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Except that rather than $20k every 5 years, we're on track for $10k every 15. An amortized $1k/year is less than what I spend on gasoline.

https://www.plugincars.com/tes...
https://cleantechnica.com/2018...

What do you want me to say?

Additional Cites...

As a start, let's just look at what it means to take care of your battery. This means don't charge it to more than ~80% of capacity and don't discharge below 20%.
- This takes the 73 mile range down to 73 X 80% X 80% or 46.7 miles
Next, let's assume that after 7 years, the capacity is expected to be down to 80% of the new, maximum.
- This takes the 46.7 miles down to 46.7 X 80% or 37.4 miles for 'battery-kindness"

http://www.plugincars.com/real...

"Nine bars equates to about 70 percent of remaining capacity--meaning that the effective range of a 2011 Nissan Leaf, originally rated at 73 miles, could be down to something like 50 miles."

http://www.greencarreports.com...

In theory, the range of my Leaf is 83 miles when fully charged. In practice, however, that varies widely depending on where you're going and who is driving. My wife, for example, tends to drive more aggressively than I do and she has experienced somewhat shorter range. Similarly, range drops off significantly when you go on the highway or crank the AC.

https://www.treehugger.com/car...

Battery prices have been falling very quickly for years. They were estimated to be ~$600 per kWh in 2012 and expected to reach $200 per kWh by 2020 and $160 by 2025
http://www.plugincars.com/lith...

We may already be at the $200 level or getting close and *should* beat that $160 level by 2019.

We're already several years ahead of that curve.

From QUARTZ:

The average lithium-ion battery pack has plunged to $150 per KWh from $1,200 per kilowatt hour in 2010, says MIT's Keith. Musk predicted on Tuesday that the Gigafactory could reach $100 per KWh by 2020,

Battery prices have been falling very quickly for years. They were estimated to be ~$600 per kWh in 2012 and expected to reach $200 per kWh by 2020 and $160 by 2025
http://www.plugincars.com/lith...

We may already be at the $200 level or getting close and *should* beat that $160 level by 2019.

Steel cage bodies?? EVs aren't the only ones requiring those.

Don't be too sure. There are a lot of people out there who want a cheaper version of Model S.

Then why don't they buy one? They already exist, yet aren't selling all that many.

Everything from the Leaf to the Volt to the Fusion Energi are options, yet their sales are less than impressive.

How about the BMW i3 or Merc B-Class?

http://www.plugincars.com/cars

It seems like a lot of people think Tesla is the only company doing this, but Tesla plans to sell more Model 3s than almost that entire list combined.

In 2015, 540,000 plug in EVs (including hybrids) were sold in the whole world. Among ALL those vehicles.

Tesla wants to double that number with just one model.

Is it possible? Sure. Is it likely? It sure seems like a very steep curve. But anything is possible.

If you look at this nice little map of supercharger locations https://www.google.com/maps/d/... you will see that where I live in Morgantown, Wv it is farther than 400 miles to the closest existing charger, so while I would love to have a viable electric car, especially a tesla, it is not a possibility here.
Even their projected future rollout would be useless to me. http://www.plugincars.com/site...
While I would technically be within 400 miles we are talking about WV roads. Our average road grade is higher than the worst in almost all other states, which will kill a battery quickly.

1) That's oil that could have been left in the ground or used to produce electricity or some other use.

2) That's almost entirely accounted for. The calculation takes the BTU of a barrel of crude, refining efficiency (~85%) and the BTU of the resulting refined products and converts the difference to kilowatt-hours.

Keep in mind that's only the energy consumption of the refining process. If you do a full "well-to-wheels" analysis of the various energy sources, fossil fuels start to look ugly very quickly.

http://www.plugincars.com/refi...
http://www.eia.gov/energyexpla...

At present, the TCO is about the same because the lower maintenance and fuel costs are offset by the increased up-front cost. And that is with the government tax credits included. A search for electric car TCO gives dozens of articles that seem to corroborate this.

In the long-term, I believe the TCO of electric cars will probably become lower. I'm betting that electric cars will last longer, the maintenance curve will not increase as the engine ages, and that green electricity sources will widen the gap between gasoline and electricity costs. But at some point we will lose the tax credits.

Just so no one thinks I'm cherry picking my search results: Here are the first 6 Google hits (other than PDFs) and they all agree:
http://www.plugincars.com/tota...
http://www.pluginamerica.org/d...
http://tdworld.com/site-files/...
http://www.greentechmedia.com/...
http://www.forbes.com/sites/to...

Most of the results are tepid, arguing things like "hey, electric cars are NOT actually more expensive" or "well, it's about the same long term." but are hesitant to declare a clear winner.

http://www.plugincars.com/tesl... (first result from "tesla battery lifetime").

15% loss by the time you reach 100k miles. Hell, it wouldn't shock me if an ICE car lost that much fuel economy after that much driving,

5-7 years which is ~2-3 times the life of a battery pack

Cut out the FUD, you utter <REDACTED>. You're full of shit, and you either know it or didn't do even a cursory search. First hit for "tesla battery lifetime": http://www.plugincars.com/tesl...

100,000 miles (call it 160.000 KM) is at least eight years of driving for most people. At that point, the battery pack is not only quite functional, it's still got the vast majority of its initial capacity. Yes, the car has lost *some* of its range per charge, but not terribly much.

That's based on 2008 battery technology, too. Science marches ever onward.

I'm not sure to what extent Tesla innovated to create the cars they have, but certainly they made the first EV that people actually wanted to have for reasons other than it being an EV or hybrid.

The Tesla Roadster made electric cars cool, in that it was a car for the ultra-top end market, people who otherwise would be buying a Lotus or Ferrari. So, it was an existence proof that you could make an EV that contended with top-end sports cars.

It was also one of the first mass market EVs that doesn't look like utter crap (the Honda Civic hybrid being the other one).

Actually, Leaf is the top selling EV on the market right now. If you count electric cars with gasoline backup, Volt would be on the list.

Tesla doesn't make a mass-market EV yet; their Model S right now is rather a luxury car rather than something for the average buyer. While I'd love to have one... I don't think Tesla comes anywhere close to being "the first" in the way of mass market EVs. There are a lot of electric cars out there, both mass-market and otherwise.

There are more, but you can't drive the Tesla vigorously and get the range... Even with the 85 kw batteries a lot of owners are reporting 200-250 miles typically without being hard on it with no A/C or heat, which is good but I live in the South and A/C is a necessary evil and I have yet to see any conclusive "real world" testing in either extreme heat or cold situations, both of which reduce range.

Likewise their 20 minute "super chargers" only give you about 141 miles of range, so if you're doing city driving where you plugin at work or at home then it'll be fine but on long road trips you'll be spending quite a bit of time waiting... So a car with a plug is still a car that's tethered.

I'm not saying the car is a bad car, I think it has a few issues to work out and I wouldn't buy one until they figure out their fire issues. Oh and by the way, I also have a Nissan Leaf so I'm not exactly anti-EV.

The maintenance on EVs are negligible, a fact that for instance prompts many Nissan dealers to marginalize, even avoid stocking the Leaf altogether. Wiper blades, alignments, and tires. Check the maintenance schedule on them. There really isn't much to do, it's most just a bunch of inspections. The usable life on Tesla battery packs will easily outlast the average life of an ICE retaining 85% capacity at 100,000 miles.

no. li-ion batteries have 3 main issues:
1) Overcharging will kill them.
2) high power drains.
3) most of all, HEAT. Heat is the bane of li-ion batteries.

With tesla, they avoid all 3 issues. With nissan, they suffer at least 2 of the issues.

For example, both probably keep the overcharging down. However, the leaf is far more likely to suffer from overcharging. The reason is the few numbers of cells that they use that must undergo large amounts of charging. Basically, the leaf has 192 cells, of which they pull and charge from all of the cells in parallel.
OTOH, the Model S has 7000 cells in the Model S 85 KWH pack. What they do not do, is pull from a set of cells at a time, until they are drained down to a certain level, and then go to another set of cells. As such, when you are charging the tesla for nighttime from your average 40-70 miles, you will only charge a fraction of the cells.
Now, another issue is the heat, and this is a big one. Nissan thinks that putting all of the cells in a closed box and then air cooling the box will work for when charging. Nothing could be further from the truth. BTW, you will notice that Nissan is re-formulating their chemistry to handle those high temps. And if you look through my postings from several years ago, I spoke about the fact that I would never want to own a leaf in the south esp. in AZ, southern CA.
OTOH, Model S has cells that are basically AA size, with each one fully monitored and each one individually liquid cooled. That means that each cells is pampered.

And as proof of the situation, the roadsters that have 100,000 miles already, none had more than 19% loss. They are varying between 12-19% loss. And that is with the OLD formula that is not supposed to be as good as what is in the model S. There was ONE roadster that with 149K miles, was down to 50% levels, but he is the only one. It is possible that he abused his car since he is the ONLY one with this issue.

no. li-ion batteries have 3 main issues:
1) Overcharging will kill them.
2) high power drains.
3) most of all, HEAT. Heat is the bane of li-ion batteries.

With tesla, they avoid all 3 issues. With nissan, they suffer at least 2 of the issues.

For example, both probably keep the overcharging down. However, the leaf is far more likely to suffer from overcharging. The reason is the few numbers of cells that they use that must undergo large amounts of charging. Basically, the leaf has 192 cells, of which they pull and charge from all of the cells in parallel.
OTOH, the Model S has 7000 cells in the Model S 85 KWH pack. What they do not do, is pull from a set of cells at a time, until they are drained down to a certain level, and then go to another set of cells. As such, when you are charging the tesla for nighttime from your average 40-70 miles, you will only charge a fraction of the cells.
Now, another issue is the heat, and this is a big one. Nissan thinks that putting all of the cells in a closed box and then air cooling the box will work for when charging. Nothing could be further from the truth. BTW, you will notice that Nissan is re-formulating their chemistry to handle those high temps. And if you look through my postings from several years ago, I spoke about the fact that I would never want to own a leaf in the south esp. in AZ, southern CA.
OTOH, Model S has cells that are basically AA size, with each one fully monitored and each one individually liquid cooled. That means that each cells is pampered.

And as proof of the situation, the roadsters that have 100,000 miles already, none had more than 19% loss. They are varying between 12-19% loss. And that is with the OLD formula that is not supposed to be as good as what is in the model S. There was ONE roadster that with 149K miles, was down to 50% levels, but he is the only one. It is possible that he abused his car since he is the ONLY one with this issue.

You probably won't own that car for 150k miles. You might, but most people don't.

I will. For those who won't -- they recoup most of it as resale value.

Gas isn't $4/gal, and here it is $2.79/gal.

And your car price is $xx.xxx, and the mileage is xx mpg, yet there is still a significant fuel cost markup

Time value of money, the gas has to be paid over time, the car has to be bought up front.

Gas also becomes more expensive with time, we can assume that present value of future gas spending = present price of gas.

If I drive less, I buy less gas.....I probably plan to drive less...

But your car lives longer if you drive less. You will recoup EV markup over a longer time period, that does not affect my formula.

Electricity isn't free

Cost to Drive 25 Miles $0.96

That knocks down the difference from $4 per 25 miles to $3 ($3 to $2 in your case) , but does not make it insignificant.

add in the cost of a new battery.

This is a topic of a separate research, but you might never need to replace one.

It looks like you are not an EV backer, because you forgot to include

1. Tax rebate and

2. Much lower maintenance costs for EV, such as oil changes, etc.

If 25% of gas cars are replaced with EV cars, gas may well get cheaper, electricity may well get more expensive.

This one is my favourite!
2. If Obama builds 25 nuclear power plants, electricity will become dirt cheap.
3. If oil reserves dry out, gas cars will become landfill
4. if WWIII starts, you will get to drive a tank for free, all the way until #3 happens!

The Volt uses the gas engine to power the electric motors which actually drive the car

http://www.plugincars.com/truth-out-above-70-mph-chevy-volts-wheels-powered-directly-engine-90006.html

http://www.plugincars.com/tesla-roadster-battery-life-study-85-percent-after-100000-miles-127733.html

And if you look at what Toyota did with the Prius battery system: they initally sold the car as getting 50 mpg, but they noticed that the battery systems got run down quickly, so they reconfigured the car computer so that the battery systems are used less and thus will last longer. But this decreased usage of the battery system greatly decreases that promised high mileage efficiency. So now the battery lasts longer, but you're not saving as much gas as they promised you would. Some people are just getting a little over 35 mpg, which they could get with a pure combustion engine alone.

I would. And with a long waiting list it would seem I'm not alone. By all accounts the Model S is every bit as "up-scale" and luxurious as any BMW or Mercedes. Oh yeah, and then there's that whole 2013 Motor Trend Car of the Year thing... Who in their right mind would want a BMW when they could have a Tesla for the same price?

Plugin cars are making a lot more sense.

Lots of critics argue plugins don't make economic sense. But looking at the long game ( next few decades ), getting plugins to the point where economies of scale reduces their price is one of the best solutions to this energy problem.

The way I figure it, sizing of the engine will be the trickiest part. Here's what I would do:

1. Figure out how much power you need to get the vehicle to go down the highway at a typical highway speed. I'm thinking 80mph is a good number, you don't want to go too low. A coast down test is the simplest way, but a rolling road wind tunnel would be the best if you can afford it. Remember to have ballast in the vehicle to simulate a fully loaded vehicle.

2. Factor in losses from your transmission type, including generator and electric motors. Plus remember to include power for air conditioning, an alternator and other power accessories you may have.

3. Select an engine. Unless you are having an engine custom made, it's not going to have the exact requirements you need. To save money, you will have to make some sacrifices. Don't forget to factor in what we engineers call "packaging". You will be installing a lot of hardware on to this vehicle and the shape of each component will become critical to ensure it all fits.

Also, it's popular to separate an engine bay into two separate sections if possible. The "hot side" is where the exhaust is. Anything that will be hot enough to fry electronics, or ignite fuel should be located on this side of the engine. The "cold side" is where your air intake is located and any sensitive electronic controllers.

I'm thinking the engine you select should have a maximum power output that is equal to the power required to drive the vehicle at 80mph (see step 1) plus any accessories. Any accelerations, or hills climbing should be performed by relying on your batteries for reserve power. Regenerative braking can be used to make up this power, as well as running the engine at maximum load while the required load to drive the vehicle is low. (i.e. the Volt's mountain mode)

Beware, diesel engines that are approved for gensets must meet different EPA requirements than those in on-road vehicles. While a genset engine is fine for your one-off vehicle, it will not be allowed in a production vehicle.

There are two big things that can help electric cars (does Musk also include plugin hybrids?) 1) like you said, is the cost of gas. It's not going to stay at $3.50 or $4 a gallon, in 20 years, we may well have hit oil's terminal decline phase, and even if not, the cheap stuff is gone. Expect at least $10/gallon in current dollars in 20 years. 2) the cost of batteries. They're going down. Fast. see: http://www.plugincars.com/lithium-ion-battery-prices-drop-160-kwh-2025-123193.html I actually used the 8% growth in energy density claimed above, which brings my price to $220/kWh in 2025 (not $160 like mckinsey claims). At that price, a 100 mile range battery will cost $8000, down from about $20,000 today. By 2032, prices could come down to $4500 for a 100 mile range. This assumes exponential gains in capacity/density/etc, but those gains have happened in the last ~15 years. The big question is whether they'll continue in the future. I'd say we'll get to about $250/kWh before battery scientists slow down, but improvements won't stop. That will get us to some pretty cheap, reasonable range electric cars in 20 years. Basically, the Nissan Leaf will go from $35,000 ($20k for the car, $15k for the battery) to $25,000 ($20k for the car, $5k for the battery) [assumptions: no EV efficiency gains, still 35 kWh/100miles, which is what the Leaf, Volt, and plug in Prius achieve today.]

There were 243 million CFL's sold in the US in 2009. And there were 34 reports of smoke, and 4 reports of fire in a US consumer product safety database from March 2011 through December of 2011 (see this article for more information). Seems like a pretty safe product to me.

In terms of your supposition that CFL's actually cost more than incandecents? Here is a study that says no, In terms of the ACEEE.org study, I can't find specifics (unless you are talking about the 2006 study, which is hopelessly out of date). But electric cars top the ACEEE.org list of cleanest cars this year.

I do not have the money for a car to drive to work and a car to drive longer ranges.

Why would you want to own an internal combustion engine if you don't need to - use your electric car for commuting, and rent a gasoline fueled car (or fuel cell car, or maybe a generator-trailer that you hook up to your own electric car for longer trips)

My commute is around 10 miles by car (12 miles by bike). I choose to bike or take transit, but if I really wanted to drive, a Nissan Leaf would be very practical for my commute, and I have easy access to Zip Car or City Car Share cars when I need something with longer range.

The Nissan Leaf draws 34 kWh per 100 miles, or .34 kWh (340 Wh) per mile. So that number is in the right neighborhood, if a little low.

I meant the big main battery. This says new (level 3 - 480V?) chargers do 80% charge in 20min. How long does it take to reach 30%?
http://www.plugincars.com/quick-charging-plus-better-batteries-equals-mainstream-electric-cars-107844.html

The small 2nd battery gets swapped and charged more slowly. I also don't mean to imply the idea can only be in charging stations. Maybe you want a little extra, and don't want to spend more than 16min at a diner. Any restaurant that can provide a charger can make space for a few batteries. And, it doesn't have to be only one battery. Why not 2?

I guess the important number is the amount of time you save by going through the trouble. I'm too tired to plug in numbers right now, but welcome any :)

The 2011 Chevrolet Volt does NOT have a direct mechanical connection between the engine and wheels.

Not a 'direct connection', but the gas engine does, under certain circumstances, help propel the car.
At least that's what the Volt chief engineer says.

It's the Nordschleife. http://www.plugincars.com/fastest-ev-nurburgring-peugeot-ex1-107128.html

Agreed that apartment living makes things a lit more difficult. This is a recognized problem from manufacturers like Nissan as well.

However, I disagree that public charging stations are restricting potential market to "1%." Statistics released by the federal transportation department show that 80% of people rarely drive more than 40 miles per day. Even allowing for the occasional trip to a relative's house (which is certainly a valid argument) there is surely a number of people for whom a 100 mile range is perfectly adequate - somewhere between 1% and 80%.

For the record, I'd be one of them if I didn't already own a car that was in good repair and gets decent economy (7 years old, ~28 on average.) This car isn't going to last forever and an EV is absolutely an option I'll be considering when that time comes, probably in another 3-4 years.

Anyway. I'm aware a lot of people have reservations about new technologies, especially if there will be a lot of inconvenience if the tech fails... a dead battery in your iPod is not going to get you stranded on the side of the road. So I would expect market penetration to be quite slow at first, until people get more accustomed to what they can do and how they perform. Something like the Volt is a good stopgap here and I recognize that as well, however flawed I think GM's handling of the vehicle design and marketing has been. (I just can't shake the feeling that the Volt will be the FV1 of the 21st century...)

But my point is, from earlier, that rapid-charge (aka "level 3") stations are absolutely not a showstopper for introducing electric vehicles to market. There is still enough people who can get by without them that public awareness will increase. It is not the chicken-and-egg problem some people make it out to be.

And obviously there are some people for whom an electric vehicle will legitimately not be a viable option. But the flip side to that objection is that we all shouldn't be driving semi trucks all the time because we might need it someday. The right vehicle for the right application, and I think a lot of people will be surprised how a current-generation EV will actually suit there needs when they really sit down and work it all out.

FWIW one last thing worth mentioning is that the first real-world test of the Leaf saw 116 miles at 94.9% battery utilization.
=Smidge=

The Prius does not quality for the same rebate as the Leaf because it's not a zero-emissions vehicle. It qualifies for a lesser rebate because it is partial zero-emissions. The Volt qualifies as neither because the requirements are pass-or-fail, and the Volt fails.