AI answer - “An extra electric vehicle battery upgrade equals the cost of filling a larger gas tank when comparing upfront package price differences to repetitive refueling savings, typically breaking even after 3,000 to 5,000 extra miles of driving or 150 to 200 individual charges depending on home versus public electricity rates. [1]”
3 Likes
And true to American corporate culture they attempted to reclaim them all (from owners) and crushed them to get rid of any evidence. Following a Youtuber that is working on one now and the history of that poor car is tragic.
3 Likes
Battery pack costs are approximately $110 per kWh hour, so the larger pack in the U.S. probably adds about $2.2K to the manufacturing cost of the car. Production cost - cost to the consumer may be higher. That is significantly larger than what it costs to increase the size of a gas tank. You’re not earning that back in 3-5K miles.
1 Like
Availability of charging stations depends where you live, and whether you can use Tesla. There is a EA station three miles from my house, and then several more between me and either LA or San Diego. I also have a charge point account.
As the networks build out, availability becomes less and less of an issue.
I would also point out that no tech starts out cheap. It becomes cheaper over time as it is improved, manufacturing improves, etc. In this case, battery tech is advancing, and some may be ready for prime time very soon. Detroit could be spearheading this, but they aren’t. It’s only a matter of time before we have 500+ mile batteries that recharge in 5 minutes. I read the Chinese are really close to achieving that. That will be the final nail in Detroit’s coffin. US automaking will go the way of US textiles and steel and ship building. (You can put these batteries in monster trucks and SUVs, too.). Barring protectionist acts, they will not be able to compete.
1 Like
Sure, but it’s still an order of magnitude lower than gas stations. There’s a gas station within less than a half mile of my house in any direction. Even in the suburbs, there’s a gas station on almost every corner of the half-mile grid.
They were, when it was possible that it made economic sense to do that. Now it doesn’t make any economic sense to do that. So they’re not going to any more.
Again, EV’s are not well suited to the U.S. market. We are a poor fit for that product. You can paper that over with big governmental interventions. But absent those big governmental interventions, they are a small and slowly growing part of our market. By contrast, they’re a massive part of the Chinese market and still a sizable part of the global market, and a tiny part of our market.
Detroit automakers are simply not going to have enough domestic sales to spread big investments in battery or other tech around. They probably never did have enough sales. However, as long as they were getting big subsidies and big regulatory incentives, they could make it pencil out. But without those things? Not very likely.
This doesn’t mean that things will work out well for Detroit. They certainly won’t. But that’s not because Detroit’s making the wrong choice - it’s just that all their choices are bad. The future of cars globally is changing to a new technology for cars that isn’t well-suited for the U.S. market as it’s currently constituted. Our gas prices are too low and our demographics are wrong. Without a whopping big tax on gasoline to get national prices up to the $8.00 per gallon you see in much of Europe, or a huge amount of governmental intervention in the market like you see in China, you’re just not going to see enough EV adoption in the U.S. fast enough for Detroit to have any ability to compete (let alone lead) in this new technology.
The below chart says it all. Even with Tesla (a US based company fully committed to electric vehicles), the U.S. has trailed Europe and China in EV adoption. No S-curve, BTW - linear growth across all markets and not especially fast in Europe or the U.S., suggesting that “ordinary” markets will have slow uptake of EV’s going forward too.
I think Detroit’s probably correct to look at that and conclude that this is not a technology they can compete in now that the U.S. government has quit the field. That’s not a good thing for them, but it’s probably not a dumb choice for them to concentrate on what they can build for the domestic market rather than try to fight the impossible fight against China’s industrial policy unassisted.
3 Likes
Nearest for me is a 22 minute drive from home - and only partially in the direction of employment.
And, of course that assumes it is: 1) working when I get there and 2) has no line.
2 Likes
That’s why Detroit will fail. They don’t think long term. EV is inevitable. I won’t predict when… Could be next year or in ten years. But it will happen. Other markets may benefit sooner from EV adoption, but eventually all markets will adopt. Then Detroit is out of business. Close the plants, fire the workers, out of business. Because they didn’t even try to keep up with the curve; to be ready when that day comes.
Not too dissimilar to their response to Japanese cars in the 70s. Japan almost destroyed Detroit, with Detroit’s help. Now Detroit seems determined to finish the job.
But the CEOs will have their golden parachutes, so I guess it’s all good…
2 Likes
All of that can be true (though I don’t think it is), and it doesn’t mean that Detroit isn’t thinking long term. Or that this isn’t the right move for them.
The US firms suffer from the unavoidable problem that they have the very biggest exposure to the US market. Other than Honda, no one else comes even close to having as many of their sales come from the US. EV’s are a new technology that is not a good fit for their US customers - and because they’ve got the largest US customer bases of any firms on earth, it means that they can’t be leaders in EV development unless the government changes the equation. And now that the government has quit the field, they have to as well.
Note: this doesn’t mean that Detroit is dead, any more than Toyota is dead because it abdicated the electric field to other firms for so long. Ford and GM still have plans to keep a toe in the water, and in the future when the technology has reached the point where it can be appealing to US customers without the need for subsidies they can make the shift then.
3 Likes
One year ago I posted that I wanted to see how easy it was to find a charging station without an app (key phrase being without an app) when we took our annual vacation to Estes Park Colorado. It wasn’t many.
This year there were several more. Not nearly as many as there are fuel pumps, but it has increased. How long before we see bill boards on the highway advertising kwh rates? Like they do for fuel prices.
4 Likes
We can do just fine with Japanese, Korean and Chinese auto manufacturing plants in this country if Detroit doesn’t measure up. But I’d keep the tariffs on foreign-sourced manufacturing.-- keep the jobs and robots here.
intercst
2 Likes
True. But in my ZDX all I do is power-up the built-in NAV system, hit one icon, and I see a list of chargers near-by. Select one and I am routed to it. And if I use that system for my trip driving it will tell me every charging stop I will need to make for the trip, how long at each stop, etc.
I get it, it’s not like looking for a sign at an exit saying “Exxon this exit”. But sheesh, people are making all sorts of excuses of why it “won’t work here”. Just like universal health care.
9 Likes
Agreed! For 90% of drivers, an EV will fulfill their transportation needs. Perceived inconveniences are another thing. This is where better marketing can help.
As for me, give me a PHEV with 600 miles of range, equally split between gas and electric. I’d buy the shat outta that vehicle!
2 Likes
I thought the same thing 5 years ago when I was considering buying a Toyota RAV4 PRIME just before Covid hit and I abandoned the idea with the price increases. But after diving a Tesla Model Y for a year, I don’t see much utility in a PHEV. I’d rather skip the added maintenance of an ICE engine.
It won’t be long before you’ll be able to get a 600 mile battery as an option on a new EV, if you think you need it.
intercst
3 Likes
Shameless plug on my thoughts on this. And no, you don’t need a 600 mile battery. Or a full charge in 5 minutes or less.
2 Likes
You might need 600 mile EV range if you’re in remote parts of Wyoming or Montana, but even there, EV charging facilities are likely improving. A wait of 15 minutes to add another 3 or 4 hours of driving time is fine.
intercst
Yeah, you actually do if you want US consumer buy in.
1 Like
I can work on an ICE engine and would like some assurances for a zombie apocalypse situation. Best case scenario, a hybrid that can plug in, or recharge from braking and wheel turbine generation.
EV is better for a zombie apocalypse. Gasoline expires. Who do you think is going to be refining and delivering new gas? Nobody. But some forms of power generation (like hydro) that will keep spinning for years. (Yeah, I saw a program about that a few years ago.)
Plus, EVs are quiet… Less likely to attract the zombies.
5 Likes
I’d be more worried about an Electromagnetic Pulse in a nuclear exchange. In that event you’d want a 1970’s vintage vehicle with spark plugs and a mechanical distributor. Anything that relies on a circuit board will be fried.
intercst
5 Likes
I mean, that’s not true today. Around a third of Americans live in multi-unit housing (apartments, townhouses), nearly all of which won’t provide opportunities for home charging. Some modest number live in other types of housing that don’t have parking to which charging can be provided. That may change over time. But an EV is rarely going to fulfill someone’s transportation needs if they don’t have access to home charging.
And the inconveniences that come with EV’s aren’t “perceived.” They can’t be fueled quickly. It is more convenient to be able to fuel a vehicle in the space of a minute or two (a retail station will deliver about 8 gallons per minute) than 20-30 minutes. Bill might think it’s just fine to wait that long because he’s happy to do other things during that time, but not everyone is going to agree. And that’s fine - Bill isn’t wrong that it’s not inconvenient for him, but that doesn’t mean that other people will find it not to be an inconvenience for them.
If you forced everyone to switch to EV’s from ICE’s, they’d find a way to deal with it. But since we’re not going to do that here in the US, you won’t get widespread EV adoption unless you meet consumer preferences - what they want their cars to be able to do, given the way they choose to use their cars. And I think Detroit is probably correct in assessing that EV capabilities aren’t a good enough match for American consumer preferences for it to be viable for them to push hard into EV’s at this time, given the lack of governmental action.
Gas is too cheap, and driving distances are too long, for consumers to be willing to make that change in sufficient numbers for a company that relies heavily on American customers to successfully make that jump right now.
6 Likes