

JoeAltmaier5• 9 years ago

Ride sharing does help with parking though. Which is almost as bad a problem.

digitalshankar• 9 years ago

The most important thing to happen is to figure out a way to reduce the pollution from the petroleum powered vehicles, especially exhaust gases. This will ensure smooth move towards Electric vehicles.

okreallywtf2• 9 years ago

How? Did you mean to say tax pollution from petroleum powered vehicles?

googletazer• 9 years ago

Anyone here investing in lithium/cobalt/graphite?

icc973• 9 years ago

One of the eye openers for me in this was the average ranges, 475 miles vs 190.

ICE cars have 2.5x the range of electric cars. I always assumed it was much more e.g. 800 miles vs 100 miles.

According to this graph [0] the price per kWh of batteries is halving every 5 years, so within ~6-7 years the range of electric cars will be equal to that of ICE cars.

[0] https://cleantechnica.com/2016/05/15/ev-battery-prices-looki...

JoeAltmaier5• 9 years ago

Wrong metric. Its kWh / kg (not price) that matters for transportation. Until we get metal-air batteries that's not going to change much.

icc973• 9 years ago

You're right that's better, but it doesn't completely invalidate my prediction, it just means I might be out a bit with the time. Battery kWh / kg is also improving too, I just don't know if it's at the same rate as price.

Its possible now with Teslas to buy the higher kWh batteries and they go further, so it's not like weight is the only factor. The new Tesla Roadster coming in 2020 [0] has a 620 mile range because it's basically a battery and little else.

So it depends on:

1. how much the extra weight/drag of a model 3 chassis would reduce the range 2. how much of the $200,000 price is down to the battery.

Then you are waiting until the price of the battery comes down.

[0] https://www.tesla.com/roadster

perseusprime11• 9 years ago

Can we pivot this conversation to building cities and towns that don't need cars instead of thinking of filling the streets with electric cars?

DarronWyke• 9 years ago

Even before reading the article, my first thought was 'need to expand the range of the vehicle'.

Yes, advances in battery technology means even the lowest-common-denominator consumer will get better battery life without having to shell out more -- but that will hit a cap before long.

Assuming an average range of about 100mi for the consumer-grade EV, that would satisfy many. But there are still many more who that will not work for, with longer commutes or more driving distance (errands, kids, other activities, multiple jobs, ferrying, taxi/rideshare services, etc.).

A dual-engine design seems to be a more obvious solution, with a primarily electric engine with a secondary, small engine providing backup power either with recharge or straight up horsepower delivered to the drivetrain when the battery is depleted or running critically low. This doesn't necessarily have to be ICE; this engine could be something else that's fairly revolutionary like a hydrogen fuel cell. Even if we get to a majority EV situation, having these be commonplace will give everyone who owns one more freedom and options rather than locking them down to what that particular model has (I see a future with more vendor lock-in).

GiorgioG• 9 years ago

The issue of energy portability is not an insignificant one IMO. I can carry 5 gallons (or 100-150 miles worth of range) of fuel fairly easily. Not so much with an electric vehicle.

What happens when I run out of juice on the side of the road? I don't care how many times the car warns me; that it shouldn't happen, etc. People still manage to run out of gas today. With an electric vehicle already hampered by half the range of an I.C.E. vehicle, it will happen even more often. If I drain my battery, I can no longer walk down to a gas station, fill up a 5 gallon container and be on my way.

"But that should never happen!" sure and people don't get stranded for hours in traffic in the middle of a winter storm. An I.C.E. vehicle can easily idle for a day non-stop on half a tank. Can an electric vehicle provide me with heat for 24 hours when it's -3F outside on half a charge?

Even when we reach range parity, the convenience and portability of gasoline will keep me buying I.C.E. vehicles until it is overwhelmingly superior.

Florin_Andrei2• 9 years ago

A car should be able to charge another car. There needs to be some kind of standard here.

Or else small portable batteries need to become more common.

Or I could envision a service where, if you run out of electrons, you tap a button and a drone is dispatched with a portable battery to your location. Or maybe the car itself could place the call automatically.

twothamendment5• 9 years ago

How big would a battery have to be to get a dead EV off the side of the road and 25 miles to a charging station? Can a drone fly a 25 or 50 pound battery? What would the range on the drone be?

I'm guessing a tow truck with the ability to charge a car is more likely.

twothamendment5• 9 years ago

In addition to fuel being portable, storage is important too. I can store extra fuel. When the power is out and the gas station can't pump - I don't care, I have a backup. I can put it in my truck, generator, etc.

CaptSpify• 9 years ago

You can't do that with a spare battery?

evgen2• 9 years ago

And solar panels can both power your home and recharge your car. Indefinitely. What happens when you run out of extra fuel?

stuffedBelly• 9 years ago

This may sound like a joke but I think it might work - would carrying a pedal/hand generator resolve emergency like this, at least for a little while?

euyyn• 9 years ago

For all that is holy, carry a small gas generator instead. The same way people today carry a small extra battery for their ICE cars.

thebluehawk• 9 years ago

Ehhhh. I doubt it. I looked up and a typical hand crank is 10 watt. That won't be any good. That wouldn't power a laptop. I found a decent pedal generator that says it can output 400 watt. My car uses around 330 wH to go a mile, so if you charged at 400 watt for an hour, you would get slightly more than a mile of range (assuming no efficiency loses). Pedaling for an hour to go one mile doesn't sound like fun to me.

ianferrel• 9 years ago

Just add removable floorboards so you can Flintstone it.

dawnerd• 9 years ago

hampered by half the range of an I.C.E.

Not always the case. There's plenty of petrol powered cars that have horrible range. Thing with electric cars is they'd be plugged in when parked (ie overnight). ~300 miles on electric might not sound like much, but do normal people drive 300 miles every day? nope. If their car is fully charged every morning they should never run out of battery power. Long trips, yeah it's a problem that'll need to be fixed but really not all that different from being stranded in the middle of no where miles from the nearest station. Likely roadside assistance will have portable chargers or just simply tow you to the nearest charger.

thescriptkiddie• 9 years ago

I'm skeptical that we will ever see a day where there are as many electric cars on the road as there are ICE cars today. That's not because I think people won't buy electric cars, but because I think people won't buy cars in general. In the western world we are rapidly approaching "peak car". The number of cars on the road today is simply unsustainable. I would not be surprised if over the next few decades, more cars are taken off of the road entirely than are replaced with electric.

apatheticonion• 9 years ago

For me it's accessibility, style and performance. In my mind, I wouldn't purchase a car above 4k (NZD) unless it's an electric car.

However, there are fewer electric cars where I live (New Zealand) than I have fingers, and the ones that are available cost over 100k or are very ugly (sorry leaf owners but it's not a cool looking car)

I saw the e-golf, felt hope but after learning of it's lethargic 0-100 (0-60) and the fact that it's not even available here, I quickly lost hope.

I don't care if I get a 100km (60 miles) range, I never travel further than that - I firstly want to actually be able to buy one, would appreciate a little thrill, and style that doesn't make me feel like I am making a statement.

Chances are that won't happen, so I'm probably just going to build one.

cyb0rg• 9 years ago

We no longer live in a past-is-prologue world. Now we live in a if-the-business-plan-works world where human inertia is no longer a big factor. All of the discussions below assume that most cars will be personally owned. My guess is that most passenger miles and commercial ton miles will be logged by robotaxis and robotrucks in the near term (five to ten years) because the convenience will be so high and the cost so low. The robotaxis will have smallish batteries and will charge often, but the charge stations will be more centralized and will be fed by small utility pv installations dotted around the periphery of the city and yes, these same robotaxis could be used for load balancing storage, but I suspect that their used and/or obsolete batteries will provide the storage.

  No need for parking space chargers or for that matter for parking spaces.

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