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Number of Electric Vehicles on Roads Reaches Three Million: IEA (reuters.com)
The number of electric vehicles on roads worldwide rose to a record high of 3.1 million in 2017, but more research, policies and incentives are needed to drive further uptake, the International Energy Agency (IEA) said. From a report: The number of electric cars, including battery-electric, plug-in hybrid electric and fuel cell electric passenger light-duty vehicles, increased by 57 percent compared with 2016, the IEA said in a report. China accounted for 40 percent of the global total last year. Research and development, policy support, charging infrastructure investment and production improvements are resulting in lower battery costs and higher electric vehicle (EV) uptake.
...sold are still on the road? The other 10% made it home.
A vehicle where the fuel is nearly free, goes the same distance, and has 5x the horsepower along with a nearly immortal lifetime due to nearly no moving parts.
What boggles my mind is that this is only happening because of elon musk, they spent decades and millions of dollars holding back electric vehicles for stupid reasons. This revolution should have happened a long time ago.
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Interesting article here with USA vehicle statistics: https://www.nanalyze.com/2017/...
Right now EV's are 0.22% of all cars on the road in the US. I couldn't find a chart that included hybrids.
You mean like the the 5 trillion dollars per year that is subsidizing the fossil fuel industry?
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It depends of your need. In Québec for instance, electricity is very cheap, having a car that do ~50 miles and you can easily commute with it everyday and do all your standard groceries/shopping the week-end. All this with 0 gasoline (gas price is $4.50/gallon here).
A lot of people have a second car with an ICE, like a Grand Caravan or whatever to haul the kids.
EV cars are an efficient means of transportation
"Science will win because it works." - Stephen Hawking
You are full of shit LynwoodLiar. Average range of electric vehicles in China is 103 miles Or 3 times your bullshit number.
Actually a large percentage of electric vehicles are coal powered. Electric is only good for the environment if your electric power comes from non-fossil fuel sources.
It's still more efficient and uses less fossil fuels to produce energy at a centralized location at big plants than it is on-site in tiny little car engines. Sure, electric cars powered from solar power are responsible for less pollution than one's powered by coal plants... but both are less polluting than your average internal combustion engine.
"That's the way to do it" - Punch
It makes tons of sense if you have a place to charge your car at home. Many do not, causing EVs to be more inconvenience than their benefits are worth.
Electric vehicles won't work for everybody (yet); but they would work for most people. The choice for society at this moment in time isn't everyone has to have ICE or everyone has to have EV. There is room for both on the road.
Eventually, especially as technology improves for things like batteries, it would be nice if all vehicles were EV... and with that change charging becomes easier- but for now it's ok that some people who can't get by with today's EVs don't have them. They aren't appropriate for everyone yet.
"That's the way to do it" - Punch
You can have both heated seats and a heated cabin, but it shortens the distance you can travel without re-charging (or the gas engine kicking in in the case of a plugin hybrid). If the range is long enough then it doesn't matter but it's something you need to be aware of. It's also a consideration in hot climates in terms of A/C use.
I have a 2012 Chevy Volt and it's electric range is between 25 and 45 miles depending on a number of factors including weather, driving style, etc. After that the gas engine ("range extender") kicks in. Since and I and most Volt drivers have a strong preference for limiting the amount of time the range extender runs, it becomes kind of a game to see how far we can go on electric only.
What my son and a lot of people will do in hot weather is turn the A/C to max, - he'll set it to 60 or whatever. It drives me nuts because it shortens the range and is totally unnecessary. The climate system does a pretty good job of managing the temp in the cabin if you set it at 72 or 75. And it will be far easier on the range. But for some reason, people like their cars to feel like inside of a refrigerator when it's hot outside.
Same with the heat. There's no reason to set the temp at 85 in the cabin when you're already wearing a winter coat. I dress for being outside and don't need or want it to be 80 inside the car. But like I said before, the Volt will comply and even has the bonus of remote start from the key fob or phone app that will warm the car up before you drive while it's still plugged in.
Cars like the Volt are nice because even if the electric range is shortened below the point where you get all the places you need to be, it has a gas engine to charge the battery and the mileage is still much better than most gas engine cars would get. And I think new EVs (all electric) like the Bolt and newer Teslas have enough range that even if it's shortened in cold weather, it's still adequate.
What if you want to haul 12 foot sheets of drywall in your vehicle and be able to drive 6 kids to football practice when it's your family's turn to drive? Or what if you want a vehicle that gets 50+ mpg and 90% of the time, you're the only one in it?
The answer for a family is probably to have two different types of vehicles, each well suited for certain types of trips while being less suited for others. One vehicle could be a small EV and the other a more traditional gas powered vehicle. Maybe a minivan or SUV. And maybe for certain kinds of things (12 foot sheets of drywall), they'll just rent or pay to have the stuff delivered.
That's what we do. For years we've had a small economy car for the bulk of the trips and a larger vehicle to be used when you need a bigger vehicle.
In your example, most families probably aren't going to "suddenly" go camping in a remote area without electricity anyway. That takes a little bit of planning and if they've got time to plan and are an all EV family, they probably have some disposable income and can find a cheap rental car or borrow one from a friend.