"It turns out not all 'fast chargers' live up to the name.... To be considered 'fast,' a charger must be capable of about 24 kW. The fastest chargers can pump out up to 350. Our charger in Meridian claims to meet that standard, but it has trouble cracking 20.... We feel defeated pulling into a Nissan Mazda dealership in Mattoon, Ill. 'How long could it possibly take to charge the 30 miles we need to make it to the next fast station?' I wonder. Three hours. It takes 3 hours. I begin to lose my mind as I set out in search of gas-station doughnuts, the wind driving sheets of rain into my face.... At zero miles, we fly screeching into a gas-station parking lot. A trash can goes flying and lands with a clatter to greet us. Dinner is beef jerky, our plans to dine at a kitschy beauty shop-turned-restaurant in Memphis long gone....."
From "I Rented an Electric Car for a Four-Day Road Trip. I Spent More Time Charging It Than I Did Sleeping. Our writer drove from New Orleans to Chicago and back to test the feasibility of taking a road trip in an EV. She wouldn’t soon do it again" (Wall Street Journal).
Posts
107 comments:
EV’s are a total scam driven by federal income tax credits and the CAGW scam.
They, quite obviously, did it wrong. This is before hindsight.
Me and my fellow engineers, who are mostly schematically of electric cars, did the math under ideal, but practical and realistic, conditions. To perform an EV road trip, you need a lot of planning. And a lot of charge time.
Save the EV for your commute, and planned medium distance journeys. Rent a gasoline car for road trips.
two words... HA HA SUCKER!
of course, in three years; we will All have, as required by law, electric cars.
Then the two words will be... WE SUCK!!!!
"We followed eight Wall Street Journal reporters in four countries to see if they, and the world, are ready to make the switch."
I think Hawaii may be ready. Maybe Luxembourg? Guam?
From what I understand, Tesla deals with this pretty well. They have charging stations all around the country and your Tesla will tell you how much of a charge you need to get to the next charging station. But you still have to wait while your car charges.
Electric cars are actually really good for a daily commute to work. (Since you can charge them overnight at your house.) But for long road trips, the electric car technology isn't there yet and there are not a lot of standard charging stations around that can charge all electric cars.
An interesting side effect of electric cars is the infrastructure effect that it has on the car dealerships. They have to spend hundreds of thousands of dollars in electrical upgrades to upgrade their dealerships to charge their new fleets of electric cars.
When I got solar on my house, I had to upgrade from a 100A service to a 200A service. That was not cheap. It wasn't that I was going to pull any more power from the grid, quite the opposite. There was a slight possibility that I might feed more than 100A back into the grid if everything was off in my house and it was a bright, sunny day.
A tale of a high density draw, low density producer, unreliable energy for Green effect, fast charger, and slow battery.
Twenty four kilowatts takes a substantial service, or generator. With a home service, the cost to upgrade can be thousands of dollars. With a generator (they require fossil fuels to operate) the cost is over five thousand dollars. Both cost to operate, and neither is something many retail merchants are willing to invest in. So, an electric car is pretty well a glorified golf-cart to show off to those willing to be impressed by wasteful spending. Any municipality that invests in such madness is wasting precious tax dollars on ridiculous whims.
"She wouldn’t soon do it again"
They were lucky the power did not go out at their various stops.
But before long, we will all have to do it, again and again. If our prog overlords have their way.
Of course, the story exposes the utter folly of trying to electrify transportation by the 2030s. It cannot be done, at least not while maintaining our current standard of living and basic freedoms. Since progs will insist on doing it anyway, the real plan is to degrade our quality of life and control our everyday behavior.
This is where reality drives a wedge between the Unicorn World and the Real World- the one you actually have to drive in. Not everywhere is LA. There will not be adequate chargers along the highways for years- if ever. You'd be better off planning your trip around the location of tech offices where there are sure to be a handful of charging stations in their parking lots. Just hope you don't need a code to use one.
The other reality never spoken about is the one this author covered: charging speeds. They will vary and there's nothing you can do about it when you're on the road. You get what you get.
Of course the largest thing is where the power comes from for these chargers to begin with. Where do the charges get their power from? As we cancel coal, and reduce other sources of energy, where does the electricity come from that is needed to charge up all these cars expected?
Stay tuned. I'm sure the generation that doesn't drive will have an answer for us soon.
Should have rented a Tesla. The rest aren't ready for prime time. And a little secret from a Volt owner, charge goes down twice as fat at 80 as it does at 50.
LOL they couldn't figure that out beforehand?
Real world.. Most people DO NOT want to spend 30 min (or MORE) at a charg station every 4 hrs
Dream World..It will be GREAT! to stretch your legs, and get a bite to eat at the charger station
Real world.. a restaurant 6 blocks away is TOO FAR to walk to and back for lunch
Dream world..a it will be GOOD! to stretch your legs (every 4 hrs)
Real world.. EV range disintegrates in rain/snow/night/cold/hot
Dream world..It's ALWAYS SUNNY IN EV LAND!!
Real world.. Charging stations DON'T, Fast Chargers AREN'T
Dream world..There will be one on Every Corner.. Really Soon! Any Day Now! They're on the Way!
Real world.. Car Makers will quit making gas cars in 5 years. States will ban Gas Stations
Dream world. Car Makers will quit making gas cars in 5 years. States will ban Gas Stations
Should have rented a Tesla. Superchargers servicing TESLAs are strategically located everywhere you travel—including in New Orleans where this reporter began her trip. I know Hertz rents Teslas.
My son owns a Tesla. He evacuated from New Orleans in his Tesla before Hurricane Ida hit and was able to recharge along his evacuation route to Jackson, Mississippi with no problem finding superchargers. And when he returned to New Orleans in his Tesla days after Ida hit to see if his house was still standing, he found lines of cars of exasperated overheated people outside gas stations trying to get gas for their cars so they could evacuate post-hurricane to escape the heat (no electricity for weeks) or to get gas for generators. People were shot and killed at gas stations over cutting in line post Ida.
My son zoomed inTO New Orleans driving his Tesla and had enough charge to zoom out back to Jackson, Mississippi—2 stops at strategically placed Tesla superchargers along the way. No lines or frantic people at the supercharging stations. And a supercharge took 20 minutes.
The WSJ reporter apparently pitched the idea for this article as part of her application for her job @rachelbwolfe
Lazy reporting.
And this surprises anyone (who has paid attention to real science and engineering) how?
The whole electric car/ green nude eel thing will hopefully vanish before it crashes our civilization. Hopefully.
This is disinformation and should be banned from all media.
President Biden tells us that electric cars are super convenient and affordable and not merely the future, but the now, especially with his policy of unaffordable gasoline.
I didn't notice the article's title. Scanning, I thought they were talking about a cell phone charger. That's about the level of technology we'll support a charge fail on. But a car? Hahahaha!
There's more of that hope ... the theme of the afternoon.
"We hit the road with high hopes."
Electric cars are to get you out of that car and into a bus or commuter train so you can work from your highwise office and live in your central city apartment. No suburbs for you, no road trip vacations.
Peasants are to stay in their places.
Even the engineers at Toyota (the "Gold Standard" in the auto business) will tell you that pure EVs are a waste of money and resources. Non-plug-in hybrids are a great cost-effective solution to low mileage, conventional powertrains.
This article describes the lunacy of a nationwide charging network. What they would like to do, in theory, is replicate the liquid fuel network that took 100 years and probably $500 Billion or more to develop. In ten minutes, all across America, you can refuel your gasoline powered car, go to the bathroom and get some food for the trip while the electric charging takes, at best, a couple of hours. Having charging stations at dealers won’t work out for interstate travel, they’re usually in cities. And what is Love’s or Flying J’s incentive to spend hundreds of thousands, if not millions, of dollars on charging stations at each service station? Electric for intercity travel works, but not interstate travel. And I also read the replacement cost of the battery for the first Teslas is around $15,000. We’re simply not there yet.
Was this article paid for by people shorting TSLA? It sounds like a brand-killer...
Just wait until we have rolling blackouts. Fun times.
Well, yeah.
This is why plug-ins with engine backups are good.
And your own garage is needed (chargers are $$$; you can't charge outside without theft risk).
Electric cars aren't good for road trips here in Cali; trying it in the South? Ugh.
I wonder if those electric cars are cheaper if you buy two.
EVs are great (arguably superior) for around town driving and daily commutes, which comprise >95% of most driving.
For road trips EVs still have a long way to go and may never become as good as ICEs. Still, the authors of this article were obviously ignorant about how EVs work and made their experience much worse than it needed to be. They could have saved a lot of grief by downloading the ABRP app (A Better Route Planner), which optimizes stops to minimize charging time. Or they could have rented a Tesla, which has a robust charging network with functionality like ABRP built-in.
"What, me worry?" I'm sure that Pete Buttigieg, who is totally not a token as Transportation Secretary, will be addressing this soon.
ANd when it's really cold, and the battery life is cut by what, 50%?
This is THE problem with electric cars. Of course, once/if there are a lot of them, the grid providing enough electric power will become THE problem as well.
"Just wait until we have rolling blackouts. Fun times."
I am really dreading the apocalyptic world these idiots are producing.
she was lucky to find charging ports.
did she try plugging car into her laptop!?
Reality 101- Physics and engineering rule the world, not dreams and hopes.
Want to reduce fossil fuel use? All electric drive with an onboard generator that comes on at 30% or so charge and off at 75% or so. With enough generation capacity to drive the car south to Los Angeles up the grapevine at 65 MPH should the vehicle hit the bottom at 30% or so charge. It would greatly simplify the drivetrain, reducing total weight, and the genset arrangement could be tuned to run at maximum efficiency when it comes on.
The infrastructure for this already exists. Overall efficiency of today’s top performing hybrids already beats overall efficiency of all battery all the time. Especially in bad weather. Summer now and I’m back over 50MPG with my Hyundai Ioniq, only got 42-45 during the winter months.
Just recently made 2 long distance round trips, one tank of gas for the day, most of it highway driving with the cruise control set at 74 MPH. 50 MPG computed for both trips.
where art thou John Galt?
where is thy Motor?
And I also read the replacement cost of the battery for the first Teslas is around $15,000. We’re simply not there yet.
========
why can't the battery pack be a tow-along-add-on? drop yours and pick up fresh-charged-pack at change stations? a la container shipping!
come on Elon - get with it!
I have a 24 kW generator as a backup for my entire house (even then, I can't turn on everything at once). A generator capable of producing 350 kW takes a substantial truck to move. I'm not sure they understand the heat that would be generated if that car was charged in just 5 minutes.
The range of current technology electric cars goes way down on long road trips because you aren't using the brakes very much. The brakes are used to recharge the battery which works well in city driving with all the stop and go driving. Fast charging will wear out the battery much more quickly than trickle charging so beware. Regardless, charging a battery will always take way longer than filling up your tank with gas.
Hybrids are what makes the most sense. They just have to make them more cool looking than a Prius. That shouldn't be too hard.
Speaking of rolling blackouts, the Australian band, Rolling Blackouts Coastal Fever, has a new album out and it's outstanding.
You've got to buy $100 worth of electricity to fill up.
Rolling Blackouts my ass... the grid is a target for even the dumbest of terrorists. Easy to take out. So shut up about vulnerabilities.
Take the train, honey.
The train they call The City of New Orleans.
If it's still running.
Or go Greyhound.
At least until they go electric too.
"EVs are great (arguably superior) for around town driving and daily commutes, which comprise >95% of most driving."
I need a vehicle capable of meeting 100% of my driving needs.
The amount of heat generated in charging a lithium ion battery that can take a car 100+ miles has got to be pretty significant. I can't imagine what it is like to generate all that heat in 5 minutes. I wouldn't have it in my house. I wouldn't live in a building building that had one.
Relax people. Obama figured it out before he started this Fundamental Transformation we're now enjoying. Just like he figured out Obamacare, which may only rise to about %50 higher this year. Hence the "Lightbringer" tag.
The authors weren’t dumb. They set out to write an article on this topic.
I attended an Omaha Public Power District Board meeting where the CEO whined about the fact that people were charging their cars at night.
Louddogblog
Are you in a state that requires "net metering"? That is where the utility has to pay the same for the power you sell to them as the power you buy from them. In effect the utility is your $5-10,000 battery system and it, free to you, is paid by your neighbors.
Somebody has to pay the utility's massive infrastructure cost that makes up about 75% of the cost per residential kwh.
If you are not on net metering, if you are paying the true cost of backup, great.
Many, most? states, require net metering. AFAIK, none other than Puerto Rico have a cap on it. When solar gets to 5% of total net metering goes away.
What happens in California when 50% of houses are on solar? And using pge as a free battery?
How is that in any way "sustainable"?
John LGKTQ Henry
"Original Mike said...
This is THE problem with electric cars. Of course, once/if there are a lot of them, the grid providing enough electric power will become THE problem as well."
I sell EV chargers, and it's already an issue in many markets, especially California. The biggest problem is the utilities can not provide the power upgrade in a timely matter. I have a dealer customer spending $300K for the power upgrade to meet the manufacturer charger requirements, and it will be 14 months before SDGE can get to it.
It's funny that most electric utilities provide rebates for businesses and consumers to buy stuff that reduces consumption...they don't want to build new generation plants...but then offer incentives for EV's. My only guess is that they see an opportunity to increase consumption in non peak times when usage is lower...like in the evening when people are charging at home.
The Dems put billions into fast chargers deployment along the interstate system to help the long haul problem described. It will be awhile though. And as the national EV fleet grows the issue of how long to charge will be paired with how long to wait to charge.
Fast chargers typically are 3 phase, and provide higher KW but their other advantage is that provide DC power. That allows the power to go straight to battery...more efficient because it doesn't require and inverter. Level 2 chargers are AC, and the car uses an internal inverter to convert to DC.
"He evacuated from New Orleans in his Tesla before Hurricane Ida hit and was able to recharge along his evacuation route to Jackson, Mississippi with no problem finding superchargers."
It's 185 miles from NO to Jackson.
One of the things that a lot of people don't realize is that you can't just leave your car on the charger when it finishes.
If you do, at least with the Tesla supercharger, you have about 10 minutes grace period. After that it charges something like 10-20 cents a minute penalty.
I went with a friend to a lonestar steakhouse in his Tesla once because it was the only supercharger in Rocky Mount. Not because either of us wanted to eat there. He would not have been able to get back home to Sanford without a charge.
Just about the time the food came he got a text and had to go out and move the car.
Seems like needing to hang around the car while charging is a major drawback. I see no way around this with public chargers absent some automated system to move the car when charged.
John LGKTQ Henry
'The authors weren’t dumb. They set out to write an article on this topic.'
True, but they didn't seem to know which version of the car they rented.
The best setup today (if you have $$) is an EV charging at home for trips within the EV's range. And an ICE vehicle for the occasional road trip.
Doable but not cheap.
Why the hell is she writing in the present tense when she's telling a story from the past? Is this some New York thing?
Its fucking annoying. I've seen books like this too (Allen's memoir comes to mind) where he suddenly switches from past to present tense to past tense again.
"Electric cars are actually really good for a daily commute to work. (Since you can charge them overnight at your house.)"
Assuming the power at your house is provided by something other than solar panels.
"Just recently made 2 long distance round trips, one tank of gas for the day, most of it highway driving with the cruise control set at 74 MPH. 50 MPG computed for both trips."
You started with a fully charged battery, right? You aren't saying you have an automobile that can drive 50 miles on the energy in a gallon of gasoline?
Overall efficiency of today’s top performing hybrids already beats overall efficiency of all battery all the time
Hybrids are more efficient, reliable, and less toxic by weight than electric vehicles. ICE lags in efficiency during moderate driving situations and given acceptance of the tenets of [catastrophic] [anthropogenic] climate cooling... warming... change.
Electric cars, or some other alternative, will happen on a large scale, but not in my lifetime. I'm puzzled that some of the comments here seem to think we'll still be using something like the internal combustion engine forever. It will take many years for charging stations to appear across the country. Took a long time for filling stations, too.
This shows the liberal folly of all electric by 2050. Simply not viable. I can say that I would love to own a Tesla. A dual motor doing 0-60 in under 4 seconds sounds like fun. My driving is almost always under 50 miles in a day, so electrical can work for me. But that does not work for long haul trucking and family road trips, RV's etc. But I would take an electric once the issues of rare earth mining, long term battery cost and battery disposal are addressed.
But to concur with others here, I think Hybrid is a better option. But they are not as fun to drive as my turbo SUV with 560 torque nor the imagined dual motor Tesla. One of each would be ok, I suppose.
I have a WSJ subscription, so was able to read the article. What an ordeal!
I want one of those things like I want a hole in the head.
One word - Hurrevac
This is from 2014 so the EV technology has changed some, but Car and Driver matched a Model S Tesla and a Model T Ford on a cross country trip. The Tesla won, but not by much.
1915 Ford Model T vs. 2013 Tesla Model S: Race of the Centuries
I posted this back on 5/30 concerning converting to all electric cars by 2050. There's no way it can be done.
Electric Transportation By 2050
Summary:
We’ll need ~ 2,250 terawatt-hours of electricity per year to move the people and the goods around. And how much new generation will this require? Well, by comparison, the US currently uses about 3,800 terawatt-hours per year, so we’ll need a huge, unimaginable 60% increase … and that just for electric cars and trucks and nothing more.
How much generating capacity will that take? We’ll need an additional ~ 570 gigawatts of generating capacity. And how long do we have to do that?
The only currently available technology capable of delivering that is nuclear. And it takes about ten years from conception to completion for a nuclear power plant.
So … to provide for an all-electric transportation fleet, starting tomorrow we’d have to build a new 2.7 GW nuclear power plant each and every month for the next 215 months … and those are huge plants, 20% larger than the giant Diablo Canyon power plant in Californa.
Oh, and besides building 215 new giant nuclear power plants at the rate of one per month every month for the next 18 years starting this month, we’d need to upsize our entire power grid by 60% from end to end, all the way from the generators down to the transformers and the electric wires feeding your house.
Wonder what the trip would have been like if there were, not a few thousand, but a few million EV's on US roads trying to use the same stations? Compare that with a typical gas station on a busy hiway. The gas station may run several hundred vehicles through in a day, each one taking 10-15 minutes. Now, how many charging ports would be needed if each vehicle needed a hour, more or less, to charge for the same vehicle volume? How much power would be needed to operate these charging ports?
Temujin: Of course the largest thing is where the power comes from for these chargers to begin with. Where do the charges get their power from? As we cancel coal, and reduce other sources of energy, where does the electricity come from that is needed to charge up all these cars expected?
Are you questioning The Green Leap Forward?
Temujin: Of course the largest thing is where the power comes from for these chargers to begin with. Where do the charges get their power from? As we cancel coal, and reduce other sources of energy, where does the electricity come from that is needed to charge up all these cars expected?
Are you questioning The Green Leap Forward?
They didn’t include any additional rental costs. Just looked up rental fees for the Kia EV6. Premium rental charge from the one site I found. And anything over 600 miles on a 3 day rental incurs a $0.89 mile charge. About a 2000 mile round trip Chicago-New Orleans. Based on my Ioniq mileage and $5.00 gallon gas (I haven’t paid that much- yet) fuel cost of $200. A Prius gets about the same mileage as my Ioniq. My son, a frequent flyer, rents them at his destinations. No extra charges over renting a pure ICE vehicle.
So if your sole purpose in life is to virtue signal, go ahead and inconvenience yourself with a battery only car. If you want actual good efficiency get a hybrid. If you want power or luxury, get a Lamborghini or a Rolls Royce.
I have a 36 mile one way commute. Coming home at midnight with 4” of snow on the ground, plow drivers resting up until they start to clear roads before the morning commute that most people have, and blinding snow still coming down, so my heaters, defrosters, and wipers- all electrical loads would all be operating, I wouldn’t want to be worrying if the battery was going to last. I actually don’t want to be on the road at all, but there are no beds at work…
As already noted, Tesla solved this problem for Tesla vehicles a long time ago.
EVs don't make much CO2 sense unless they replace high-mileage, high-use vehicles.
The best use case for private electric vehicles involves being home every night and having a reliable charger at home.
The best use case for commercial vehicles is local pickup and delivery such as UPS, FedEx, Amazon and USPS. Back to base every night and high-power charging for every vehicle in the garage.
Everything else is just window dressing and virtue signaling.
There is a design solution, entirely apart from the amazing Tesla supercharger network. The Chevy Volt (now discontinued) provides 53 miles of battery power, supplemented by an internal combustion engine with a 9 gallon tank that runs an electric generator. With this car, I can go six months driving locally using a total of 1 or 2 gallons of gas. But when I need to drive to San Francisco, I simply rely on the gas engine to power the generator.
As I write this, I'm in back country Maine. No sane Mainer living outside of Portland would want to go electric. In the winter, battery range goes down 40% or more because a battery is just a framework for a chemical reaction, and cold temps dramatically slow the speed of the chemical reaction.
Narayanan said...
where art thou John Galt?
where is thy Motor?
I think John Galt motor is commercially available now as a standard AC motor.
Galt made a motor that used some sort of ambient power that already existed.
If Elon Musk can beam power from space, any motor can use it. Similar result, opposite approach.
How "ambient" can this power be? Can it be generated in a way that allows it to be picked up by an antenna on the car?
It would minimize the battery problem. You would still need a small battery to get through tunnels, parking garages and such. But 3-5 mile range, not 300+
John LGKTQ Henry
UPS going electric in London ...
Switching to electric vehicles, though, as UPS has discovered, is not simple. Fleet vehicles like those UPS operates are logical candidates for conversion because they stick to similar daily routes, only go limited distances and come home to the same building. Yet making the switch to electricity has proved challenging and expensive.
[ ... ]
In addition, the power grids in London and elsewhere in Britain are not robust enough to meet the hefty demand for electricity that large numbers of trucks plugging in at once might create.
In London, Electric Trucks Are Helping UPS Make ‘Eco-Friendly’ Deliveries
Blogger Ann Althouse said... The authors weren’t dumb. They set out to write an article on this topic.
Oh Ann. Really?
In New Jersey, is it legal to charge your own electric vehicle?
They already made the car Gospace describes. The Chevy Volt worked pretty much exactly like that. Nobody bought them. Which is too bad because he's right, that is the way to go. Diesel electric locomotives are common and also work this way, so it's a proven technology.
Hunter @ 2:54: "... the authors of this article...could have saved a lot of grief by downloading the ABRP app (A Better Route Planner), which optimizes stops to minimize charging time."
Implicit in your comment is the surrender of driver discretion on route. Or, in plain English, the freedom of the road. We all tend to get in a (metaphorical, sometimes literal) rut, on certain itineraries. There's an optimal way to get to Grandma's or the office. But we still retain the idea that the choice of routes is not dictated by an algorithm like ABRP but by us.
As this idea is challenged, the resistance will mount. Particularly when it is accompanied by long hours of waiting in line for that Supercharger to dispense its largesse.
What Gospace said at 3:15. I could be persuaded by hybrid, never by pure EV.
Electric Vehicle Is (a) Loser = EVIL
exhelodrvr1 @ 3:01: Yes. This article is one of a few decent real-world real-driver exposures to EV Paradise, and it's not pretty. Not just because there's a learning curve to getting optimal use from an EV without crimping your lifestyle; but also because the overpromising about EVs is increasingly going to crash into the mass market. The gear heads make big allowances and their confirmation bias is powerful. But when every middle-of-the-roader is trying to drive out of a blizzard in Minnesota with an EV at 10% charge remaining, you are going to see surprising backlash.
Never mind the stress on the grid trying to deliver all those Joules to the Superchargers.
I have a Tesla Model 3 Long Range. Works great for my 99-percent-plus use case: commuting 40 miles round trip to work, the occasional 200-mile-one-day round trip for work, and charging at 240VAC, 48 amps on cheap electricity from midnight to 6am in my garage (that’s about 11 kW, which about as much as you can realistically get in a typical house built in the last 25 years; the car can recharge from about 10% to 80% or more at that rate over six hours). I’m currently paying about 20% (if not less) of what it would cost to fuel the ICE car the Tesla replaced. Absolutely no regrets so far (and note I got zero tax breaks).
That said…I’m in about the best use case for a battery electric vehicle (BEV). I live in a place where the temperature pretty much never gets colder than about 40 deg F and rarely gets hotter than about 90 deg F, so I don’t have to worry about cold temperature battery degradation or running the AC all the time. If my occasional 200-mile round trip turned into staying at the destination for several days, well, there are Tesla Superchargers all over that location, so recharging is easy (not to mention many hotels have chargers similar to the one in my garage). And for any longer road trips, they would typically also be in places where the Tesla Supercharger network is extensive. If not, I can afford to rent an ICE vehicle.
But I understand my situation is not typical. Mild temperatures year-round, ability to easily and quickly charge overnight…not feasible for many and that situation will take a long time to rectify (pun intended). Extensive nationwide charging infrastructure…currently a Tesla exclusive, and even then it has to grow substantially to support more BEVs. Initial cost of a BEV…prohibitive for many (I paid about 25% more for my Tesla than a comparable ICE car at the same trim level would have cost). If I keep the Tesla for six years, and it’s reasonably reliable, I’ll make much of that back in cheaper fuel and maintenance costs, but it’s a risk many can’t take. And an arbitrary road trip where you have to stop for (optimistically) 30 minutes every 200 miles won’t work for many.
TL;DR - the “coming BEV revolution” advocated by many of the ruling class is going to hit a brick wall in the next 3-5 years or so, and our betters will be forced into saner policies.
In theory there’s no difference between theory and practice.
Under pants gnomes planning....
1. Outlaw the ICE in X years.
2. ???
3. Energy independence.
One expects "2" will involve much suffering.
I've eaten at that kitschy beauty-shop turned restaurant. Also had a few beers, with some library colleagues. I have eaten worse food and drunk worse beer in worse places. That was probably the last time I drank much and drove . . . 2015 I think, since I was ruling out voting for either Bernie or Hillary if they got the D nom.
The all-electric future is a fantasy for the tech-credulous.
’ANd when it's really cold, and the battery life is cut by what, 50%?’
The laws of thermodynamics are racist.
Just recently made 2 long distance round trips, one tank of gas for the day, most of it highway driving with the cruise control set at 74 MPH. 50 MPG computed for both trips.
I bought a new 2022 Hyundai Elantra last June. Comparable in size and features to the Ioniq but ICE, not hybrid.
I passed 10,000 miles in April, average milage for the 10,000 was a bit more than 41mpg. Probably 40% freeway, 60% city/suburban.
I'll be going Fajardo to Yauco tomorrow, about 130 miles each way. Includes a climb over a 3,000 foot mountain. Probably 90% freeway. On this trip I normally get 51-51mpg driving 65-70mph.
I agree that hybrids are the way to go. A battery that will get you 40-50 miles range and a motor to keep it charged with the drive pure electric.
Charge it opportunistically with 11v from a 20 amp household plug. Maybe a 220 50amp stove outlet.
Motor big enough to get you you to your destination wihout battery if needed.
John LGKTQ Henry
It strikes me the only practical method of junking gas-powered cars in favor of electric cars is if every car power station is stocked with electric batteries being charged all the time. When drivers drive in low on juice, the power stations swap out the depleted battery and insert a freshly-powered replacement.
I don't know if there are technical reasons why this could not be done, but if there are not, then the only hurdle would be requiring all electric battery makers make their batteries universally compatible with all electric cars from all car makers, (and that all car makers be required to adhere to uniform specs such that universally compatible batteries could be plugged into all cars).
Martha said...
Should have rented a Tesla. Superchargers servicing TESLAs are strategically located everywhere you travel—including in New Orleans where this reporter began her trip. I know Hertz rents Teslas.
**********
From the article:
"Charging nuances
New Orleans, our starting point, has exactly zero fast chargers, according to PlugShare. "
So...how about posting the map showing the locations you allude to.
And, by all means, offer us the rental prices for Teslas as opposed to other comparable vehicles.
Finally, where the hell are we going to get the electricity to run these things, when we are already talking about blackouts all over the freakin' country this summer??
I predict every EV in the land will be keyed multiple times, if people have no power for their AC or refrigerators. Cold comfort if you drive an EV, when you too can't power yours up!!
Double dare you to address that.
I install a 50Amp line to the garage in every new home I build, because electric cars are a thing now, and I don't want any homebuyer of mine to think, after the sale, "Why the F*@K did the builder only put in a 20Amp car charger, that takes 24 hours to charge my car?"
A 50Amp circuit will get you 250 to 300 miles of charge in 8 hours.
A 20Amp circuit will get you 100 to 120 miles of charge in 8 hours.
Of course, smart people steal electricity from work for their electric cars.
’It strikes me the only practical method of junking gas-powered cars in favor of electric cars is if every car power station is stocked with electric batteries being charged all the time.’
No problem at all swapping out the batteries in an EV. Super easy - barely an inconvenience!!
For now, bring your own snacks and board games. If the charging station is not walking distance to a nice restaurant, order from Uber Eats. Or Uber to and back from the nice restaurant.
Blogger Robert Cook said..."It strikes me the only practical method of junking gas-powered cars in favor of electric cars is if every car power station is stocked with electric batteries being charged all the time. When drivers drive in low on juice, the power stations swap out the depleted battery and insert a freshly-powered replacement. "
Interesting. But I think the batteries weigh a ton. Literally.
"And as the national EV fleet grows the issue of how long to charge will be paired with how long to wait to charge."
Yeah.
Robert Cook said...
It strikes me the only practical method of junking gas-powered cars in favor of electric cars is if every car power station is stocked with electric batteries being charged all the time. When drivers drive in low on juice, the power stations swap out the depleted battery and insert a freshly-powered replacement.
**************
You aren't familiar with the world of technology, are you............
https://evs101.com/how-big-is-an-electric-car-battery/
Have you seen the weight of those EV batteries?
"The capacity of an electric car battery is measured in kilowatt hours (kWh). For example, the Tesla S Model has a large 90 kWh battery which provides a driving range of up to 265 miles (424km). The battery weighs 1,200lb (540kg). This heavyweight increases the vehicle’s energy consumption to 380Wh/mile (238Wh/km).
The capacity of an electric car battery can also be measured in ampere-hours. Ampere is the amount of current the battery can pull in one hour. For example, the most recent version of the BMW i3 (2019) has a capacity of 120Ah, which is equivalent to 42kWh. It provides a driving range of up to 115 miles (345km). The battery is lightweight and has a low energy consumption of 260 Wh/mile (165Wh/km)."
Note that they don't tell you what "lightweight" means, but if it offers 260Wh/mile (165Wh/km) vs. a 380Wh/mile (238Wh/km) it will weigh approx. 260/380 x 1,200 = 820 pounds.
So, yeah, every gas station will be using bazillions of kwhs keeping multiple types of EV batteries charged up, to they will be able to drop one into, in a few minutes, any EV that show up.
And the ones they swap out will be totes rechargeable.
Yeah, that's reeeaaaallll practical.
snort
When drivers drive in low on juice, the power stations swap out the depleted battery and insert a freshly-powered replacement.
Cookie -
The battery powered cars are more polluting than the gas powered cars.
Ultimately, the electric cord connecting your battery car to the grid finds a hydro-carbon burning fuel source. Oil, and carbon.
At some point in time, the battery in your battery-powered car will need to be replaced. Just like your laptop battery.
Remember all those atoms that aren't in the second row of the periodic table?? Yeah, we use them to enhance the stored ampHr, and extend the life of batteries. You don't want the depleted electric car batteries decomposing into the ground water. Those are really nasty atoms.
I'm remodeling an old house. The electrical service established in 1943 was limited by a 100 amp breaker. Most houses today have a 200A service. Consider the all power requirements we demand today. Hair dryers, clothes dryers, washing machines, TV's, and computers.
The electrical distribution system in many neighborhoods was designed post WWII. Like the old house, the entire electrical distribution system is dated, and limited.
We need more nuclear generating plants, and additional electrical distribution infrastructure to support this green initiative.
It's a perfect storm.......but we can fix it with a tax!!
"Electric cars are actually really good for a daily commute to work. (Since you can charge them overnight at your house.)"
The people who are pushing electric cars are the same ones who don't think you should have your own house. Rather, you (not them, of course) are expected to live in an apartment building, along with all the other sardines. Want to guess whether or not you get A) a parking spot or B) a charger to go with it?
Elon needs to invent a time machine, to go back to the 70's and explain to the environmentalists that the nuclear power generation industry that they were shutting down would be needed some day.
You can't run the USA on windmills and solar panels.
Robert Cook said...
It strikes me the only practical method of junking gas-powered cars in favor of electric cars is if every car power station is stocked with electric batteries being charged all the time.
The battery pack in a Tesla is 900 pounds according to my quick lookup. And if you look at the readily available diagrams- not in a spot where you could remove and replace them.
Weight distribution is important in a vehicle. There isn't any easily accessible place in an automobile where you could place the battery pack needed to run it and keep the weight distribution you need to keep the car stable.
Good idea- and physics and engineering once again rule the roost and say, no, can't do it. Best overall energy efficiency from beginning to end is still going to be from a hybrid. Which still haven't reached their peak possible efficiency.
Jupiter said...
"Just recently made 2 long distance round trips, one tank of gas for the day, most of it highway driving with the cruise control set at 74 MPH. 50 MPG computed for both trips."
You started with a fully charged battery, right? You aren't saying you have an automobile that can drive 50 miles on the energy in a gallon of gasoline?
Ummm... Are you serious? That's exactly what 50 MPG means. I started each trip with a fully loaded tank of 87 octane gasoline. Battery management system on my Ioniq is different than on a Prius. Several times I've had a Prius battery at 100% (or near 100% from the battery charge indicator). Haven't seen the Ioniq above 90%, and rarely that high. Also haven't seen the charge go as low as I've seen on a Prius. Which will, in the end, vastly increase battery life. And one of the reasons I got the Ioniq instead of another Prius- lifetime battery warranty to the original purchaser. My wife and I don't trade vehicles in- we drive them until they're ready to fall apart. Got 179,000 miles on our 2012 RAV4. We had 160,000 on the Prius when we transferred title to my son. His college friends laughed at him driving an old car. Until graduation day when- he had a car, with no car payments, and they had to go out and buy one...
"It strikes me the only practical method of junking gas-powered cars in favor of electric cars is if every car power station is stocked with electric batteries being charged all the time. When drivers drive in low on juice, the power stations swap out the depleted battery and insert a freshly-powered replacement.
I don't know if there are technical reasons why this could not be done..."
None at all. It's just like a Ryobi drill. Pull, push, click. Now go find a cut-a-way graphic of an electric car.
Not to mention.... Hmmm, my battery is showing signs of depletion. Guess I'll go swap out at the neighborhood station and (hope to) get a better one". Of course it could be a worse one.....
Welcome to REGRESSIVISM!!!
you guys! QUIT Picking on Robert Cook, and implying he has no clue!!
Remember! Robert thinks Communism is a good form of Government; of COURSE he has No Clue!!
I read a few, “but a Tesla”. I think those comments miss the point. By the way, I predict we will soon have lots of articles written about the lines at charging stations.
"Super easy - barely an inconvenience!!"
Perhaps we could have a pitch meeting about it. :)
What this country really needs is a modern network of solar-powered monorails!
Original Mike said...
""EVs are great (arguably superior) for around town driving and daily commutes, which comprise >95% of most driving."
I need a vehicle capable of meeting 100% of my driving needs."
There it is. A replacement battery for a Tesla cost about 20,000 bucks. For that money you could by a low mileage Prius and still have cash left over for gas for a couple of years. Even at 5 dollars a gallon.
My hyundai Elantra is comparable in size/class with the ioniq hybrid mentioned above but is not hybrid, pure ice.
This morning I drove 112 miles Fajardo to Yauco. 95%freeway but including a 3,000 foot mountain.
55.8 mpg.
Picture here for the doubters
https://darkislandpr.blogspot.com/2022/06/elantra-milage.html?m=1
John LGKTQ Henry
My hyundai Elantra is comparable in size/class with the ioniq hybrid mentioned above but is not hybrid, pure ice.
This morning I drove 112 miles Fajardo to Yauco. 95%freeway but including a 3,000 foot mountain.
55.8 mpg.
Picture here for the doubters
https://darkislandpr.blogspot.com/2022/06/elantra-milage.html?m=1
John LGKTQ Henry
Someone gifted us a 2001 hybrid Tahoe for which he had no use.
It got amazing gas mileage, even though it was a first generation hybrid, with some engine issues, and the size of a tank.
I'm a car ignoramus. But when the big battery needed changing, the dealership wanted almost 6K. I went online and found a company in the next state over that comes to your house and changes the battery for $2400. They recycle the old battery. They drive all the way to Atlanta every day and change scores of batteries -- mostly at dealerships, who then almost triple the price. It took 15 minutes, one ratchet. They were there 12 hours after I called them. They mostly do Teslas.
When someone innovates cars in a way that I can apply, that's real market innovation. I regret being a car dolt, but there's no battery to fix that.
Ann,
The authors weren’t dumb. They set out to write an article on this topic.
They did, huh? I gave up on the WSJ some time ago (good paper, but not worth the cost), so I don't know whether this was addressed at all, but WTF exactly were they driving??? It makes a tremendous difference.
We have a Tesla Model S, a pretty early one. The supercharger network, at least on the West Coast, is really, really good, and new stations are being added constantly. And we've done road trips in ours -- mainly to the SF Bay Area or south (brother-in-law lives in Gilroy, sister-in-law in Hayward). That's roughly 10-11 hours drive each way, so we tend to split it in half, stopping at Yreka (just below the CA border) or Mount Shasta, or even Corning. Yreka doesn't have a charging station IIRC, but the other two towns do.
It's true that sometimes you get to a station and all the slots are used up. This is (so far) generally when there's some sort of mass Tesla-related event going on; once we ran into a bunch of Tesla drivers from British Columbia going to a Tesla conference or what-have-you in AZ.
As others have said, there are still disadvantages to taking a road trip in a Tesla. But they are much, much worse with any other EV. You do need to be a little savvy. The superchargers are paired, for one thing, and it makes a considerable difference whether you plug into one of the same or opposite polarity as the one(s) already in use. And look for decent food. On the West Coast a lot of the extant superchargers seem to be located next to a Black Bear Diner (Mt. Shasta and Grants Pass are, and I think several of the others), which is a step or two above fast food.
Teslas are fairly popular here in Salem -- there are five or six just in the immediate neighborhood that I see regularly -- and much more so in the Bay Area. Up here I'd guesstimate that they are 1 in 2-300 vehicles, mostly Model 3 but some S and X and even a Y or two. The difficulty, of course, is what happens if/when the numbers get much higher than that, as of course they already are in SFBA.
But if the article, to repeat, doesn't say what the vehicle is, it's functionally useless. I would not want to take, say, a Nissan Leaf on the trips we have taken in our Model S!
Related ...
Tesla Plans to Build a Supercharger with a Drive-In Theater and a Restaurant In Hollywood
The theater/restaurant will have 29 space for Supercharging stations. If it gets built.
jalopnik
Several who have responded to my comment have pointed out the great size and weight of electric batteries. If this hurdle makes swapping them out impractical (or impossible), then that is a technical reason why it could not be done, (which I acknowledged might be the case.)
However, I repeat, the only practical way for electric cars to replace internal combustion powered cars is if such a method for quick power replacement for electric cars is realized. So, this may mean electric cars will never be practical...or someone may find a way to develop smaller, lighter batteries that can be replaced and recharged quickly. Or, a way will have to be developed to quickly re-charge the battery built into the car.(Perhaps an array of smaller, lighter batteries that could be charged and replaced quickly and independently of each other.) Or, a way will have to be developed to quickly re-charge the battery built into the car. If potential solutions along these lines are never realized, then electric cars won't be practical replacements for internal combustion driven cars. Of course, it could be the difficulty in developing practical solutions to the shortcomings of electric cars as they are today is at least partly a result of the of the oil companies. Electric cars were popular over 100 years ago, but their growth--and possible development of improved energy-renewing technology--was stopped dead by the rise of cheaper gas-driven cars.
Or, we could build comprehensive mass transit infrastructure within every town and city, including long-distance speedy trains, and shift away from privately owned vehicles. I never missed having a car in 40 years in NYC.
electric-car-owner-stabenow-says-gas-prices-dont-matter
how would this trip compare to WSJ article writers' ?
do we need any fact check?
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